Kare11
Mpls. 911 Center ramps up hiring amid staffing shortages
The Minneapolis 911 Director says new hires and technology may help improve call answering times.
MINNEAPOLIS — The Minneapolis 911 Center is ramping up hiring and adding new technology this year to bolster staffing and improve answering times, which currently fall short of federal guidelines set by the National Emergency Number Association (NENA).
According to Minneapolis 911 Director Joni Hodne, the department currently has 45 call-takers and dispatchers out of 69 authorized positions. In a city council committee meeting this week, Hodne attributed these staffing shortages to slower answering times. In August, data showed that Minneapolis 911 only answered 76 percent of calls within 10 seconds, below NENA’s standard of 90 percent.
However, Hodne told KARE 11 on Friday that as many as 16 new staff members will be joining her team by the end of the year.
“Once we start to get them up and going, and completely trained, [we hope] that number will go back to the 90-percent range that we would like to see of answering those calls within 10 seconds or less,” Hodne said in an interview. “The past few years have been very difficult. And I think we’re in kind of a rebuilding mode right now.”
To improve response times, Hodne’s department is also implementing innovative technology to ease the burden on call-takers. That includes a new system for calls coming from alarm companies, which will connect the companies directly to dispatchers — thereby eliminating the need for the call-taker. Hodne said that technology, which will be live by the end of 2023, could save as many as 30,000 to 40,000 calls per year for call-takers. Currently, the 911 center in Minneapolis fields about 600,000 calls per year.
Hodne said her staff is also working on new technology for automatic callbacks in the event of accidental hang-ups, which could free up call-takers for other duties.
“With the staffing shortages, we’re looking at anything that we can to think outside the box,” Hodne said.
Hodne and other 911 professionals are also pushing for legislation that would upgrade the classification of call-takers and dispatchers to first responders, which would help bolster their mental health and retirement benefit options.
April Heinze with the National Emergency Number Association urged Congress to move forward with that legislation.
“Today, the federal government currently classifies 911 telecommunicators as clerical or receptionist. Unfortunately, clerical and receptionist-type classifications don’t receive the same level of pay as our protected-services classifications do,” Heinze said. “They don’t receive the same types of benefits like mental health and wellness, worker’s comp for PTSD… these are all issues that our 911 professionals do suffer from.”
Just last month, a bipartisan group of lawmakers also wrote a letter to the National Telecommunications and Information Administration, asking the agency to “follow Congressional intent in the creation of a plan for a competitive grant program to provide 911 call centers and agencies with resources to help 911 professionals address critical training needs.”
In Minneapolis, Joni Hodne said the 911 Center boosted pay for their staff last year as well to help retain employees. A call-taker currently starts at about $30 per hour.
“The staff right now, we’ve been running short for quite some time. After the pandemic and the civil disturbance in Minneapolis, it’s been difficult to get recruitment,” Hodne said. “The staff that is here right now is working long hours. They’re amazing. But we’re trying to get more people in here.”
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The former state trooper is charged with the killing of 18-year-old Olivia Flores.
ROCHESTER, Minn. — Editor’s Note: The above video first aired on 8/26/2024.
The former Minnesota State Patrol trooper charged with the killing of an 18-year-old girl is asking for his case to be dismissed and a change of venue for it to be moved out of Olmstead County.
The former trooper, Shane Roper, and his attorney argue that the “extensive and regional media coverage” jury pools are likely tainted and a fair trial could not be conducted in Olmstead County.
According to a criminal complaint, Roper was driving 83 miles an hour, full throttle with his lights and siren off when he sped through the busy Rochester intersection by the mall and slammed into 18-year-old Olivia Flores.
Records show he’d been suspended twice and reprimanded twice more for similar behavior.
The order from Roper’s attorney also asks the court to preclude the introduction of any evidence related to prior speeding or traffic incidents involving Roper.
Roper and his attorney are asking for charges 1-8 to be dismissed for “lack of probable cause.”
Kare11
‘This doesn’t change anything’ Biden apology for Native American boarding schools draws mixed reaction
For the very first time, a sitting President has apologized for boarding schools that tore Native Americans apart and led to countless cases of abuse and death.
MINNEAPOLIS — During his first presidential visit to Indian Country on Friday, Joe Biden delivered a historic and emphatic apology, acknowledging 150 years of abuse, trauma and death inflicted by Native American boarding schools.
“I formally apologize, as President of the United States of America, for what we did,” Biden said. “It’s one of the most horrific chapters in American history,” said President Biden.
