National Public Safety Telecommunicators Week

On behalf of Sheriff David Jones and Tom Green County Sheriff's Office we'd like to say thank you to our Dispatchers for all the sacrifices they make to create a better and safer world for the public. Your commitment to your profession is appreciated by all of TGSO, and the citizens you serve.

National Public Safety Telecommunicators Week began in 1981 and is celebrated the second week of April each year, with this year going from April 9 to April 14. This week offers a much-deserved thanks for our dispatchers who perform the most underrated and under-appreciated yet the most stressful and important job in public service.

A dispatcher is generally the first point of contact, the true first responder, and the unseen hero. A dispatcher's job is a complicated one. It is exciting, rewarding, fulfilling, and becomes a way of life. It is also stressful, exhausting, thankless, and forgotten by so many.

Dispatchers are a rare breed. A good dispatcher can be on a 911 call giving pre-arrival instructions, entering information into the computer, checking on an officer at a traffic stop, running a license plate, all while taking a bite of lukewarm food, and wondering how their sick child is. Dispatchers prove that multi-tasking does exist, and they're good at it!

Show your dispatchers some love, respect and appreciation this week. Give them a heartfelt "thank you" for a job well done. A dispatcher's job is thankless, and they all deserve this week of recognition and honor.