I have a saying I’ve carried with me for years, one that has become the foundation of everything I do:
Share your story every chance you get, because you may not get to share it one day.
National Public Safety Telecommunicators Week is that chance. And I need you to take it.
I didn’t plan to end up in 911. A friend encouraged me to apply in 2004, and I said yes, not knowing that decision would define the next two decades of my life. What I did know, even then, was that this work meant something to me on a level that went beyond a paycheck or a job title. I grew up knowing what it meant to need help. I grew up knowing what it felt like when the system either showed up for you—or didn’t. That shaped me long before I ever put on a headset.
For 20 years, I was on the other end of that line. Call taker. Dispatcher. Trainer. Supervisor. I worked mass shootings, suicides, and plane crashes. I was on duty on January 6, 2017, when our center was flooded with calls during the shooting at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport. A woman was hiding in a bathroom stall, terrified, and I was the voice on the other end of that call. There is no manual for what that moment demands of you. You figure it out, and you hold it together, because someone is counting on you to.
In 2018, I was named the Florida Sheriff’s Association Dispatcher of the Year—the first Black woman and first Regional Communications Operator from my agency to ever receive that honor. I stood on that stage, and I was proud. But I also remember thinking, “How many people in this room have no idea what it actually took to get here?” How many calls? How many nights? How many moments nobody ever sees?
That’s the problem I’ve spent the last several years trying to solve.
HELLO, 911! started as an idea in a grad school classroom. My professor told us to start our LLCs, and something clicked for me. Not because I had a business plan (I didn’t), but because I had a conviction: The world needed to know who we are. Not just what we do. Who we are.
We’re the heroes behind the headsets.
I’ve been building a book of real 911 stories from telecommunicators around the world. I’ve created COMMS Appreciation Day in South Florida to bring agencies together and celebrate the people in this profession. I’ve spoken nationwide about technology, leadership, and the urgent need for the 911 community to be seen not just by the public, but by each other.
Because here’s what I know after 20 years: As a community, we struggle to tell our stories for fear of judgment.
We are trained to be selfless. To transfer the call, move on, and not dwell. We don’t talk about what we hold. We don’t talk about the call on January 6th that is still with us. We don’t talk about the night we stayed on the line with someone for 35 minutes and never found out if they made it. We show up the next day and do it all over again, because that’s what we do.
But silence has a cost. And this week, more than any other, I want to push back on it.
NPSTW has been officially recognized since 1994. Over 30 years of official recognition. And still, in most of America, if you ask a random person on the street what a telecommunicator does, you’ll get a blank stare or a vague answer about “answering 911 calls.”
They don’t know about the split-second decisions. The training that never fully prepares you for a real mass casualty event. The emotional labor of being someone’s lifeline while simultaneously working three other calls. The fact that “first responder” should include the person who took the call before the responders ever left the building.
We are the first first responders. We have been saying that for years. And it is still not common knowledge.
So here is my challenge to every telecommunicator reading this: This week, share your story. Not for clout. Not for sympathy. But because your story is evidence. It is proof of what this profession demands and what this profession gives back. It is the thing that changes minds, shapes policy, and makes the person sitting next to you on a 12-hour shift feel a little less alone.
Post it on social media. Tell it to a colleague. Submit it to HELLO, 911! Because I am actively collecting stories from telecommunicators around the world, and yours belongs in that record. Write it down somewhere, even if nobody else ever reads it. The act of naming what you have been through is powerful in ways I cannot fully explain, but I have seen it transform people.
Share your story every chance you get, because you may not get to share it one day.
I am not speaking in metaphor. I lost my mother when I was a child. I know what it means to lose someone before you ever got the chance to fully know them. That loss shaped everything. My drive, my mission, my refusal to let the people in this profession remain invisible. Life is not guaranteed. Your story is not guaranteed. The time to tell it is now.
This week, I hope you receive the recognition you deserve. Whether it’s a catered lunch, a proclamation, kind words from leadership, you deserve all of it—and more.
But more than that, I hope you walk away from this week having claimed something: The understanding that your experience matters. That the calls you’ve taken, the years you’ve given, the weight you carry—all of it is worth documenting, worth sharing, worth preserving.
You are not just a dispatcher. You are a first responder. You are a historian of the most human moments in people’s lives. You are someone who shows up, over and over again, when it counts most.
Now it’s your turn to be seen.
Tell your story. The industry needs it. The world needs it. And honestly? So do you.
Dominique Mathis, M.S. Ed, RPL is the Founder and CEO of HELLO, 911!, the Co-Founder of First Call Ready, a Public Safety Manager at Axon 911, and a 20-year veteran of emergency communications. She is a recipient of the 2018 Florida Sheriff’s Association Dispatcher of the Year Award and is currently pursuing her Doctorate in Instructional and Performance Technology at the University of West Florida.