LEONARDTOWN, Md. — St. Mary’s County is moving toward a major upgrade to how firefighters and EMS crews are alerted to emergency calls, with officials considering new technology that could provide faster notifications and real-time updates before responders leave their stations.
The St. Mary’s County Emergency Services Board voted Aug. 12 to support a series of recommendations for improving in-station alerting and to send a letter backing the effort to the Commissioners of St. Mary’s County.
The discussion centered on how to better connect fire and EMS alerting systems with the county’s Tyler computer-aided dispatch system.
County officials said the long-term goal is to give responders more complete and updated information while also protecting the county’s primary CAD system from being overloaded.
Faster Alerts, Real-Time Updates
Deputy County Administrator Dave Yingling told the board that one of the options under review could provide pre-alerting, allowing the station responsible for a call to know an incident is coming before the full dispatch is completed.
That could give firefighters and EMS crews additional time to begin preparing for a response.
Officials also discussed moving beyond the current email-based alerting process, which generally sends information only once.
Under a proposed additional connection, updated information — such as changes to an incident location — could be pushed to responders in real time instead of requiring crews to wait until they are in an apparatus and viewing the county’s Tyler CAD system.
County Could Seek $30,000 To $50,000
One of the biggest technical concerns is preventing multiple outside alerting platforms from repeatedly accessing the county’s live CAD system.
Yingling said the county’s IT department is working on a potential solution involving a virtual machine that would essentially act as a separate version of CAD for those systems to access.
That would allow alerting platforms to pull information without constantly pinging the county’s critical live dispatch infrastructure.
Yingling estimated the first phase could require roughly $30,000 to $50,000 and said officials may take a funding request to the county commissioners in late August or early September.
The final amount has not yet been determined.
60-Day Trial Among Recommendations
Emergency Services Board Chairman J.A. Nelson outlined several recommendations developed after discussions with the county’s fire and rescue associations.
Those include continuing the existing Active911 email parser, creating a connection that would allow a 60-day trial of Chief 360 Mobile for county fire and EMS responders, developing more advanced data connections for alerting vendors, and exploring an email connection for existing station dashboards.
Officials also discussed eventually providing standardized alert controllers to fire and EMS stations, with individual departments responsible for additional station-specific equipment such as lights, bells and other alerting features.
Chief 360 has offered the county a 60-day trial at no charge once the necessary connection is established, according to the discussion.
Longer-Term System Could Go Through Competitive Bid
County officials emphasized that no single vendor has been selected as the permanent countywide solution.
Yingling said the longer-term approach could involve issuing a request for proposals for a system capable of meeting 13 alerting requirements previously identified by fire and EMS representatives.
That process would allow vendors to compete and would leave fire and rescue representatives heavily involved in choosing the best solution.
Officials said the county would likely continue supporting existing alerting methods in the meantime while working toward a more standardized system.
The Emergency Services Board ultimately approved a motion to send a letter to the county commissioners supporting the alerting recommendations.
Officials said the more advanced technical work could take weeks or months, depending on funding, staffing and whether the proposed connections can be implemented without affecting the reliability of the county’s CAD system.
Watch the full meeting below.
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