Monmouth Sheriff’s Office 9-1-1 Communications Center Receives National Recogintion

Monmouth County Sheriff Shaun Golden and Undersheriff Robert Dawson were in Washington yesterday to accept the the Outstanding 9-1-1 Call Center/Program Award from the NG9-1-1 Institute and the Congressional NextGen 9-1-1 Caucus. The ceremony took place at the Rayburn House Office Building.

The Monmouth County Sheriff’s Office 9-1-1 Communications Center serves as a hub for county emergency services and is a blueprint for state of the art communications centers statewide. The award reaffirms the critical importance of 911 services and the hard work, dedication and commitment of the 114 public safety telecommunicators who play a vital role in life saving efforts, 24 hours a day seven day a week.

The call center provides critical services for not only the citizens of Monmouth County, but also the hundreds of thousands of tourists who vacation on its beaches in the summer. The Monmouth County Sheriff’s Office Communications Division processes over 750,000 emergency calls per year. The call center serves as a dispatch for 56 fire departments, 30 first aid squads, and 20 police squads, as well as Brookdale Community College, Monmouth University, Gateway National Park-Sandy Hook, and Naval Weapons Station Earle.

Its primary center is a 45,000 square foot facility with 110 full-time staff members in Freehold. Its backup center is in Neptune. The facilities were upgraded after Superstorm Sandy to prepare for future extreme weather conditions, and they can now operate in a category 5 hurricane.

The center was also be recognized on Wednesday for its scaling of its IT systems in a fee-for-service model to assist local communities whose response systems may be antiquated and who may not have the resources to upgrade their own systems. By operating as a central command center, the call center also allows local communities to communicate with each other during a large-scale crisis.

“At some point in our lives, each of us has or will turn to our first responders in emergency cases,” Congressman Chris Smith said. “It is paramount that the response be prompt and diligent. I am so proud of Monmouth County’s 911 call center for being a top center in the country for serving our communities with excellence in their moments of greatest need.”

“Thank you to the NG9-1-1 Institute for recognizing the efforts and results of our great team at the Monmouth County 9-1-1 Communications Center,” Sheriff Golden said. “A special thanks to the Monmouth County Board of Chosen Freeholders and to all of our partners we serve under shared services agreements. It is their vision and cooperation that allows us to save lives with the best available technology being deployed by the best trained operators in the world, while saving tax payers millions of dollars annually.”