Christine Diindiisi McCleave, former CEO of the National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition, spent years documenting the stories of boarding school survivors and advocating for justice and accountability by the US leaders.
“My family has two generations of boarding school history that I know of,” McCleave said, during an interview for the KARE 11 Series “Lost History,” which detailed the impact of boarding schools in Minnesota.
During his speech on Friday, President Biden acknowledged the work of the Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition and efforts to better understand the horrors and generational trauma the schools inflicted.
“Generations of Native children stolen, taken away to places they didn’t know,” Biden said. “Children abused emotionally, physically and sexually abused, forced into hard labor, some put up for adoption without the consent of their birth parents. Some left for dead in unmarked graves.”
Christine Diindiisi McCleave: “I struggle with what I’m supposed to say and what I really feel.”
Kent Erdahl: “Why do you say that?”
McCleave: “Well, because today is historic and while I am grateful to see this progress being made. I am also realizing just how short it falls… from real reparations, from real healing.”
She knows she’s not the only one who feels that way. The National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition surveyed survivors in 2016.
“The thing they wanted the least was an apology because, while it is an acknowledgement, it doesn’t change anything,” McCleave said. “The majority of them said they wanted a truth commission. Trying to find out exactly how many boarding schools existed, how many children went to those boarding schools and how many children died at those schools.”
She says an investigation led by Interior Secretary Deb Haaland, whose grandparents and mother were among those sent to these schools did help better understand that impact, but it only scratched the surface.
“They were only able to investigate the Federal Government’s records,” McCleave said. “Half of these schools were run by churches, of various denominations, and so a truth commission would be able to look into those records as well.”
“Nearly one thousand documented Native child deaths, though the real number is likely to be much, much higher,” Biden said on Friday.
Bills in both the House and the Senate could make that commission a reality, but until that happens, Christine says she can’t ignore the politics of an apology that took place in a swing state, just days before an election.
McCleave: “This apology doesn’t change anything for my mother, who was abused as a child. Of for my grandfather who was a abused at a Catholic Indian Boarding School.”
Erdahl: “Do you hope that this isn’t just an election ploy?”
McCleave: “I hope that this apology actually helps that bill get passed. Native American people are no stranger to being political pawns, so you know what, if this is an election ploy so be it, I hope something good comes out of it.”
Researchers spoke about increased THC potency and the impact on youth brain development.
ST PAUL, Minn. — Whether purchased from dealer or dispensary, weed has become more potent over the years. In 2022, the federal government reported THC levels more than tripled since 1995.
Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation Graduate School addressed this Friday at its first cannabis summit. Attendees primarily included the nonprofit’s graduate students as well as undergraduate students from nearby universities.
Speakers included researchers from the University of Minnesota, Hamline University, Mitchell Hamline School of Law and others.
Ken C. Winters, is a senior scientist at the Oregon Research Institute’s Minnesota location and a consultant for the University of Iowa’s Native Center for Behavioral Health.
He covered the interplay between youth, cannabis and health.
“It’s not your grandparents’ marijuana these days,” Winters said to the students.
The Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation Graduate school offers a 2-year program, in which students like John Ryan and William Barksdale are earning counseling degrees in substance use and mental health.
“The takeaway would be that you’ve seen potency levels increase quite a bit, and the research is trying to keep pace with that,” Barksdale said.
“As we saw today, marijuana use has gone up in the last couple years such that it’s eclipsed alcohol use in terms of daily users in the United States,” Ryan added. “It’s is much more concerning now because there is such a higher degree of potency that’s available on a wider basis.”
Ryan says it’s especially concerning for youth.
“The subject of the last presentation, which I found quite engaging, was the specific effects on adolescents,” he said. “So, teenagers and people within that young adult range, the 18 to 25-year-olds because that’s generally the period the most brain development takes place. So that’s the area of concern … but it’s still something that I think is being studied and being observed in the first stages of that.”
Kevin Doyle provided opening remarks. He has more than 35 years of experience as a licensed professional counselor. Today, he’s president and CEO of the grad school.
“Potency, dosage, frequency of use, availability, legal cutoffs in terms of age, all those things need to be talked about,” Doyle said. “Adolescent brain development. We know more and more about that every year. Sometimes it seems like every day we learn more about that.”
“How do we as a treatment community need to be prepared to respond?”
The summit comes as Minnesota works to set rules for the cannabis industry after legalizing the drug for recreational use last year. A public comment period is expected later this fall.
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