As Colorado 911 Center Presumption Bill Advances, Dispatchers Nationwide Joining Ranks Of First Responders

  Tuesday, February 4th, 2020 Source: WorkersCompensation.com

A bill we first discussed a few months ago appears to be advancing through the Colorado legislature that would grant workers’ compensation mental health benefits to Emergency Center Dispatchers.

While the effort to include 911 dispatchers into the growing world of special protections for first responders is actually going on nationwide, Colorado seems to be one of the few early adopters codifying it into law.

Nationally, the “911 Saves Act” is before Congress and if approved would change the classification of 911 dispatchers to match that of all first responders. A county in Colorado has already made that move, and the state of Texas did so last year.

The argument is, of course, that dispatchers hear terrible things happening over the phone, and must endure tremendous emotional challenges as they calmly work to help people.

A director of Denver’s 911 Call Center, speaking in support of the current legislation being debated in the state, said that her workers, “get calls from someone considering suicide to someone screaming because they just came home and what they found, it may be somebody in cardiac arrest, where the person calling may need to do CPR.”

There is certainly an argument to be made regarding the stresses that these workers face. But as we have argued before, these types of benefit changes are creating a two-tiered system of injured worker.

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