Schuylkill County Commissioners approved the hiring of 3 telecommunicator trainees on Wednesday.
The 3 hires will start at the training rate of $15.50 per hour. If they make it out of the training period and become the next desperately needed 9-1-1 dispatchers, they’d start at $16.50 per hour.
The people hired Wednesday are:
- Brandon Blank, Ashland
- Justin Boudreaux, Orwigsburg
- Karlei Olmos, Hegins
These hires come after months of public pleading by their AFSCME union representative, Andrew Koslosky, to address a severe shortage of dispatchers at the Schuylkill County 9-1-1 operations center.
Koslosky has asked Commissioners to meet with him to discuss addressing the shortage of dispatchers at Schuylkill County 9-1-1 and the pay rate he considers low.
He wants the Commissioners to open the contract that governs the pay rate for dispatchers. That contract expires in about 2 years.
There is a shortage of 7 dispatchers at Schuylkill County 9-1-1. Before today’s trainee additions, there was one other person working as a telecommunicator trainee.
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