By LESLIE EIKLEBERRY
Salina Post
Tucked away in the Kansas Highway Patrol Troop C Headquarters building in Salina is a room that is a beehive of activity.
From that room, communications specialists with KHP's Troop M provide dispatch services for most of the state 24/7. The site in Salina dispatches for KHP for the entire state with the exception of the Turnpike and the state capitol.
"The police officers that are there, they have their own dispatch center as well, however at midnight and overnight, we take over operations for them," said Lieutenant Alex Taylor, who oversees the central communications operations for Troop M.
While much of their communications are over the radio, the dispatchers also field thousands of telephone calls from other law enforcement agencies and the public, including calls to the Kansas State Department of Education's school safety hotline.
With all of that, the communications specialists keep quite busy.
Since Jan. 1, the communications specialists have handled more than 4,317,000 radio transmissions and phone calls, Taylor noted. In 2020, they dealt with 309,103 incidents from across the state, he added.
Brian Walter, a public service administrator who has worked for the KHP for 19 years, reiterated that the communications specialists stay busy.
"Just on one day of this month (March 2021), for a 24-hour period, we averaged 980 phone calls," Walter said.
The Salina dispatch center employees 49 people, including seven supervisors. Taylor noted, however, that the dispatch center also has 13 open positions.
From a few years to many
Some of the communications specialists have been with KHP for more than 20 years, while others have been with the dispatch center for only a few years.
"You know, it's not uncommon to have people who do this for a career and want to be here for 10 to 20 or longer years," Taylor said.
"The unique thing about KHP is that it is very much like a family here," Taylor added. "There is a lot of commitment here and a lot of unspoken things that keep people drawn to this, plus, you don't come into this profession without wanting to help people. And there is a purpose behind it, and I think people see that and they value that greatly."
Derek Lathan, a Communications Specialist II, said he came to the KHP because he was unhappy where he was and needed a different job.
"I kind of just ended up here and ran with it," he said.
That decision proved to be a good one, as Lathan has now been with the KHP for 22 years. When asked what he liked best about his job, he replied, "All of it."
"From the start it's always been intriguing to me. I like the camaraderie with the troopers and the one-on-ones with them. Running the traffic, the end-of-the-day result, especially if you've spent most of the day trying to hunt down information on a subject or incident," he said.
Lathan also said he enjoyed being a part of the finished process from start to finish.
"I hate it when a car chase starts at shift change and you lose out on it at shift change because it is time for you to go home," Lathan said and laughed.
"It's just great being on this side of law enforcement rather than being on the uniform side of it, and I did try that out also, but I just wasn't physically cut out for it. I got a little bit of an injury so I came back to dispatch and haven't looked back since," he said.
Lathan said that the most challenging part of his job has been learning the troop areas.
"I was born and raised here in Salina," Lathan explained. "We dispatch the entire state for the highway patrol from here. For me it was learning a lot of areas that I'd never been to or never frequented a lot."
Now that he's learned the areas, they seem familiar to him when he does happen to travel there, he said.
For Nikki Miles, the path to a career as a KHP communications specialist, began with a suggestion from a former supervisor.
"Actually, I had never heard of the highway patrol. I was working at Raytheon Aircraft in the administrative office and my supervisor used to be a dispatcher. Our department was getting laid off and she said 'I think you'd be really good at dispatching.' And I'm like, 'really? What does a dispatcher do?'" Miles said and laughed.
The woman explained to Miles about dispatching, but Miles said that initially, she was reluctant to pursue a dispatching job because it sounded stressful and she saw herself as being soft-spoken. But the idea stuck in her head, and when she saw an ad for a dispatcher opening with KHP, she applied. That was nearly 20 years ago and she is now a Communications Specialist II!
Over the years, Miles, like other dispatchers, has had a chance to meet some of the troopers with whom she communicates over the radio or by telephone. She said the troopers never look like she imagines they do while she is talking with them over the radio, but their voices are the same.
"I think it was the first time I ever met a trooper, they had come in and they were standing behind me, and I could tell by just them talking," who they were, Miles said.
Dispatching for the Kansas Highway Patrol is both challenging and rewarding, Miles said. While some days are stressful, others are not; and for those stressful days, there is support and the dispatcher team in place to help.
"We seem to be a pretty good group. Like if we have a critical incident or something major is going on, the teamwork is there and that's comforting to know that you've got people behind your back helping you out," Miles said. "The teamwork is just awesome."
A love for the job and for helping
Megan Rogers, a Communications Specialist I, who has been with KHP for a little over a year, said she had always wanted to be a dispatcher.
