STAMNES, WASHINGTON CO. E-911 RECEIVING NATIONAL RECOGNITION

  

Washington County’s E-911 department and E-911 Director Kristi Stamnes are attaining recognition on a nationwide level.

Stamnes recently served as a committee member to help organize this year’s Association of Public Safety Communications Officials (APCO) Conference, held last month in San Antonio.  The conference had over 4,500 people in attendance and represented all 50 states, as well as the countries of Canada, Great Britain, Jamaica and Australia.

Stamnes said she was honored and humbled to take on a leadership role for the event.

 

Stamnes will serve as the chair for the Texas APCO conference in April 2022 in Galveston.

Last year, the county joined a select few groups in the nation testing out new cloud-based 911 software from Motorola.  Smart Transcription allows for voice audio taken over an emergency call to be transcribed during the call and highlights key words and phrases, while Citizen Input allows citizens to send media such as photos, recordings or videos to dispatchers.  Stamnes said the company invited her to participate in an advertisement to promote the new software, which will launch nationwide at the end of the month.  The advertisement can be seen here.

 

Last week, the county took the first NEXTGEN call for the Brazos Valley Council of Governments (BVCOG).  Stamnes described it as new technology to deliver emergency calls to dispatch centers, also called public safety answering points.

 

In addition to her work as a BETA tester for Motorola, Stamnes has been a 911 instructor for over 20 years, has received Advanced Level certification through the Texas Commission on Law Enforcement and is nationally certified as an Emergency Numbers Professional.  She also started the 911 for Kids program locally to teach children how and when to call 911.

Commissioner Joy Fuchs said under Stamnes’ leadership, Washington County E-911 “has become one of the finest in the state.”