Communications

        Without communications, the street officers would not be able to do their jobs. It is absolutely necessary for the officers to be able to communicate with each other and headquarters as well as communicate with citizens who call for assistance. Today's police departments simply could not exist without an effective method of communications.

In yesteryear, before the advent of two way radio communication, police officers used telephones as their main method of communication. The use of telephones, both public phones and private "call-boxes" maintained by the Department allowed the officer to remain in communications with Headquarters. To dispatch an officer to a call, Headquarters would call the officer on the phone and give him his orders. The officer would then respond to the call and take care of whatever needed his attention. He would then go back to a phone and call in his results to Headquarters. Not a very efficient method of communications, but it was all we had at the time.

When portable radios for mobile use became available, patrol cars were fitted with this new-fangled device. Unfortunately the earliest radios allowed only one-way communications from Headquarters to the patrol car. The officer would receive his assignments via radio and respond to the call. When he finished the call he would find a telephone and phone his results in to Headquarters. Ultimately it was possible for two-way communications between the patrol officer and Headquarters.

Technology has improved greatly over the past 30 years. Today we are still using two-way radio communications, however the quality of the radio systems have greatly improved. Our first two-way radio system worked on vacuum tubes and needed to warm up before you could use it. If you left the radio on while you were at a call you were likely to find a dead car battery when you returned to the patrol car.

Today's technology allows us to communicate with a wide variety of people and agencies. Computer technology allows for instant retrieval of driver license and vehicle registration information from any state in the country. Within seconds our officers can find out that the person they just stopped for running a stop sign is wanted in another state for sexual assault for example. Computer technology is allowing us to place laptop computers in our patrol cars that will allow the officer on the street to directly communicate with any other Department or Criminal Justice Agency around the world.

911 Emergency Calls

    Everybody knows (or should know) that the easiest and quickest way to report an emergency is to dial 9-1-1 on the phone. What everybody doesn't know is how 9-1-1 works.

In essence, 9-1-1 is a method of direct connection to local emergency services. When you dial 9-1-1 from any phone in Massachusetts the call is directed to a local public safety answering point (PSAP) depending on the number of the phone being used to place the call. A computer program at the phone company recognizes that a particular phone is being used to dial 9-1-1. That particular call is routed to the PSAP for that geographic area. In Sterling, the PSAP is the Sterling Police Department.

When the 9-1-1 call is received at the PSAP, the number of the phone being used, the owner information and location of the phone are received automatically. The dispatcher who receives the call learns automatically where the call is coming from and who the phone belongs to. This way, should contact be broken with the caller at least that information is available. You might ask yourself, if the location of the phone and owner is known, why does the dispatcher still ask for my name and address? The answer is simple....there may be a programming error in the system, the telephone subscriber information may be incorrect, or you may simply be reporting an incident somewhere other than where you are. The important thing is to verify all the information given. We never assume anything. Assumptions lead to errors.

Cellular phones work somewhat differently. If you dial 9-1-1 from a cellular phone in Massachusetts  the call goes automatically to the Massachusetts State Police. Once they determine where the emergency is occurring, they forward the call to the proper agency. Unfortunately there is no method currently available that will tell us where you are if you are using a cellular phone. That technology is still a couple years away.