Information obtained Thursday from Henderson-Vance County Emergency Operations, concerning the number of dispatches made to area agencies in 2020, shows the Vance County Sheriff’s Office was dispatched the most in this area, receiving a total of 39,077 calls or 43.94 percent of the total.
Not far behind was the Henderson Police Department with 36,332 calls or 40.85 percent of total call volume.
Calls in Vance County with Henderson-Vance County Emergency Operations being involved in 2020 for the North Carolina State Highway Patrol totaled one percent or 892 calls.
Keep in mind some calls for all agencies would have been hang ups but still required some follow up.
Remembering covid was not recognized as being present in North Carolina until March of 2020, if a majority of calls represented points of exposure to those responding, then local law enforcement faced many times over the risk and points of exposure to covid than did their counterpart first responders in all the EMS, Rescue Squad and all fire departments in Henderson and Vance County including all volunteer companies as well as forestry and the fire marshal’s office combined.
And it’s not even close.
Essentially, the local law enforcement agencies of the HPD and the VCSO “answered the call” 84.79 percent of the time in 2020. The NC SHP did one percent in Vance County in 2020. That leaves just 14.21 percent for everybody else combined. Also keep in mind the SHP can be otherwise dispatched.
Vance County EMS got the call 7,489 times or 8.42 percent.
The Henderson Fire Department was on the receiving end of the call 2,083 times in 2020 or 2.34 percent of the time.
The Vance County Fire Department had 880 calls or .99 percent.
Everybody else combined accounted for 2.46 percent of the calls.
EMS and Fire first responders were slated for covid vaccines before law enforcement by the State of North Carolina. But if there are no apples to oranges comparisons here, and there could be because these are just numbers/stats, then those getting the call 15 percent of the time were put in front of those getting the call 85 percent of the time for the covid vaccine.
These numbers are facts. None of these numbers are reported to in any way undercut any agency or minimize even one of the calls.
A total of 88,937 call records exist for Vance County E911 for the year 2020.