Howard Joins Coalition in Demanding Urgent Action on DC’s 911 Call Center

WASHINGTON, D.C. - AUG. 15, 2024 - Brad Howard, candidate for ANC 1E01, today joined over 130 current and former ANCs and ANC candidates in calling on City officials to urgently address the Office of Unified Communications (OUC)’s 911 call center, including the creation of an independent task force and the immediate implementation of reforms to increase accountability and transparency within the agency.

“We have waited far too long for the 911 call system we deserve,” said Brad Howard, Candidate for ANC 1E01. “We should not only immediately implement some short-term patches, but we also need long-term solutions to get us out of this deadly cycle of dysfunction and disarray. That starts with an independent and comprehensive review of our entire system, followed by commonsense reforms. Most importantly, we need City officials with the courage, compassion, and commitment to get it done before another life is lost.”

Addressed to Chairman Mendelson and the entire City Council, the Aug. 15 letter was signed by 132 current and former ANCs and ANC candidates, including 86 current Commissioners from all eight wards who collectively represent nearly a quarter of District residents.

The content of the letter is below:

Dear Chairman Mendelson and members of the Council of the District of Columbia:

We write to follow up on our September 5, 2023, letter, signed by 126 current and former Advisory Neighborhood Commissioners (ANCs), to express our deepening worry about chronic understaffing, procedural dysfunction, and fatal errors by the Office of Unified Communications (OUC)’s 911 call center. This letter is signed by 132 current and former ANCs and ANC candidates, including 86 current Commissioners from all eight wards who collectively represent nearly a quarter of District residents.

As you are aware, on August 2, 2024, a five-month-old boy died after going into cardiac arrest. At the time of the incident, OUC’s 911 system had crashed—reportedly the fifth time since May 2024. (OUC experienced a sixth outage a week later on August 9.) Reports indicate that the family of the baby boy were unable to get through to anyone at the 911 call center for more than 10 minutes. When a caller was finally able to get through, public reporting indicates that the call was likely mishandled by OUC. We are heartbroken for this family and the unbearable loss they now endure.

We are also appalled that OUC’s dysfunction has been allowed to persist, unchecked, for so long. Since we first wrote over 11 months ago, OUC’s performance has rapidly deteriorated: the agency continues to dispatch FEMS teams to the wrong locations; the agency still inadequately prioritizes calls; residents report (and OUC’s own data confirms) worsening call answering times and dropped calls; and, since OUC inexplicably launched its new call answering program, PowerPhone, in February 2024 amid these ongoing failures, the call center has experienced multiple system crashes.

It is apparent that neither the Director of OUC nor the Mayor are up to the task of addressing these chronic problems. We therefore turn to you, once again, to finally do so. We cannot emphasize forcefully enough how desperate our—your—constituents are to see you meet this crisis with the seriousness it demands.

Time is of the essence. The Council must launch an independent 911 task force to examine OUC’s chronic failures and identify solutions to address them. We also urge you to fully implement items two and three listed in our September 2023 letter, pertaining to robust data collection and the release of call transcripts and recordings, to keep OUC open, honest, and dtransparent about its failures and progress.

Thank you, once again, for your consideration. We request the courtesy of your timely reply, which may be directed to Commissioners Huma Imtiaz (5E04@anc.dc.gov), Christy Kwan (6C01@anc.dc.gov), and Janell Pagats (3C03@anc.dc.gov).

Sincerely,

Commissioner Huma Imtiaz (5E04)

Commissioner Christy Kwan (6C01)

Commissioner Janell Pagats (3C03)

Former Commissioner Colleen Costello (5B05)

Commissioner Dieter Lehmann Morales (1A02)

Commissioner Stephen Coleman Kenny (1A05)

Commissioner Mukta Ghorpadey (1A07)

Commissioner Billy Easley (1A10)

Commissioner Santiago Lakatos (1B04)

Commissioner Sabel Harris (1B08)

Commissioner Tucker Jones (1B09)

Commissioner Daniel Michelson-Horowitz (1C01)

Commissioner Lee Dixon (1C02)

Commissioner Peter Wood (1C03)

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Commissioner Joe Van Wye (1C04)

Commissioner Lynda Laughlin (1C06)

Commissioner Angela Allison (1D06)

Commissioner Josh Jacobson (1E06)

Commissioner Yannik Omictin (2A01)

Commissioner Trupti Patel (2A03)

Commissioner Meg Roggensack (2B01)

Commissioner Jeffrey Alan Rueckgauer (2B02)

Commissioner Zach Adams (2B08)

Commissioner Christopher Davis (2B09)

Commissioner Daniel Chao (2E07)

Commissioner Thaddeus Bradley-Lewis (3A01)

Commissioner Kevin Lavezzo (3B01)

Commissioner Hayden Gise (3C01)

Commissioner Adam J. Prinzo (3C02)

Commissioner Roric McCorristin (3C04)

Commissioner Sauleh Siddiqui (3C05)

Commissioner Tammy Gordon (3C06)

