St. Johns County 911 dispatchers, first-responders working holidays to keep community safe

ST. AUGUSTINE, Fla. — While most of us will be home for Christmas enjoying time with family, first responders will be on call keeping our community safe — that includes 911 dispatchers.

Action News Jax Alicia Tarancon spent the morning with the St. Johns County Sheriff’s Office.

She caught a glimpse of our unsung heroes who are working behind the scenes this holiday season.

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Shelly Castellano has been a 911 dispatcher with the St. Johns County Sheriff’s office for four years.

She’s normally the first person standing by during someone’s worst day.

“Possibly not going to make it, like it’s a life-or-death situation all the way to maybe an elderly person who’s lost,” Castellano said.

These men and women are working 24/7 behind the scenes directing emergency calls to deputies and firefighters throughout the county.

Director Russ Martin said these dispatchers are sacrificing their time away from family this Christmas to keep their community safe and their call volume typically increases during the holidays.

“As with any event when you have more folks congregating together, those events typically kind of increase with domestics or any kind of other disturbances, traffic concerns as well,” Martin said.

St. Johns County is hiring more 911 dispatchers to keep up with the county’s growth and Director Martin said it normally takes five to nine months before someone is fully trained.

“Then we get out here and we’re going to assign a coach; that coach is going to walk through every process and every scenario that we can possibly think of and get you up to speed,” Martin said.

Castellano said that as a 911 dispatcher, you must be prepared for anything when you pick up the phone line.

Despite the stress and challenges, this is the job she said she was born to do.

“I found this, and I absolutely love it because I put my absolute all into it and I have found that it’s very fulfilling,” Castellano said.

St. Johns County needs to fill at least six more spots to help support the growing county.

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The St. Johns County Sheriff’s Office told Action News Jax that 911 call volume has increased by at least 18 percent.

So far in 2021, the county has had 112,963 emergency 911 calls, compared to nearly 96,000 emergency 911 calls in 2020.

You can apply online to become a 911 dispatcher here.

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