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by Nathan Steele

Seal Beach City Council

As part of my work as District 5 councilman for Seal Beach, I have been given tours and presentations around Seal Beach.

I’ve met with every department head in city hall. I have toured the Seal Beach Naval Weapons Station, Boeing, the OC Sanitation plant in Huntington Beach, the ground water recovery system and other interesting places I never knew about in our town.

My experience visiting our 911 call center at the Seal Beach Police Department was especially memorable. Those people are real pros and do great things for our city and for Leisure World.

The 911 center is called West Cities Police Communications or “WestComm.” The agency was formed by a joint powers agreement to serve Seal Beach, Cypress, Los Alamitos and the Orange County Park Rangers.

The dispatchers are very impressive, highly trained with have many years of experience handling all kinds of difficult challenges for police, fire and medical emergencies. Even in the most high-stress situations, they excel.

Here’s how it works. When someone calls 911, their location is instantly mapped on the monitor right in front of the dispatcher. It could be a call for an ambulance from someone who needs directions from the dispatcher to apply immediate first aid. It could be a call for a fire with kids in the house. It could be a call from a person whose house is being broken into where they are hiding. There are literally thousands of scenarios the dispatcher may

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_______________________________________________________ Bowden (center) and Lindsay Lenart.