This posting is intended to establish a hiring pool for future openings in our facility. Interested parties will need to apply tthrough www.elkhartindiana.org under the Human Resources or 911 Communications pages.
Established by city ordinance, the Elkhart City Communications Center dispatches all police, fire and ambulance services within the city limits of Elkhart. The center currently operates with a Department Head, Assistant Department Head, Training Coordinator and 15 full time dispatchers. Communications is staffed 24 hours a day, seven days a week and operates on three shifts, 6:30am-2:30pm, 2:30-10:30pm and 10:30pm-6:30am. The center is typically staffed with 4 dispatchers working each shift; however, minimum staffing does allow them to work with three dispatchers. During peak hours and weekends shifts, the center is normally staffed with four and sometimes up to five dispatchers. This can fluctuate depending on personal vacation time taken, holidays, and time of year.
In 2015, the Elkhart City dispatchers handled 102,499 incoming calls for assistance. The busiest month of the year was August, where dispatchers fielded 10,781 calls.
Elkhart City dispatchers are trained “hands-on” in a 40 hour a week training program by the Training Coordinator. This training involves learning to answer incoming emergency and non-emergency calls, having a working knowledge of the city roads and businesses, and dispatching proper police, fire and ems units to calls when needed. Dispatchers are also required to become CPR certified, and NCIC/IDACS (National Crime Information Center/Indiana Data and Communications system) certified; this gives them clearance to run driving records, criminal histories, FBI checks and Local wants/warrants for a variety of agencies. They are also required to complete a 3 day Emergency Medical Dispatching course that certifies them to give pre-arrival medical instruction on the phone before first responders arrive. Training for new hires generally lasts anywhere from 3-5 months depending on experience and the trainees’ personal abilities.
A typical day in the center is multi-faceted. Dispatchers answer incoming 9-1-1 calls that are placed within the city, all non-emergency and business lines, several direct dial private lines and currently receive cellular calls via a transfer in. The types of calls received can range from someone needing directions, information on parade routes and times, citizens reporting minor complaints and more importantly, 911 calls that require immediate assistance and can be for a variety of reasons such as; fires, burglaries, heart attacks, childbirth, etc. Dispatchers also send police, fire & ambulances’ to emergency calls in the city and many times contact several support agencies for special circumstance calls.
Although our dispatchers do not always know the outcome of an incident, the end goal is to make sure all calls for help are processed quickly, efficiently and with care. The safety and security of our citizens is our priority and all of our dispatchers regularly display this through their quick actions, team work and empathy.
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Applications my be obtained from the Human Resources office on the third floor of the City Building. You MUST specifically ask for a Communications application.
Testing process: All applications received are reviewed by the Director and Asst. Director for completeness and qualifications. Selected applicants are contacted and scheduled for a group testing session. Areas tested are spelling accuracy, short-term memory, multi-tasking ability and basic map reading abilities. Applicant must score 80% or higher on all tests to be considered.
During this session, a brief orientation will be given. This orientation covers: work hours, wages, benefits and department specific issues. Time is also allotted for the applicant to ask questions of the Center Administration.
Depending on the results of the group testing, the applicant may be asked to come back in for the next round of tests. These test are more job related. For example: typing tests, decision making tests and data entry and information retrieval tests.
Based on the second round of tests, the applicants will then be scheduled for an interview with the Board of Safety and Communications Administration. Depending on the outcome of these interviews, the applicant then may be offered a conditional offer of employment.
The City of Elkhart is an Equal Opportunity Employer (EOE). We EVerify.
Job Type: Full-time
Salary: $21.68 /hour
Required education:
- High school or equivalent
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