By Melissa Ortiz
Buffalo, NY – Erie County has consolidated three emergency dispatch operations inside its new Public Safety Campus Center downtown.
Sheriff's, Central Police Services and ambulance dispatches have been operating out of the facility since July. They're called Public Safety Answering Points, or PSAPS. Most towns have their own. But Giambra says he would like to see all PSAPS combined under one roof to improve the efficiency of 911 services.
"You have 24 different public safety answering points, which is totally ridiculous," Giambra said. "The best way I can describe it is that we're still here in the Fred Flinstone era, when we have a 21st century facility here in downtown Buffalo that will allow us to house all of these 24 different operations in one room."
Giambra says more than $6 million would be saved if the existing 24 PSAPs within Erie County were merged.