Recently a text message in the area was sent to 911 and police did not receive a response from the sender. To track the message took a significant amount of time. Although everything worked out, this brought to light the way we do things. (The message was not sent from the Middleton Police App but text to 911 works the same in both)
In the very near future, I will be updating the Middleton Police Mobile App.
Text to 911 was designed for emergencies when folks cannot talk or do not have enough phone signal to call but can text. It should only be used in Emergency Situations. An example of when you are encouraged to use it is when your house is broken into and you are hiding inside or during a domestic incident when you can't place a call. Another would be a medical emergency when you can't speak.
I will announce when our updates are live but what I did was create three buttons: police, fire and medical emergency. When you select each button there is a message that is copied to your messaging program on your phone that will say: There is a police emergency at: the text will contain the longitude, lattitude and accuracy of your gps device attached to your phone. (You will have to allow us to access your location)
This will give 911 an indication of what services are needed and they can obtain further dialog with you to get details.
While one should call 911 in an emergency when needed, this allows a resource when you can't make that call. Once again a first in the country by providing high end location data.
I am in the testing phases now and will have more in the near future.
When this is fully functional I will dress it up a little and make it prettier.
Once I am back to work, I will show the end result of the message so I don't broadcast my home address over the world wide web.
Always remember that text to 911 is not perfect. If you receive an error message, call 911. You don't have to say anything, just leave the line open.
If you don't have the Middleton Police Mobile App you can download the App free at these locations:
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