For the second consecutive meeting, Ceres Police dispatchers painted a dark picture of workplace demands for members of the Ceres City Council.

Dispatcher Justin Vosbein said that as of March he worked 6,033 hours of overtime, taking him away from family. He noted the dispatch center has been short-staffed 90 percent of the time which has “required an astronomical amount of overtime from the dispatchers, time that is taken away from our families, from our kids, from ourselves.”

On Monday he said he was on his second stretch of 12 consecutive days of work because of vacant positions and training – and multiple sick calls of dispatchers.

“I was forced to work alone for 11 hours,” said Vosbein, “which means no breaks, no lunches, no running to the bathroom between calls.”

His job entails monitoring police radio traffic, doing clerical work, monitor surveillance cameras in the parks and handle 911 and non-emergency calls from residents of Ceres and Newman.

In 2018, Newman contracted with the city of Ceres to handle its 911 calls. As of July 1, 2022, Newman pays Ceres $16,500 monthly, or $198,000 per year for the service. That has driven up demand for service among the limited number of dispatchers Ceres has.

“These seven current dispatchers are exhausted,” said Vosbein. “Exhaustion is going to lead to a decrease in service and ultimately a liability for the city. We’ve brought up the physical and mental health toll that this is taking on us but nothing has changed. Nothing’s gotten better. Morale is non-existent. We are not attracting new employees and we’re not retaining the dedicated ones we have.”

He said Ceres offers the second lowest pay in the region and that Oakdale, which is half the size of Ceres, pays better.

“Being that negotiations do not start for several months and that a new MOU won’t take effect until next year, the reality is you won’t have any dispatchers left by then if things are not done.”

Amber Scott, a former dispatcher who left last year, attended Monday’s meeting to offer support to her former colleagues. She said while the department felt like a family, she was barely making ends meet and had to leave. Scott said she now makes more, has a reduced work load and works less overtime.

Loreal Ahart asked the council for a resolution to the “crisis” in the center.

“We were hopeful by attending our last City Council meeting to have brought awareness but as it appears this still remains to be a lower priority as no further action has taken place,” said Ahart. “I love this city. It is where I live, where I was raised and where my loved ones reside.”

She noted that dispatch services are critical to the community’s safety but said the long hours, stressful situation and staff shortages are taking its toll.

“It is astounding to me that our pay can be compared to those of food chain employees,” said Ahart.

She said the city hasn’t been fully staffed in the past nine years “and the 176 hours of overtime a month that must be dispersed by four is constantly depriving us of having a balanced home life and affecting our mental health.”

Mayor Javier Lopez said the council is listening but noted there is a process that must be followed.

“I am hearing what you’re saying,” he said.

The city has authorized 11 dispatcher positions and only seven are filled.

“In the last two months we’ve had two people quit in the early stages of their training,” said dispatcher Ashley Shaw told the council. “This is largely due to the vast amount of work that we do and the low compensation that we do for it along with the overtime.”

She said dispatchers are expected to show up early to relieve the dispatcher going off shift but not allowed to clock in early.

“We are expected to work large amounts of overtime but somehow are expected to not burn ourselves out,” Shaw said. “We are expected to monitor five cameras at the police department, 43 throughout the city parks and over 550 at the city schools.”

“I’m confined to a 20 by 40 room from anywhere to 11 to 18 hours a day. If I need to go to the restroom I need to ask an officer to cover my desk and pull him from the street. That’s not a luxury that extends to everybody. I am one of the lucky ones because I happen to be scheduled with the officer trained in dispatch. My co-worker, Desirae (Freese) for 11 of her 16 shifts in the month of October, she’s expected and required to work by herself from midnight until 5 a.m. 

“Yesterday I was scheduled to work by myself for seven of my 11-hour shift and I spent almost three hours of that seven sick and throwing up in a trash can because I can’t walk away from my desk.”

Shaw noted that in her four years with Ceres dispatch, she’s work approximately 2,300 hours of overtime, 632 hours in 2022 alone.

“You cannot provide the officers the safety they deserve with dispatchers that are burnt out, overwhelmed and underappreciated,” said Shaw, who invited the council to sit in during a Friday night when “every third house is having a party and our phone doesn’t stop ringing. Sit in when the city approves El Rematito (flea market) having concerts and the citizens are calling from across the freeway because they can hear it in their living rooms.”

Hearing the pleas, Ceres resident Gene Yeakley begged the council to remedy the situation.

“Fix this problem, don’t let it go any longer,” said Yeakley.

Lorri Julien, another Ceres police dispatcher, said making $28 an hour and surprised that a position that does so much would have “a low pay scale.”