The communications division operates the 911 system for nearly all fire, emergency, and medical calls County-wide and manages the dispatch of first responders to more than 100,000 fire and EMS incidents annually. This is a critically important responsibility, requiring our dispatchers and staff to deal with life and death situations on a daily basis, and so we must maintain a fail-safe approach to customer service.

Contra Costa County Fire has made major improvements to the way we manage information technology and communications resources in support of the community. An important change was the consolidation of these two functions into a single new division, under the leadership of a newly created assistant chief position and a new manager for overseeing the communication center.

This new organization achieves greater levels of efficiency and collaboration and better positions the district to innovate in today’s dynamic fire service and communications environments.

Customer service has been a significant focus of our efforts this past year. Our dispatchers are the key to delivering high-level service and we worked hard to ensure our communications center was fully staffed with seasoned professional dispatchers to deliver quality customer service on every call, every time. The best customer service in the world is worthless if we don’t have the communication infrastructure and support to ensure seamless interactions between the public, our dispatchers and first responders. For this reason, we worked tirelessly to upgrade radio, telephone and information technology services, adding staff and expanding availability to support our 24/7 operations. With an eye toward providing better, and more efficient, service, we also carefully evaluated historic response data and, as a result, have been able for the first time to reduce dispatch of fire engines on ambulance-only calls for assistance, representing significant cost savings and freeing of resources for higher-priority incidents. All 911 call takers in our center are certified as Emergency Medical dispatchers by the International Academies of Emergency Dispatch (IAED). This ensures accurate responses based on the patient’s complaints. Accreditation by IAED requires maximum accuracy, effectiveness and efficiency of emergency call systems, with resultant quality of public safety and patient care improvements.

One area of communication center growth has been the addition of emergency medical service personnel – part of our new and unique Alliance ambulance transport program you can read more about elsewhere in this report — to coordinate our ambulance resources. To accommodate this growth, we expanded the dispatch floor, adding four additional and fully functional dispatch work stations.

An important function of our dispatch center is ensuring the right first responder resources are in the right place at the right time to respond to emergencies. This year, we began the use of a software-based approach to identify “holes” in coverage by tracking each unit’s status, location, and incident assignment. The software then instantaneously recommends optimal unit relocations, or “move-ups,” to effect the best possible coverage based on current locations and historical experience.

Communications technologies are advancing at a rapid pace and we sought to take advantage of these, improving our digital tools for real-time communication for our mobile workforce. As part of this, we won a State of California Homeland Security grant in 2017 allowing us to place an iPad on every fire apparatus in the county this year, providing a standardized tool for improving incident response efficiency.

The Contra Costa Regional Fire Communcations Center (CCRFCC) is the vital link between the citizens we serve and the first responders we send them. CCRFCC Dispatchers are trained in fire and medical emergencies and are certified as Emergency Medical Dispatchers (EMD’s). Our dispatchers are trained to provide pre-arrival medical instructions to ensure the best care to our citizens while first responders are on the way.

The CCRFCC dispatches fire and medical first responders for the following areas of Contra Costa County:

The City of Antioch
The City of Brentwood
The City of Clayton
The City of Concord
The City of El Ceritto
The City of Hercules
The City of Lafayette
The City of Martinez
The City of Oakley
The City of Orinda
The City of Pinole
The City of Pittsburg
The City of Pleasant Hill
The City of San Pablo
The City of Walnut Creek

As well as:
The town of Moraga
BART (in Contra Costa County)
East Bay Regional Parks (in Contra Costa County) -This includes Tilden Park

And Unincorporated area of the county which includes:
Alamo (some parts shared with San Ramon Valley Fire Dept), Bay Point, Bayview-Montalvin, Bethel Island, Byron, Clyde, Crockett, Discovery Bay, East Richmond, Heights, El Sobrante, Kensington, Knightsen, Pacheco, Port Costa, Rodeo, Rolling Wood, Tara Hills.

The Fire Agencies Dispatched by the Contra Costa Regional Fire Communications Center (CCRFCC) are:

Contra Costa County Fire Protection District, El-Cerrito/Kensington Fire Department, East Contra Costa County Fire Protection District, Rodeo-Hercules Fire Department, Pinole Fire Department, Crockett/Carquinez Fire Department, Moraga/Orinda Fire Department.

In 2023, Contra Costa Fire responded to the following:

Alarm – 5,043
Ambulance-only call – 19,247
EMS – 43,167
Fire – Other – 2,142
Fire – Structure – 498
Fire – Vegetation – 201
Fire – Vehicle – 64
Other – 30,774
Rescue – 787
Vehicle Accident – 3,204

Total calls for all cities in 2023: 105,127