New 911 service stores callers’ info before emergencies

Smart911, a free service that gives first-responders more information during emergencies, is now available in St. Clair County, the Emergency Telephone System Board’s members announced Tuesday.

Smart911 provides emergency dispatchers with information about callers at a time when they might be panicked and might not remember essential facts for firefighters, EMTs and the police. Anyone can register at smart911.com.

The board is inviting the public to create profiles about who lives at their residence, including descriptions of their physical characteristics, their medical concerns and pictures, as well as information about pets, building entrances and locations of gas and water shut-offs.

Herb Simmons, the executive director of St. Clair County’s Emergency Telephone System Board, said the more information Smart911 has, the better.

Simmons also recognized people’s privacy concerns and stressed that only emergency dispatchers will have access to the Smart911 profiles. They will be available only when people call in. After 45 minutes, the information disappears from their screens. For it to reappear, callers would have to dial 911 again.

Smart911 uses Symantec to encrypt users' information and does not sell it to third parties, said Randy Randolph, ETSB’s senior 911 information technology analyst.

Users can register their cell, land line and Voice over Internet Protocol, or VoIP, numbers.

Smart911 will cost $300,000 of the $2.4 million bond for Next Generation 911 connectivity funding, which was passed by the St. Clair County Board on Jan. 29, 2014, Simmons said. The $300,000 covers all equipment purchases and a five-year subscription to Smart911.

Ron Schmitz, who lives between Freeburg and New Athens, plans to sign up for Smart911 as a deterrent to crime.

Schmitz visited the Emergency Telephone System Board on Tuesday, to discuss a break-in at his home. On Dec. 7, he saw that the door from his garage to his home was open, and that his belongings had been displaced. When he called 911, a dispatcher warned him not to go inside, but he did, he said.

When police came, they bypassed his house. Now Schmitz plans to install video cameras on the outside of his home and register an account with Smart911. Schmitz doesn’t think people who live in the countryside, like he does, can completely protect themselves, but he views Smart911 as another tool that will help.

St. Clair County received 189,365 calls to 911 in 2014, or about 518 per day.

Randolph said the service can also be helpful in missing-persons reports. When someone goes missing, he said, dispatchers can provide pictures of those missing in the crucial early period after a report, instead of having to wait to get one from family members.

Smart911 debuted in Nashville, Tenn., in 2010, Randolph said. St. Clair is the first county in the metro-east area with the new service. It does not exist in St. Louis.

The closest region with Smart911 is Columbia, Mo., Randolph said, where Chuck Mastalski, a dispatcher there, was recognized Wednesday by the service for using it to successfully help save the life of a man who had previously registered an account and had been unable to breathe.

Smart911 helped the dispatcher as much as the man in distress.

“When you can hear that someone is in distress, but you don’t have the information you need to help them, those are the moments that make this job difficult,” Mastalski told Smart911.

This story was originally published December 15, 2015 at 5:02 PM with the headline "New 911 service stores callers’ info before emergencies."