From my relatively small amount of monitoring since Westport moved to the combined center, it seems like there are still some wrinkles to be ironed out. This has been illustrated during recent brush fires on I-95 requiring mutual aid coordination between Fairfield and Westport who both now dispatch out of this combined center.
Since moving to the combined center, it appears Westport's old conventional P25 dispatch frequency, used by neighboring towns when providing mutual aid, has been un-patched from the Westport Fire dispatch talkgroup on CLMRN and isn't consistently monitored by the combined center…. Or anyone else. Two weeks ago, mutual aid tankers from Wilton and Weston were calling Westport Fire Dispatch in vain for several minutes while enroute to an I-95 brush fire as those towns' engines can’t currently operate natively on Westport’s CLMRN phase 2 talkgroups. The old Westport channel was eventually patched to the appropriate Westport Ops talkgroup so the tankers could communicate with units on scene. Guessing it took some cell phone calls to initiate that.
During another I-95 brush fire today, there were similar challenges with Fairfield and Westport command units attempting direct communications with each other but not realizing channels were not patched. For the first time I’ve ever heard, in years of casual monitoring these two agencies, Westport’s and Fairfield’s FD dispatch channels were patched together … which was .....interesting..... with overlapping engine numbers operating on unrelated calls. Ironically, it sounded like the same dispatcher was dispatching for both agencies during today’s incident, so this wasn’t a showcase of the highly touted efficiencies of the combined center.
I still notice an occasional dispatcher acknowledgement of a fire or EMS unit on the wrong channel or talkgroup but far less frequently than the first week Westport was in the combined center. All of this will undoubtedly sort itself out in time but, for anyone who's been listening, it does provide some evidence suggesting the concerns voiced by the dispatcher union president of inadequate cross training, just prior to Westport move, may well have been warranted.
Other miscellaneous changes since Westport's move for those interested ..... From the sound of the dispatchers' voices, it appears Westport EMS, previously dispatched by PD, is now dispatched by FD dispatchers, and is using similar automated over-the-air dispatching to Westport FD. Unit IDs on CLMRN for the combined center consoles start with 209xxxx. (Of the three towns dispatched from that center, only Westport is currently on CLMRN).
I suppose this also continued to get better once Fairfield gets on CLMRN but I haven't heard much about that plan or timing recently. Anyone?