By Adam Pagnucco.
Earlier today, I wrote about how the Montgomery County Police Department (MCPD) was handing off calls for service in the Rockville and Gaithersburg municipalities to city police departments. In that post, I related how I asked MCPD’s public information officer for documentation of the new policy and was told, “Unfortunately, I don’t have anything in writing to share with you.”
Well, it turns out that there was something in writing and the document appears below. The county government has confirmed its authenticity and provided a comment which will follow.
In a memo to all emergency communications center employees dated September 1, 2023, MCPD Communications Division Director Cassandra Onley wrote the following. (I included some full spellings for acronyms in italics.)
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Effective Sunday, October 1, 2023, Rockville City Police Department (RCPD) and Gaithersburg City Police Department (GCPD) will assume full and primary response responsibility for Calls for Service (CFS) within their city limits.
CFS as denoted in CAD [computer aided dispatch] as RO and GA will be primarily dispatched to the respective municipality agencies. MCPD will still assist Rockville and Gaithersburg with priority CFS. MCPD will provide backup assistance as necessary to ensure the public and officer safety is not jeopardized.
Permission to hold CFS will be obtained by the respective municipality agency.
There is no change to calls that are TRU [telephone reporting unit] qualified. Calls will be sent to TRU for handling. If a call is rerouted for patrol and it is in the RO or GA area, then a municipality unit will be dispatched or permission to hold by the municipality agency Sergeant will be obtained.
As a result of the redeployment, some PRAs [police response areas] will be changed in Rockville and some beats may not need to be filled with MCPD units. Please follow the dispatch recommendations in CAD.
All CFS outside the RO and GA city limits will follow the MCPD manner of dispatch and permission to hold for 1D [First District – Rockville] and 6D [Sixth District – Montgomery Village].
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Assistant Chief Administrative Officer Earl Stoddard, whose portfolio includes public safety, provided this comment:
As a data driven organization, MCPD regularly reviews its call for service distribution across the County. In considering the resource allocation of MCPD personnel in the municipalities – including the importance of contributions of the municipal police departments – MCPD recognized that a more equitable alignment was needed.
We are early on in this process. While the police chiefs of Gaithersburg and Rockville have been engaged with MCPD leadership, there are still additional conversations forthcoming with municipal and County leadership.
A copy of the MCPD memo on letterhead appears below.
