The 9-1-1 Community Marks a Special Month, Part II

Part II: Who Recognized 9-1-1 Telecommunicators Best?   

In Part I of this two-part blog, we focused on how Team DCC helped NENA-The 9-1-1 Association set new records for social media performance during National 9-1-1 Education Month (April) and National Public Safety Telecommunicators Week (NPSTW or TC Week) – plus what we learned in the process.

But during TC Week this year, we noticed that online appreciation of 9-1-1 professionals by others has exploded in popularity too. (And it’s about time for the “unsung heroes of public safety”!)

In fact, we counted 289 social media posts by local public safety authorities, companies, and individuals honoring TCs and using the hashtags #TCWeek and/or #NPSTW on Facebook and LinkedIn.

I don’t have any data for prior years, but I’m certain that’s a huge increase over what occurred every April when I first got into this field over 10 years ago.

So then I was curious: Who did it best? After reviewing all 289 posts, here are some of the most notable recognitions and events I saw.

Among larger cities:

• The Chicago Office of Emergency Management & Communications (OEMC) published nine unique posts during TC Week, including multiple photos of TCs at work and a large ceremony honoring extraordinary TCs, with in-person and online remarks by Mayor Brandon Johnson and leaders of the Chicago Fire and Police departments. And don’t miss their post about 40-year OEMC Veteran Debra White. Bravo OEMC!

• The Denver Dept. of Public Safety organized a week-long celebration for telecommunicators, including daily posts featuring team members and their stories. Here’s a Facebook post capturing it all.

Among smaller cities:

• The Marshall, Texas Police Department celebrated NPSTW by securing an excellent article in the Marshall News Messenger, including a laudatory statement by the chief of police and interviews with five dispatchers.

• In Tehachapi, California in rural Kern County, the city’s emergency dispatchers were recognized by the mayor and the police chief during a meeting of the City Council. “In eastern Kern, we are the only 24/7 fully functioning agency that takes medical calls and police calls,” the chief said. “We take calls for the county when they're not able to staff their station. We also take public works calls and handle customer service at the front counter. I would put this group of communications dispatchers up against anybody, anytime.”

While this was not a scientific or all-inclusive study, the variety and quality of posts show that 9-1-1 appreciation is alive and well in many communities. Among the scores of other posts we saw, there were colorful office celebrations; goodie boxes delivered by a 9-1-1 technology vendor; free car washes for TCs by volunteers in the parking lot; and even a discount on food from a local BBQ joint.

If you’d like to see these and more examples of TC appreciation, search for the hashtags #TCWeek and #NPSTW on Facebook and LinkedIn, or check out the NENA #ThankYou911 toolkit, which provides a wealth of templates and examples that can be adapted to your needs.  

Also, if you’re going to be at NENA 2025 and want to brainstorm on the best ways to earn some love for your local 9-1-1 telecommunicators, please attend a special session on Monday, June 23 entitled, “Leveraging PR and Community Relationships to Build Local Appreciation.” The discussion will be led by myself and my colleagues Laura Tucker and Chris Nussman of NENA.

Or feel free to reach out directly anytime via our website.

Also see: Part I, NENA Sets Records for Social Media Engagement  

The 9-1-1 Community Marks a Special Month, Part I

Part I: NENA Sets Records for Social Media Engagement  

As everyone in the 9-1-1 Community knows, April is National 9-1-1 Education Month, and the second full week of April is National Public Safety Telecommunicators Week (NPSTW or TC Week). The former is an occasion to educate the public about key issues and trends in 9-1-1 service, and the latter is dedicated to recognizing the hard-working women and men of America’s 9-1-1 services.  

Naturally, our client NENA-The 9-1-1 Association works to make the most of these dates for public education and member engagement purposes. One of our signature activities each year is a month-long campaign of daily posts on NENA’s Facebook and LinkedIn pages, reaching thousands of association members as well as their colleagues, friends, and families.

Team DCC works with NENA to prepare the April social posts weeks in advance, dividing them into four “themes of the week”:

•  Kickoff Week: Links to NENA’s public education resources about 9-1-1 and its challenges

• TC Week: 9-1-1 hero stories and #ThankYou911 messages of appreciation

• Third Week: Policy issues such as the need for NG9-1-1 funding and for occupational reclassification from “administrative” to “protective service”

• Fourth Week: A grab bag including celebrity shout-outs, recent 9-1-1 news, and careers in 9-1-1.

