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Audit of the State 911 Department Objectives, Scope, and Methodology

An overview of the purpose and process of auditing the State 911 Department.

Table of Contents

Overview

In accordance with Section 12 of Chapter 11 of the Massachusetts General Laws, the Office of the State Auditor has conducted a performance audit of certain activities of the State 911 Department for the period July 1, 2017 through June 30, 2019. 

We conducted this performance audit in accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards. Those standards require that we plan and perform the audit to obtain sufficient, appropriate evidence to provide a reasonable basis for our findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives. We believe that the evidence obtained provides a reasonable basis for our findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives.

Below is a list of our audit objectives, indicating each question we intended our audit to answer; the conclusion we reached regarding each objective; and, if applicable, where each objective is discussed in the audit findings.

Objective

Conclusion

  1. Did the State 911 Department develop and execute a plan to successfully implement Text to 911, as required by Chapter 223 of the Acts of 2008?

Yes

  1. Did the department educate the public on the silent call feature of the statewide 911 emergency call system, as required by Appendix A of Section 2 of Title 560 of the Code of Massachusetts Regulations?

see Finding 1

  1. Have all telecommunicators been trained on Text to 911 and 911 silent call procedures so they can receive information and take appropriate action in a timely and accurate manner, as required by Section 18B of Chapter 6A of the General Laws?

Yes

 

To achieve our objectives, we gained an understanding of the State 911 Department’s internal control environment related to our audit objectives by reviewing applicable agency policies and procedures, as well as conducting inquiries with department management. We evaluated the controls over the training of telecommunicators.

We performed the following procedures to obtain sufficient, appropriate audit evidence to address the audit objectives.

Deployment of Next Gen 911 with Texting

To determine whether the State 911 Department successfully executed a plan to convert the statewide 911 emergency call system from analog to digital, we reviewed relevant documentation that addressed key areas of system infrastructure, the project timeline and schedule, staff training, and public awareness regarding the new statewide 911 emergency call system enhancements and the Text to 911 feature. This included reviewing project contracts, meeting minutes, invoicing records, staff training records, marketing campaign materials and results, website posts, and social media posts. We reviewed the State 911 Commission meeting minutes and the Commission Standards Committee meeting minutes to determine whether the commission, which oversees the State 911 Department, was kept informed of the statewide 911 emergency call system upgrade progress and of approved benchmark timeline changes. We reviewed the minutes of all seven commission meetings and both subcommittee meetings held during the audit period. We assessed the outreach plan executed by the department to determine whether the department educated the public on the conversion of the statewide 911 emergency call system from analog to digital, which enabled telecommunicators to respond to emergency calls through texting. This outreach plan included 169 public appearances at schools, retirement homes, and senior living centers; monthly newsletters posted to the agency website (14 of the 24 newsletters posted during the audit period discussed the new statewide 911 emergency call system); 16 department Facebook posts; and 2,929 public service announcements on eight television stations statewide during the audit period, July 1, 2017 through June 30, 2019.

Public Education on Silent Call Features

To determine whether the State 911 Department assisted municipalities with public education programs, including helping provide information on the 911 silent call feature, we interviewed management and found that the department did not regularly provide educational materials to Public Safety Answering Points (PSAPs) or communities.

We reviewed the department’s website posts, training manuals, monthly newsletters, and aids containing silent call procedures telecommunicators must follow when a caller needs help. We also reviewed materials presented at community organization and municipality events detailing the silent call feature.

Telecommunicator Education

We performed testing to determine whether active telecommunicators attended and received training according to the following requirements:

  • New telecommunicators were required to complete 40 hours of department-approved basic telecommunicator training and two days of 911 equipment training. 
  • New telecommunicators were required to receive both silent call and Text to 911 training as part of their new hire training requirement.
  • Active telecommunicators were required to obtain 16 hours of 911 training annually.
  • Active telecommunicators who were employed before the audit period were required to receive Next Gen 911 training on the new system, including education on how to handle Text to 911 messages. 

We selected a random, statistical sample of 60 telecommunicators from the population of 6,645 active telecommunicators, using a confidence level of 95% with a sampling error rate of 5.929%, and reviewed screenshots of active telecommunicator education records for courses administered and approved by the State 911 Department, as well as PSAP certification compliance records attesting to the fulfillment of telecommunicator training requirements. We found that all 60 of the selected active telecommunicators had received the required training without error.

Data Reliability

To gain an understanding of the PSAP Database Management System (PDMS) and controls, we interviewed information technology personnel responsible for oversight of the system. To determine the completeness and accuracy of the data, we reviewed various attributes in PDMS, including telecommunicators’ names, training dates, numbers of hours, and descriptions of courses. To assess the reliability of the telecommunicator education data in PDMS, we traced our sample of source attendance records to PDMS attendance data. We determined that the telecommunicator education data from PDMS were sufficiently reliable for the purpose of this audit.

Date published: June 30, 2021

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