Commission approves first responder resolution

The Quay County commission on Thursday unanimously approved a resolution recognizing the county’s 911 dispatchers as first responders.

County Sheriff Russell Shafer and Jamie Luaders, director of the Tucumcari/Quay Regional Emergency Communications Center, requested approval of the resolution during the commission’s meeting Thursday, rescheduled from Jan. 27 because commissioners were in Santa Fe to meet with state lawmakers before the start of a 30-day session. Three other dispatchers attended Thursday’s meeting.

The Tucumcari/Quay Regional Emergency Communications Board passed an identical resolution during its December meeting. The two-page document states such dispatchers are “critical” to the public safety, make “life-saving split-second decisions” and “without them, public safety would not be possible.”

The resolution states dispatchers undergo an extensive background check, three weeks of academy training and additional annual training.

The document states dispatchers are not recognized by the federal government as a protected classification and has deemed them clerical staff. A federal bill, the 911 Saves Act, would reclassify emergency dispatchers as “911 telecommunicators,” but the measure has not advanced since being introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives in March.

Shafer said Lea County officials passed a similar resolution, and Otero County was considering it. Luaders said a bill recognizing 911 dispatchers as first responders had been introduced in the New Mexico Legislature but was “set aside.”

Shafer said some dispatchers suffer from post-traumatic stress after harrowing phone calls. Responding police officers often fail to debrief dispatchers on a call’s outcome — “I am very guilty of doing that myself,” he said — and therefore have no closure.

Luaders said reclassifying dispatchers as first responders would give them more access to mental-health counseling.

“We would like the acknowledgement we’re more than clerical workers,” she said. “We have more stress than clerical workers.”

Shafer said a reclassification would “open doors for health care.”

Commissioners Mike Cherry and Sue Dowell voted in favor of the resolution. Commission Chairman Franklin McCasland was absent; Cherry became acting chairman in his absence.

In other business Thursday:

• County Clerk Ellen White reported 662 mailed ballots for the Tucumcari school district’s bond election had been returned as undeliverable. She had expressed hope the total of 709 undeliverable ballots from the February 2019 mail-in bond election would go down this year, but they still were trickling in to her office.

“It’s irritating to get that many back, and it costs the school thousands of dollars,” she said.

White said she contacted the New Mexico Secretary of State to see whether she could place a list of undeliverable ballot addresses in the newspaper but was advised not to do so. Instead, White has used social media and a newspaper ad to remind voters of the Feb. 18 election and to come to her office in the courthouse at 300 S. Third St. in Tucumcari if they didn’t receive a ballot in their mailboxes.

White said registered voters cannot be taken off the rolls until they miss four consecutive federal elections — a period of eight years.

• During the public comment part of the meeting, Steve Roux asked commissioners whom to contact to add trash barrels or Dumpsters at Tucumcari’s Interstate 40 exit ramps to reduce littering.

Roux noted rest areas in Amarillo contain six or seven Dumpsters to help dispose of garbage. He said he’d even seen mattresses dumped by the side of the road in Tucumcari.

“It’s sickening,” he said. “There’s no place to put trash.”

County manager Richard Primrose said the exit ramps are part of state right-of-way, and he would call the state Department of Transportation to see whether garbage bins could be placed there.

• During approval of Finance Director Cheryl Simpson’s DWI Program distribution and grant quarterly financial reports, she noted changes in the program would require some adjustments. The county no longer has a DWI preventionalist to educate children on the dangers of alcohol and substance abuse, and Primrose said school districts are using their own teachers for such efforts.

Dowell expressed disappointment the county no longer has a preventionalist,

“We need more outreach to the young,” she said.

Primrose said DWI program money could be reallocated for alternative sentencing, additional enforcement and screening. He said the county also is considering a large ad in the newspaper during prom season to educate teenagers about the consequences of drunken driving.

• The commission approved the appointment of the assessor’s protest board members. Keith Bowen and Tonya Rigdon would continue to serve on the board with Regina Duplantis and Vic Baum as alternatives. Assessor Janie Hoffman said the board typically receives about 15 protests of property assessments each year. She said valuation notices would be mailed April 1.

• Primrose, speaking on behalf of absent road superintendent Larry Moore, said a prebid hearing had been held for repairs to Quay Road AR. Bids would be opened Feb. 13, with the project starting in early April, he said.

• Andrea Shafer, administrator of the county’s DWI program, said the number of drunken-driving reports was about average during the October-to-December quarter.

• The county’s Indigent Claims Board approved claims of $1,929.62 during the period of December and January.