For 2025, I’m proud to report that NENA’s social media metrics were record-breaking:

• Total Audience: NENA’s total audience across Facebook and LinkedIn grew by 16% year-over-year to nearly 30,000 followers.

• Reach and Engagement: From 2024 to 2025, impressions and reach both jumped dramatically, and total engagement (reactions + comments + shares + clicks) surged by +222%.

• LinkedIn is Hot: Despite an audience nearly half the size of what NENA has on Facebook, LinkedIn has become the highest-engagement platform, with a best-ever 7.3% average engagement rate.

Two of the top five performing posts concerned a congressional vote to reclassify TCs as protective service workers (with nearly 7,400 engagement actions) and NENA’s appeal to its members to contact their representatives about that bill (more than 4,500). This demonstrates the power of a popular policy position to drive engagement.

Another top post was a warm shout-out to TCs from actress Jennifer Love Hewitt, who plays the TC character Maddie Han on ABC’s “9-1-1.”  (We’ve developed a specialty in securing such videos!)

This year’s social media campaign also included not one but two special efforts:

•  Public Education Video: To serve its members and the public, NENA created a new 30-second video with consumer tips on how to use 9-1-1 responsibly. This single post earned almost 71,000 impressions and 1,250 engagements, including 850 re-shares.

• 9-1-1 Hero Spotlights: With support from Motorola Solutions, NENA invited its followers on Facebook and LinkedIn to submit video testimonials using the Gather Voices platform. In all, 34 videos were collected, and nine of the best were published, achieving more than 41,000 impressions and 2,000 engagements. Authentic, real-people stories are generally very strong performers.

Altogether, NENA’s April campaign on Facebook and LinkedIn represented a very robust public education and advocacy program.

Now read on to Part II: Who Recognized 9-1-1 Telecommunicators Best?   

And if you want to see creativity and engagement like this on your next campaign, simply contact us at Dale Curtis Communications.   

PR PRO TIPS: BE AUDACIOUS AND PERSISTENT

In honor of National Public Safety Telecommunicator Week — which this year comes April 13-19 — we salute the hard-working women and men of 9-1-1 everywhere. We are blessed to have the opportunity to work hard for them. Among many highlights of that experience, here’s one of my favorite professional stories ever.

In the fall of 2012, in connection with my 9-1-1 client, NENA: The 9-1-1 Association, we heard that Academy Award-winning actress Halle Berry would be playing a frontline 9-1-1 call-taker in the forthcoming film, The Call.

Our PR minds went into overdrive. How could we catch a ride on the wave of publicity that would accompany this film?

We started persistently contacting her people and the film producers, and eventually we connected with them. We explained who we were, and asked if we could collaborate.

The end result? During the film’s premiere week, we organized a special screening in Los Angeles for 200 local 9-1-1 professionals, including several of those she had worked with in preparing for the role.

The icing on the cake? The gorgeous, talented Halle Berry herself dropped by to share a few words of appreciation for the people of 9-1-1.

Needless to say, our client and everyone in attendance was over the moon. We didn't achieve our dream of getting a “Thank You 9-1-1” message on Access Hollywood or Entertainment Tonight. But we were mentioned in several Hollywood media outlets, and the social media results and bragging rights were huge. After all, how often can you arrange for your client to get a kiss from the likes of Halle Berry?

Lessons learned:

-- Be audacious and persistent. Just ask, and you never know what you might achieve.

-- Even huge celebrities will occasionally say “yes” to doing a favor for a good cause. Other VIPs will, too.

In fact, since then, we’ve developed a minor specialty in engaging celebrities to say good things about the people of 9-1-1. Check out NENA’s YouTube channel to see a few of the celebrity shout-outs we’ve gathered from Rob Lowe, Jennifer Love Hewitt, and Connie Britton (from the hit TV shows 9-1-1 and 9-1-1: Lone Star); as well as Anthony Anderson, Sean Astin, Luke Wilson, Paula Abdul, and Ice-T, who graced us with the highest-performing NENA social media post ever.