More than messengers: NERCOM dispatcher highlights important role of 911 call-takers

When Tracy McNamara began her career as an emergency dispatcher 21 years ago, the job was very different.

There was no computer-aided dispatch system, or in-car GPS. When she began working at the Fox Lake emergency dispatch center as an 18-year-old, dispatchers used a punch-card system and had to explain to police and fire departments what they were heading into in just a few hundred characters.

She moved to the McHenry dispatch center nearly 20 years ago, when that agency dispatched for three agencies. The Northeast Regional Communications Center (NERCOM) now dispatches for 16 agencies, including for towns as far away as Marengo and Harvard.

“In 19 years here, we have been through two or three CAD systems, phone and radio changes. It is huge now,” McNamara said.

She became a dispatcher at 18 because “being a first responder was in my blood,” McNamara said, even if she didn’t realize it then. Her father was a volunteer firefighter in Antioch and she “practically grew up on the truck floor” at that firehouse. Before that, her great-grandfather was a Chicago firefighter, and a grandfather served in the U.S. Army.

I meet people on sometimes their worst day. I might never meet them face-to-face when it is happening to them, but I did something good for them.”

—  Tracy McNamara, dispatcher at NERCOM, based in McHenry

She grew up helping out at Antioch volunteer fire pancake breakfasts and assisting her dad – who sold cars as his day job – during his “duty days” at the station.

But after high school graduation, McNamara said she still didn’t know what she wanted to do as a career. Dispatching seemed like a good job to do while she figured that out.

“I like helping people. I have always been a helper. I meet people on sometimes their worst day. I might never meet them face-to-face when it is happening to them, but I did something good for them,” she said.

What she wants people to know about dispatchers is they are not just clerical workers. That is how some callers treat them, she said, but what they do is more complicated than just passing along an address to fire and police.

“There are questions we have to ask to ensure my officers know what they are coming to, to paint a picture for them,” McNamara said. If the offender has left the scene, she will ask if they are in a car, or walking down the street. “Give me a description of what is going on,” she tells callers, so if an officer sees that person, they can stop them.

The NERCOM dispatchers also have an emergency medical dispatch certification. With that accreditation, they can walk callers through medical emergencies while waiting for the ambulance to arrive.

Asking questions can also help the caller focus during the emergency, McNamara said.

“You have people who call who are panicked, ‘I can’t find my kid.’ Part of our job is take them back to focus, to take a breath.”

Dispatchers can walk the parent through where the child may be – in a closet, under a bed, under a pile of blankets. Often, they will find the child, too.

Not all of the calls are successes, and those can wear on dispatchers just as much as it does the firefighters and police officers.

In 2022, the department brought in Oakley, a trained emotional support dog. Being able to have Oakley visit after a tough call can help them during the bad times, McNamara said.

“Before Oakley, I would play that bad call over and over in my head. With him being there, you allow yourself grace. Not just to process it, but be allowed to forget it.”

Often, dispatchers don’t find out what happens after the call disconnects – if that person who was having a heart attack survived, or if the passenger hurt in a crash is OK. In 2023, McHenry Community High School’s graphics department installed a new “tree of life” display to honor the life-saving work of regional emergency dispatchers. That is still being added to, McNamara said.

“It is nice to have some, ‘Heck, yeah,’” for their work, McNamara said, “but it is not about me. We don’t do it for the accolades and we are OK with that.”