Early this morning a dog with no leash or collar went running through my yard. I live near a busy street so I went and got the phone book to look up animal control with no luck, so I decided to look up the police department’s phone number, also with no luck. It’s not under the name of the town, under emergency numbers, or even police. I looked up the police and it only showed 911. This situation didn’t require a emergency, just a concern for someone’s pet. I called the company who makes the phone book and they just said they didn’t know and didn’t know what to tell me. I called 411 on my cell phone and got the number for the police dept., called them and asked them where to look. The dispatcher told me she doesn’t make the phone book and hung up on me. I wrote the number down somewhere I would be able to locate it on the future. Im at a loss. What if a teenager was home alone and needed the police? What would you do about something like this in your town/city?
First, thank you for making the effort to separate real emergencies from calls for service. I applaud you for that, and I’m sorry that you got a nasty response from the dispatcher. It seems no good deed goes unpunished sometimes. Oddly enough, that same dispatcher probably does her share of griping about people calling 911 for non-emergencies.
You did the right thing. Now that you have the number, put it on the fridge and you’ll have it in the future. If someone is home alone, needs the police in an emergency, then certainly dial 911.
As for the dispatcher, it would take a lot for me not to send a nastygram over that, but then I’m an unrepentent prick anyway. You sound like a much nicer person than I am.