Departments

Emergency Services

Emergency Communications

Department Information

Historical
The Bucks County Department of Emergency Communications was established on July 13, 1963 under the Bucks County District Attorney's Office to provide communications for county police departments. During the late 1970's Emergency Medical and Fire Communications services were added to the communications system. The 1980's brought the purchase of a computer-aided dispatch system used to improve the ability to process calls for service and unit status tracking. Improvements to the radio system and dispatcher training were made also.

In the 1990's we were able to implement many beneficial enhancements such as upgrading our CAD system, being the first suburban Philadelphia county to implement an Enhanced 9-1-1 system, beginning to provide Emergency Medical Dispatch (life-saving medical caller interrogation and instructions), and upgrade the county's radio infrastructure, just to name a few. The new millennium brought to Bucks County a new and enhanced digital radio system for all EMS, Fire and Police Departments, Mobile Data Terminals and the inception of both Quality Assurance and Training divisions to improve employee skills.

From the communications center's inception Bucks County has continually met the needs of the quickly growing constituency and now serves our county as a fully consolidated Enhanced 9-1-1 emergency communications system. With a trained dispatch staff of 125 (comprised of dispatchers, supervisors and managers), we currently provide emergency communications services for over 130 agencies (EMS, Fire and Police). Bucks County Department of Emergency Communications continually explores and researches new and improved ways to serve our customers, the citizens and emergency responders of Bucks County.

Contacts

Contact Name	Section / Division	Phone #	Email
Peter D. Ference	Acting Director	215-348-6626	pdference@co.bucks.pa.us
Dennis R. Forsyth Superintendent	Operations Division	215-348-6619	drforsyth@co.bucks.pa.us
David Neil, Jr. Asst. Superintendent	Operations Division	215-348-6151	dxneil@co.bucks.pa.us
W. J. Carwithen Director	Technology Division	215-345-3960	wjcarwithen@co.bucks.pa.us
Stephen H. Reichman Superintendent	Training Division	215-348-6627	shreichman@co.bucks.pa.us
Michael W. Dydak Fire/EMS Coordinator	Operations Division	215-348-6620	mwdydak@co.bucks.pa.us
Stephen E. Hildwine, Records Coordinator	Operations Division	215-348-6618	sehildwine@co.bucks.pa.us
Jon R. Stoughton, CAD Coordinator	Operations Division	215-348-6624	jrstoughton@co.bucks.pa.us

 

General Informational Phone Numbers

Administrative Office	215-348-6626
Administrative Office Fax	215-348-6689
Computer Aided Dispatch (CAD), Mobile Data	215-348-6624
EMS & Fire Communications Liaison	215-348-6620
Geo-File Coordination	215-348-6623, 6621
Radio Repair / Technology Division	215-345-3960
Records Requests	215-348-6618
Tours/ Police Communications Liaison	215-348-6151
Training / Recruitment information	215-348-6783, 6690

 

If you would like a walk-through of our communications center check out our Tours page.