Waterloo regional police logged more than 116,0000 calls between Oct. 1 and Dec. 31 last year, an amount that was 14.7 per cent higher than the previous three months and 24.5 per cent higher than the same time period in 2022.
In a report heading to this week's police service board meeting, staff say that even with the increased call volume, the unit was able to improve call answer times by four per cent in the fourth quarter of 2023.
The total calls handled by the communications centre include 911 calls to police, fire and ambulance, general inquiry calls and internal calls.
Actual emergency calls to the centre in the last three months of 2023 totalled 57,791, 16,909 of which were for south division.
That's an increase of 20.5 per cent over the same reporting period in 2022.
The National Emergency Number Association standard requires that 90 per cent of all 911 calls must be answered within 15 seconds, and 95 per cent within 20 seconds.
The WRPS communications unit was able to meet those thresholds for 85 per cent of the 911 calls it received with an average answer time of 15 seconds.
For the previous reporting period, June to August, 2023, that average was 16 seconds.
The time for the highest call volumes is afternoons, during which service levels dropped as low as 61.6 per cent during the peak time in October.
As call volume decreased in December, those peak time response levels bottomed out at 71.2 per cent.
During the last quarter of 2023, more than 65 per cent of 911 calls requested a patrol response, 21.3 per cent didn't require a police response, 5.1 per cent of calls were pocket dials, and 5.1 per cent were accidental where someone stayed on the line to admit it.
Citizen generated bylaw complaints accounted for 3.1 per cent of calls.
A texting app first deployed in 2019 allows the unit to communicate with dropped or silent 911 calls with an automated text message.
Frontline call reduction efforts also played a role in reducing the impact of call volume on frontline response.
Between October and December of last year, the WRPS's Frontline Support Unit diverted 7,262 incidents from frontline patrol response.
Officers performing FSU duties for calls like theft under $5,000, driving complaints, property damage and fraud, have the ability to investigate matters over the phone, in-person at divisions, through online reporting and by responding to gather evidence.
The majority of break ins are now handled by neighbourhood policing following a pilot project with FSU that ended on Nov. 6, 2023. That change resulted in only 92 break and enter calls getting handled through the alternative policing model in the fourth quarter compared to 256 handled by FSU in Q4 2022.
