An expert report examining Cincinnati's emergency communication center found many improvements have been made since the death of Kyle Plush, but management and morale remain problems that are hurting employee retention.
The production of this report was part of a $6 million settlement the family of Kyle reached with the city in April.
The family sued the city after police and 911 center workers failed in 2018 to rescue the teen, who died after he became trapped under the seat of the minivan he drove to school.
Plush used his phone's voice commands to call 911 from the parking lot of Seven Hills School, but help never arrived. The subsequent investigations found critical problems with obtaining and conveying Kyle's location to police on the ground. These problems branched into training, technology and procedures.
As part of the settlement, the city pledged to make more improvements to the 911 center and spent $250,000 to hire three outside experts to look at the city's 911 operations. The settlement stipulates that improvements recommended by the experts must be made.
The 47-page report makes 16 recommendations, and many relate to management-employee relations and morale.
"Morale remains a major issue in the center, so the ECC can’t hire its way out of a staffing shortage," the report states. "Until it addresses the core reasons why people are leaving, the ECC will never be able to hire enough people to become fully staffed."
In 2020, five employees resigned and three transferred to other departments. In 2021, 12 resigned and four transferred to other departments.
A recent voluntary survey of the employees received responses from about 30% of the staff. Of those who responded, 76.5% said they had recently considered leaving the emergency communication center.
The survey then asked if they considered leaving due to difficulty with leadership, PTSD/burnout, financial reasons or a lack of advancement opportunities. More than 46% responded "all of the above."
The report said frequent changes in leadership contribute to the problem along with managers who spent more time working on big initiatives rather than spending time on the floor with the employees.
"Many employees reported that they have seen more directors than they have years of service," the report states. "The continuous change has led to feelings of mistrust and confusion, and been a contributing factor to many of the issues that have plagued the center for years."
The report said the center needs to become "people-driven" with a focus on mental health instead of being a "task-and-results environment." It also recommended the hiring of a second operations manager, so there would be a manager for the day shift and night shift.
Overtime also appears to be another escalating issue for employees.
"In 2020, the ECC implemented mandatory overtime 65 times. No person was mandated more than a few times," the report states. "In the first eight months of 2021, mandatory overtime has been used nearly a hundred times, and multiple people have been mandated five times or more."
The final recommendation also includes some tasks that focus on the technology and procedure issues that hampered call takers from obtaining Kyle's location.
According to the settlement, there will be oversight of the emergency communications center for the next five years.
The Cincinnati City Manager's Office issued a statement about the report stating the recommendation will be studied and incorporated into the ongoing improvement projects.
"The ECC has come a long way since its restructuring in 2018, with advancements in technology, training, and hiring practices," the statement said. "The goal is to become the best metropolitan 911 center in the country with exceptional service delivery, innovation, and the prioritization of the mental health of ECC workers."
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