Missouri turns to other states for advice on emergency calls

Intro:	Tennesee's Executive Director of Emergency Communications says Missouri needs to specify district funding to benefit 911 emergency procedures.
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Wrap: Missouri turned to Tennessee's Executive Director of Emergency Communications, Lynn Questell, for advice on ways to improve response time while securing all of the funds that go into each district.

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Description: "By law, and this is so important, any funding that comes into a 9-1-1 district has to be spent exclusively in the operation of the district. And they're audited every year to make sure that anything that goes in for 9-1-1 has to be spent on 9-1-1."

President of Missouri's 911 Director's Association, Lisa Schlottach, says that Missouri is well behind other states, like Tennessee, when it comes to 911 response procedures.

Reporting from the capitol, I'm Alex Goldman.

Intro:	Missouri turns to other state representatives for ideas to improve 911 emergency procedures.
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Wrap: Missouri's Interim Committee held a conference call with Tennessee's Executive Director of Emergency Communications, Lynn Questell, to learn about ways to fix issues surrounding the state's 911 emergency procedures.

Questell talked about alternative ways to report an emergency beyond a simple phone call to 911, such as text messaging. The problem is the cost associated with text messaging and the ability to text 911.

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Description: "Texting to 911 is something that is down the road. Number one, you cannot text to a three digit number. And number two, there are no standards, rules of the road with texting like there are with calls."

Questell says that, in Tennessee, the state charges each cell phone user one dollar per month for 911 call priveledges.

Reporting from the capitol, I'm Alex Goldman.

Intro:	Tuesday morning's Interim Committe hearing reveals Missouri is far behind other states when it comes to 911 emergency response systems.
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Wrap: President of Missouri's 911 Director's Association, Lisa Schlottach, spoke Tuesday offering concerns about Missouri's 911 policies.

Among several other issues, Schlottach highlighted the problem of dispatch not having the ability to tell people what to do while paramedics are on the way. She says emergency medical dispatch needs to be more responsive and able to help on the phone.

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Description: "If you do not provide EMD and you have counties out there that have the equipment in place and everything else, but yet you're not providing, you know, a parent CPR instructions for their baby, but that it would be absolutely necessary that we include that as a call taking process and to be funded."

The committee is to report to the Speaker by Dec. 31.

Reporting from Jefferson City, I'm Alex Goldman.