Broward calls last-minute meeting to talk about taking 911 services out of control of Sheriff’s Office

Broward commissioners will take the first step next week to break away from the Sheriff’s Office os the operator for 911 services in the region.

A meeting is now scheduled for 10 a.m. Tuesday at the county governmental center in downtown Fort Lauderdale.

County leaders say they will hear updates from county administration about what happens next, and discuss their options, which can include hiring an in-house director of 911, or hiring a private firm to take it over.

The already strained relationship between the Sheriff’s Office and county commissioners took a new turn last month when Sheriff Gregory Tony refused to sign a three-month contract extension. When the New Year’s Eve deadline passed, county leaders said the contract was considered severed.

The 911 system is owned and paid for by Broward County government, but is operated by the Broward Sheriff’s Office. The system has been beset with problems, from technological gaps to staffing issues that cause delays when callers try to get through to a 911 operator. There have been repeated cases of callers who say when they call for help, nobody answers the phones, sometimes with dire results.

On Sunday, County Administrator Monica Cepero wrote Tony, saying the agreement has ended and asked for a meeting this week “to plan for an orderly transition of the operator function.”

On Wednesday, county leaders confirmed no meeting between the two has happened or even been scheduled.

The Sheriff’s Office has declined to comment on the termination of the contract, and would say in a prepared statement only that “the dedicated men and women of the Broward Sheriff’s Office Regional Communications Division continue to answer 911 calls and non-emergency calls.”

The county had been scheduled to discuss the 911 emergency at its Jan. 24 meeting, but the hastily called workshop for next week will allow a head-start to hear “from administration on what their recommendations will be, and discuss how we move forward,” said Mayor Lamar Fisher.

He said the 911 operators will be moved under county control, and not the Sheriff’s Office, so any private management firm would start working with the same employees.

“That would be the intention, to move those employees right over,” he said. He said he had hoped Tony would have agreed to a contract extension but “it didn’t occur” and the county still has to provide the 911 services. “We can’t sit back, we have to move” forward.

Commissioner Steve Geller said he’s still hoping Tony reconsiders. But if he doesn’t, the public won’t see a change: “The people taking the phone calls will continue to be the same people, operating at the same locations, using the same equipment.

“It’s just that their paychecks won’t have a Sheriff seal on it, it will have a county commission seal.”

The Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Public Safety Commission, the panel created to investigate the school shooting, had already asked Broward County to hand over its troubled 911 system to the Broward Sheriff’s Office to fix its issues.

This week, the chairman of the commission said he hoped the situation gets resolved “with finality,” especially because it’s been discussed for nearly five years.

“It is unfortunate that discord continues to permeate public safety services between Broward County government and the Broward County Sheriff,” said Pinellas County Sheriff Bob Gualtieri, the chairman of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Public Safety Commission. “These emergency communications concerns should have been addressed long ago because they are not new issues. … Public safety is a government function and a single governmental entity should be responsible for emergency communications, not a private ‘vendor.’ “

When asked whether the commission will be involved in any way going forward, he responded that was “to be determined.”

Lisa J. Huriash can be reached at lhuriash@sunsentinel.com. Follow on Twitter @LisaHuriash