"I love that we help people. They call in and we can get them the help that they need as fast as we can," Rogers said. "We can help them with day-to-day road conditions, weather conditions, that sort of thing, and also in their worst moments when they're in an accident or someone's hurt, we can get them help."
And while the job isn't what Rogers thought it would be, she wouldn't trade it.
"It's not what I thought, honestly, but it's way better," Rogers said. "I love my job. I love what I do. I love the environment. I love everybody that I work with. I think it's awesome!"
Rogers said that she considered dispatching for the Kansas Highway Patrol a career choice, not just another job.
Like Rogers, the ability to help is important to Maggie Studt, a Communications Specialist who has been with the KHP for six and a half years.
"I kind of wanted to help keep the roads or Kansas a little bit safer and I knew I couldn't be a trooper, so this was a way that I could do that," Studt said. "I thought it was kind of interesting, something different that was out of my box. I had always done office work and I wanted to try something different."
No typical day
While Taylor and a number of the communications specialists reiterated that no two days are the same, there are some steps that are taken daily, Taylor explained.
The communications specialists work on three shifts: daytime, evening, and midnight. The calls and incidents, however don't take a break for the shift changes, so it is imperative that communications specialists beginning their shift communicate with those going off-shift, Taylor said.
"The incoming dispatcher first meets with the dispatcher he/she is relieving to find out whether there are any calls that are ongoing," he said.
Likewise, as troopers go on and off duty, they are required to call in and check out with dispatch, Taylor added.
Once the incoming dispatchers are up-to-speed on current activity, they log into all of the various criminal justice information systems that they will need during their shifts, as well as the system they use to keep track of every call and the events that occur during it.
"From there, they have a phone line that is constantly getting calls, not only from troopers, but also from citizens across the state for their needs," Taylor said. "It's a dispatcher's job to determine exactly what those needs are and then relay them to the appropriate people. Throughout all this time, they're also receiving traffic calls or calls of accidents from other counties and other agencies, and they're multitasking and managing the processes of where do these calls need to go? How do they need to be routed? Which ones are of highest priority and urgency? Obviously looking at human life as the No. 1 priority and the goal is to preserve that."
Becoming a KHP communications specialist
Dispatching isn't for everyone. Likewise, everyone isn't qualified to be a dispatcher.
For those who are interested in dispatching for the Kansas Highway Patrol, there are a number of steps to complete, according to Nicole Ascher, a staff development specialist with Troop M.
"It takes a couple of months just to get through all the steps and make sure everything is clear in the background," Taylor added.
Those steps are as follows.
1. Employment application submitted. Those applications can be found at kansashighwaypatrol.org.
2. Typing test
3. Panel interview
4. Conditional offer of employment
5. Vision test
6. Hearing exam
7. Physical requirements review
8. Fingerprints
9. Background investigation (process typically takes four-six weeks to complete)
10. Psychological exam and interview (process typically takes one-two weeks to complete)
11. Final offer of employment
12. Newly hired communications specialists undergo at least one week of classroom training and at least eight-12 weeks of on-the-job training to become proficient dispatchers.
Area assignments
Once someone is hired as a communications specialist, he or she is assigned a "home troop."
"This is assigned to you partly by what's needed. It's also based off of your skill set and what's demonstrated through your basic class," Taylor explained. "We evaluate you during that time. If you're having a harder time, we may put you on a troop that's a little more forgiving or has a little bit less activity. Whereas, if you come in with some experience, maybe you've been a dispatcher before for another agency and you come in, we may put you on a busier troop."
Taylor said there are tests involved to make sure a communications specialist knows "who the troopers are who are working that area, the roads that are in those areas, the chain of command that is in those areas, and so forth. Once you complete it, then you're given some time on that troop."
"From here, there's seven different troops that are dispatched all from this location, and so there's seven different locations you could learn to work. You don't ever take a troop unless you've learned that area," he said.
Ideally, there are two dispatchers per troop working at the same time, however, other dispatchers who are proficient in multiple troop areas can also help out when needed, Taylor said.
"The nice thing about centralized dispatch like we are is the fact that if there is only one person on a troop, another person from another troop can help out. If there's a major incident, everybody works as a team. Everybody pitches in because there are so many steps that happen, like for a pursuit or for a fatality accident or an injury accident. There are so many calls that need to be made, so many messages that need to be sent. There's a lot of help down there," Taylor said.
"It's a good profession," Taylor added. "It's got good ethics and morals behind it. And it's a service-oriented position. For those people that really want to be a part of something bigger than just themselves, this is a good place to work."