‘Help, Officer, My Souffle Is Falling . . . ‘: Non-Emergencies Clog 911 Lines

Want the weather forecast? Call 911. Your toilet’s broken? Call 911. Can’t remember your senator’s name? Call 911.

Why not? Everyone else seems to be--to the chagrin of emergency officials nationwide.

Since its debut 24 years ago in the little town of Haleyville, Ala., the 911 emergency telephone number has become a nearly universal distress signal. About 75% of Americans now can dial those three easy digits to summon police, firefighters or medics.

But people are dialing for a lot of other reasons too. Each year, more and more non-emergency calls clog up emergency switchboards, stealing operators’ precious time and threatening the safety of those with true emergencies. Non-emergency calls account for 25% to 50% of all 911 calls in many U.S. cities, officials say.

“We’re the victims of our own success,” said Capt. Randy Tibbs, director of emergency communications in Seattle. “The whole focus over the years has been, ‘Call 911 for everything.’ ”

The calls range from amusing to downright bizarre, as a recent sampling shows:

A 6-year-old San Diego boy called 911 because his brother took one of his toys. Last November, a bright display of northern lights sparked dozens of 911 calls from nervous Midwesterners. In Arlington, Tex., police rushing to a 911 call found the house empty except for a Lhasa apso named Ginger sitting by the phone.

Though it is rare for callers to get a busy signal when dialing 911, tying up emergency lines with non-emergency calls poses an obvious danger. Lost seconds can be deadly.

“There’s a saying among 911 people that the most important phone call you have to answer is the one that’s waiting,” Tibbs said. “Of 10 calls, the first five may be non-emergencies. But the sixth call is a guy calling about his wife having chest pains, and the ninth guy’s house is on fire. Answering them quickly can literally make the difference between life and death.”

Another danger of 911 overload was revealed in a 1987 Justice Department study. It said many police departments are turning into “dial-a-cop” operations, reacting to whatever comes in instead of preventing crime. In many cities, the report said, drivers locked out of their cars get a quick response while homicides go uninvestigated.

If there’s a bright side, it’s that such problems show how firmly 911 has established itself as a modern-day SOS. Life-saving 911 calls have been placed by 3-year-old toddlers, and a Minneapolis study showed 99% of adults there knew they could dial 911 for emergencies. The number even has its own TV show--”Rescue 911,” a CBS series that re-enacts real-life emergencies.

The original idea behind 911 was simple enough: A minute or more can be shaved from response times if a panicked person can remember a simple, three-digit number instead of fumbling through a phone book for the proper fire, police or ambulance number.

But 911 really took off in the late 1970s, as computer technology made “enhanced 911” readily available. With enhanced 911, every caller’s phone number, name and address flash on a computer screen, allowing rescuers to respond quickly even if the caller can’t speak or doesn’t know the address.

That feature alone has saved many lives--such as that of a disabled and partially blind Detroit man who fell in his home last August. The 76-year-old man couldn’t reach food or help for three days, and when he finally crawled to his phone, he was too weak to talk, police said. Enhanced 911 allowed rescuers to find him easily.

Today, virtually all U.S. cities over 100,000 in population have 911 systems, most of them enhanced, said William Stanton, executive director of the National Emergency Number Assn. About 25% of the nation’s land area now is served by 911, with more small towns and rural counties adding systems every month, he said.

When 911 first becomes available in an area, the problem typically is getting people to switch from the old seven-digit numbers for emergencies, Stanton said. But after three or four years, few people remember the seven-digit numbers, or even know where to look them up. (They are usually buried with other government numbers in the phone book.)

Some cities have tried scolding callers who phone 911 with non-emergencies, telling them to call the seven-digit number instead. But that only wastes operators’ time and angers callers, as officials in Richmond, Va., discovered.

“All we were doing was getting them off one line and putting them onto another in the same communications center,” said Leo Godsey, Richmond’s emergency communications supervisor. “It saves us time to just go ahead and answer their questions.”

In Dallas, officials encourage people to call 911 for all police and fire business, emergency or not. That lets professionals, not the public, decide whether something is an emergency. Also, directing all calls through the enhanced 911 number identifies callers who would rather be anonymous.

“If it’s a crank call, we can track it right back to the caller.” said Dallas police Sgt. Jim Chandler.

But such a wide-open approach is rare.

“That kind of attitude will eventually bog them down,” Stanton predicted. Instead, he urges emergency officials to use advertising campaigns and community meetings to remind people to call 911 only when they want an immediate response from officers or rescuers.

Such education helps especially in low-income, high-crime neighborhoods, which typically make up about 15% of a city’s population but generate 85% of all 911 calls, Stanton said.

Simply by reminding people that non-emergency police and fire numbers still exist, Seattle officials have boosted calls on those lines, Tibbs said.

But he concedes that the root of 911 overload is harder to reach. Especially in high-crime neighborhoods, a house on fire or a gunman at the door is not required to produce a feeling of crisis. Everyday life is enough. Chronic problems, such as drug dealers or prostitutes on the street night after night, can make people call 911 out of sheer frustration.

“Drug-dealing in a neighborhood can generate an incredible number of 911 calls,” Tibbs said. But such problems need preventive police work, he said, not a 911 quick fix.