8 1
4 1
City Council
Staff Report
From: City Manager
Report Type: CONSENT CALENDAR
Lead Department: City Auditor
Meeting Date: October 20, 2025
Report #:2509-5168
TITLE
Approval of the Dispatch Center Assessment Report as Recommended by the Policy & Services Committee.
RECOMMENDATION
The Policy & Services Committee and Office of the City Auditor recommend City Council approve the Dispatch Center Assessment Report.
BACKGROUND
Baker Tilly Advisory, in its capacity serving as the Office of the City Auditor (OCA), was tasked with performing an assessment of the City's Public Safety Answering Point (PSAP) or Dispatch Center as part of the FY2024 Annual Audit Plan. The purpose of this assessment was to provide information requested by the Palo Alto Police and Fire Departments on Dispatch Center performance. This assessment answers specific questions posed by the City and is considered a non-audit service.
ANALYSIS
The objective of the Dispatch Center Assessment was to:
Gather information about the dispatch center’s performance, and Evaluate the center’s staffing, call processing, Emergency Medical Dispatching (EMD), and training.
Unlike a traditional audit report, the assessment provides information about current state operations and offers considerations for future state operations. The City’s Police and Fire Departments have provided management responses to the assessment’s results (Attachment B). The Policy & Services Committee reviewed the assessment and unanimously recommended Council approval of the report at its September 9, 2025 meeting. The Committee discussed several areas of interest, including:
8 1
4 1
Tracking and improving City performance in relation to more expediently processing/ dispatching calls,
Implementing a quality assurance process for general calls as resources allow, Continuing to eliminate duplicate incidents in the dispatching system during emergencies, and
Improving tracking and monitoring of key metrics in support of better future decision- making with regards to resource allocation.
The City operates a 24-hour dispatch center or Public Safety Answering Point (PSAP) housed within the Communication Division of the Palo Alto Police Department (PAPD). The City’s PSAP receives, and dispatches calls for various City departments including Police, Fire, Emergency Medical Services (EMS), 24-hour non-emergency line, Utilities, Public Works, and Animal Control. The City’s PSAP also serves Stanford University’s call center providing police dispatching and fire services and is part of a tri-city consolidated system with Mountain View and Los Altos.
OCA assessed the City’s PSAP performance in four areas: staffing, call processing, EMD and training, benchmarking results against neighboring cities and counties.
Staffing
OCA assessed different staffing models, how changes to the staffing structure at the City’s PSAP might impact services, and how the PSAP is performing on key answering and call processing metrics. OCA found that budgeted staffing levels appear to be in line with industry standards and benchmarked agencies but at the time of the assessment, the PSAP was understaffed.
Overall, stakeholder feedback on the PSAP’s service provision was positive but there is room for improvement. OCA was unable to determine, based on the data available, how outsourcing Fire and EMS dispatching may impact staffing levels and service provision at the City’s PSAP. In the future, the City might consider conducting a staffing utilization assessment to better understand how dispatcher time is spent and if there are opportunities to gain efficiencies.
Call Processing
OCA evaluated the PSAP’s call answering and call processing performance. The City’s PSAP follows the National Emergency Number Association (NENA) call processing standards which require a PSAP to answer 90% of calls in 15 seconds or less and 95% of calls in 20 seconds or less. Palo Alto’s PSAP exceeds these standards, answering 99.53% of call within 10 seconds. The National Fire Protection Agency’s (NFPA) call processing standards require a PSAP dispatch 90% of calls within 90 seconds and 99% of calls within 120 seconds. These standards are not currently incorporated into the City’s PSAP policies, but these standards are tracked by Palo Alto’s Fire Department. The City’s PSAP does not currently meet these standards with 68% of calls dispatched with 90 seconds and 83% within 120 seconds in 2024. OCA also noted that the 8 1
4 1
City’s PSAP lacks a formal quality assurance process for general call processing. This is something it might consider implementing.
Emergency Medical Dispatch (EMD)
EMD is a structured protocol for answering medical calls received by emergency dispatch centers to quickly determine the nature and priority of the call and provide pre-arrival instructions to the caller to help the patient until Emergency Medical Services (EMS) arrive on location. The City’s dispatchers are all trained in EMD. While the City’s PSAP complies with many EMD standards, OCA noted that EMD recommended processes have not been formalized.
OCA’s analysis of EMD calls noted that some calls are not coded accurately and there is room for improvement. However, the third-party vendor who began monitoring EMD compliance in2024 noted that the PSAP’s overall performance score meets standards. In addition to assessing call coding accuracy, OCA noted that there is no formal follow-up process on dispatcher performance reports and recommends such feedback should be formally acknowledged by the dispatcher and any deficiencies formally follow-up by management.
Training
Dispatchers, and especially EMD dispatchers, require an extensive amount of initial and ongoing training to properly answer calls and provide appropriate information to responders in an effective and efficient manner. While the City’s PSAP has a comprehensive training manual and formally evaluates EMD calls, it does not currently have a formal process for evaluating the service provided on other calls received. The City should consider developing and incorporating formal feedback procedures into the Communication Training Manual including processes for addressing performance deficiencies.
FISCAL/RESOURCE IMPACT
The timeline and resource needs for implementation of any actions specified in management's corrective action plans are identified by management within their attached response memos.
STAKEHOLDER ENGAGEMENT
The OCA worked with and would like to thank the Police and Fire Departments and City Manager's Office for their assistance in conducting this assessment. We would especially like to thank the Dispatch Center management and staff for their time, assistance and collaboration on this assessment.
ENVIRONMENTAL REVIEW
Council action on this item is not a project as defined by CEQA because contracting for auditing services is an organizational or administrative activity that will not result in direct or indirect physical changes in the environment. CEQA Guidelines section 15378(b)(5). 8 1
4 1
ATTACHMENTS
Attachment A: Dispatch Center Assessment
Attachment B: Management Response to Dispatch Assessment Attachment C: Policy & Services Committee Presentation
APPROVED BY:
Kate Murdock, City Auditor