WASHINGTON COUNTY 911 HAS A NEW NON-EMERGENCY PHONE NUMBER
Washington County 911 has a new non-emergency telephone number as the transition from a city department to a county one is completed. In October of 2014, the Communications Department began transitioning to a county-operated facility; during that time, the non-emergency number remained listed with the city of Brenham.
The current non-emergency number is 979-337-7272. That number is being changed to 979-277-7373. Kristy Taylor, Operations Manager of the Communications Department says “we do want to make sure our residents remember that if they have an emergency, they need to call 911. The non-emergency number of 979-277-7373 is just that – for non-emergencies,”
Taylor said the current non-emergency number will continue to automatically roll over to Communications for 60 days. Calls that come in during the 61-120 day period will be directed to “push 1” to be connected to Communications. Calls that come in from 121-180 days will be given the correct phone number, and then the call will disconnect, requiring callers to dial the correct number. This gives a six month window for residents to become accustom to the new phone number.
Have you tried to get anything done lately in the city of Brenham. I am not surprised that the city of Brenham is so impracticable. I couldn’t get any questions answered in the Planning Department for over a year and decided to cancel my project. Therefore, I am not surprised with this impracticality either.
In today’s age of number portability, the old number likely could have been maintained in addition to a new number, but the other issue that was missed would have been the opportunity to implement a 311 service for residents that would have been easier to remember and simple to implement at the carrier level. Fortunately, it is not too late as this type of service is ultimately terminated on local lines, and 311 is just a carrier level routing short code.
Kudos for expanding and supporting steps to improve constituent interaction for non-emergencies, as this will help in reducing the number of nonurgent calls to 911, but if you are going to take a step forward, take a full step!
I agree! Why change it to something so close to the old that it could easily get mixed up?!
Is there really such a big problem with keeping the old number? Is it such a big deal that it is listed under The City of Brenham? Such a big divide between our City and our County, it is really getting ridiculous.
It makes sense to me. WashingtonCounty residents who live outside the city of Brenham are not served by the city of Brenham, Whereas the residents within the city of Brenham are all Washington county members as well and are also under that umbrella of services. Example , Washington County Ems serves all residents.