Commissioner Tricia Duncan (3D02)

Commissioner Quentin Colón Roosevelt (3D03)

Commissioner Matthew Cohen (3E01)

Commissioner Jonathan Bender (3E03)

Commissioner Tom Quinn (3E04)

Commissioner Adrian Jesus Iglesias (3F05)

Commissioner Peter Lynch (3/4G-05)

Commissioner Zach Ferguson (3/4G-07)

Commissioner Erin Palmer (4B02)

Commissioner Evan Yeats (4B04)

Commissioner Kevin Gilligan (4B05)

Commissioner Tiffani Nichole Johnson (4B06)

Commissioner Casey Swegman (4C01)

Commissioner Brittany Kademian (4C05)

Commissioner Eric Heller (4C07)

Commissioner Joy Pinkney (4D01)

Commissioner Chrysanthe “CC” Courniotes (4D04)

Commissioner Stephen Marencic (4D05)

Commissioner Aman George (4D06)

Commissioner Edward Borrego (5B01)

Commissioner Nandini Sen (5B02)

Commissioner Prita Piekara (5B06)

Commissioner VJ Kapur (5C07)

Commissioner Sebrena Rhodes (5D02)

Commissioner Anna Roblin (5D03)

Commissioner Stephen Cobb (5D04)

Commissioner Reid May (5D08)

Commissioner Bernice Blacknell (5D09)

Commissioner Kevin Rapp (5E05)

Commissioner Tony Hurst (5F01)

Commissioner Aru Sahni (5F02)

Commissioner Mark Galvan (5F04)

Commissioner Jennifer Anderson (5F05)

Commissioner Joe Bishop-Henchman (5F06)

Commissioner Mike Velasquez (6A02)

Commissioner Roberta Shapiro (6A03)

Commissioner Amber Gove (6A04)

Commissioner Robb Dooling (6A06)

Commissioner Frank Avery (6B01)

Commissioner Chander Jayaraman (6B06)

Commissioner Matt LaFortune (6B09)

Commissioner Andrea M. Pawley (6D04)

Commissioner Bruce Levine (6D06)

Commissioner Chris Hart (6E01)

Commissioner Ahmad Abu-Khalaf (6E05)

Commissioner Travis R. Swanson (7B03)

Commissioner Anthony Lorenzo Green (7C04)

Commissioner Patricia Stamper (7C06)

Commissioner Ebony Payne (7D05)

Commissioner Marc Friend (7D06)

Commissioner Brianne Eby-Stockert (7D10)

Commissioner Ashley Renee Ruff (7F02)

Commissioner Shameka Hayes (7F08)

Commissioner Robin Mckinney (8A06)

Commissioner Dascha Cleckley (8C03)

Commissioner Sandra Harrrell (8D03)

Former Commissioner Max Ewart (1A01)

Former Commissioner Jimmy Dubois (3C03)

Former Commissioner Beau Finley (3C04)

Former Commissioner Alan Wehler (4C09)

Former Commissioner Jonah Goodman (4C10)

Former Commissioner Zach Israel (4D04)

Former Commissioner Debbie Smith (5E01)

Candidate J. Swiderski (1B03)

Candidate Scott Olesen (1C05)

Candidate Katherine Swanson (1C09)

Candidate Brad Howard (1E01)

Candidate Anthony Musa (2B01)

Candidate Alex Marshall (2B05)

Candidate Kyle Oliver (2F04)

Candidate Kevin Cataldo (2F07)

Candidate Howard Garrett (2G01)

Candidate Isaac Bowers (3A03)

Candidate Erin Beard (3C04)

Candidate Zach Shaben (3C05)

Candidate Nathaniel Bowman (3F05)

Candidate Slobodan Milic (4B01)

Candidate Joel Gwadz (4B03)

Candidate Danielle Geong (4B09)

Candidate Liz Kovacevic (4C04)

Candidate Maggie Dart-Padover (4C06)

Candidate Brendi E. Bluitt (4D03)

Candidate Emma Treat (4D07)

Candidate Jenn Kauffman (4D08)

Candidate Jingwen Sun (5B03)

Candidate Monica Martinez Lopez (5B05)

Candidate Reginald Shaw-Richardson (5D01)

Candidate Charquinta (Char) McCray (5D06)

Candidate Crystal G-Campbell (5D09)

Candidate Ana Rodriguez (5E01)

Candidate Kelly Rzendzian (5F07)

Candidate Paul Spires (6A01)

Candidate Stephen Kolb (6A07)

Candidate Marquell Washington (6D01)

Candidate Nate Coffman (6E06)

Candidate Mary L. Gaffney (7C05)

Candidate Kimory S. Orendoff (7F03)

Candidate Tom Donohue (8A01)

Candidate Betty Scippio (8B02)

Candidate Marcus Hickman (8B06)

Candidate Patrice Lancaster (8D06)

Candidate Elissa De Souza (6/8F02)

Cc: Mayor Muriel Bowser

Heather McGaffin, Director, Office of Unified Communications

Click here to see the full letter.