Tuesday, April 14, 2026 |
Photo – City of Rawlins emergency dispatch center – Bigfoot99 file photo
Rawlins officials will explore joining the county’s combined emergency dispatch center despite objections from the Chief of Police.
During Tuesday evening’s Rawlins City Council meeting, Vice Mayor Darril Garner reminded the governing body that two years ago Sheriff Alex Bakken proposed consolidating all the county’s emergency call centers under one roof. Last July, the Carbon County Sheriff’s Office assumed dispatching duties for the Platte Valley from the Saratoga Police Department. Operations are overseen by a joint powers board made up of representatives from the sheriff’s office and the Saratoga PD.
With the Carbon County Unified Dispatch Center now fully operational, Vice Mayor Garner asked to create an exploratory taskforce consisting of himself, another City Council member, City Manager Matt Hall, and a representative of the Rawlins Police Department. The group would determine what benefits, if any, joining the unified dispatch center would provide the city.
Vice Mayor Garner said the city should explore joining the unified dispatch center if it would deliver significant cost savings and improve response times.
Mayor Jacquelin Wells asked Rawlins Police Chief Mike Ward to give his opinion on the subject. Chief Ward explained that Carbon County’s emergency calls were previously handled by three separate dispatch centers: Saratoga, Rawlins, and the Sheriff’s Office. As the Federal Communications Commission-designated 911 Public Safety Answering Point, the police chief said his department handles the majority of the county’s emergency calls.
In 2023, Sheriff Alex Bakken approached the Board of Carbon County Commissioners about consolidating the county’s three emergency call centers into a single agency to address rising law‑enforcement costs. Chief Ward said neither he nor then-Saratoga Police Chief Mike Morris was consulted before Sheriff Bakken began publicly discussing the proposal.
Chief Ward said he, Chief Morris, and Sheriff Bakken agreed to form the Combined Dispatch Operations Collaborative Working Group to gather information on the issue. The chief emphasized that the group was not created to establish a combined dispatch center, but to study the concept.
Chief Ward said the group reviewed other Wyoming counties that once operated multiple dispatch centers and later consolidated them into a single agency. The review identified two examples: Sweetwater and Converse Counties, though the chief did not mention them by name. Chief Ward added that he and members of the Saratoga Police Department visited the two counties and spoke to local law enforcement, but Sheriff Bakken did not attend.
Chief Ward said he learned that assumptions often viewed as obvious, such as saving money by operating a single call center instead of several, were not true. The chief said both counties reported the need to purchase costly new equipment for the combined dispatch facility.
Chief Ward said a joint call center would require constructing a new building with the infrastructure needed to manage the county’s emergency calls. The chief added that staff in the two counties they visited reported very poor morale. Chief Ward said he was advised not to move forward with a combined dispatch center.
Chief Ward said the Carbon County Unified Dispatch Center is unified in name only. The chief said that by assuming call services for Saratoga, the sheriff’s department only increased its call volume by one or two percent.
Chief Ward urged the City Council to proceed carefully when considering whether to join the Carbon County Unified Dispatch Center.
The council voted to form a joint dispatch exploratory committee, with Councilwoman Tonya Lewman joining Vice Mayor Darril Garner. Mayor Jacquelin Wells instructed the committee to meet with Chief Ward outside of a City Council meeting to discuss the issue in greater detail.
