By Will Tuell

Longtime dispatcher Karen Redman of Marshfield retired from the Washington County Regional Communications Center in Machias on July 6 after fifteen years of sending out police, fire, and ambulance services to emergencies across the Sunrise County on a full-time basis. 

Redman, whose calm, clear voice could be heard sending deputies and ambulance crews to a crash, an overdose, or a house fire, said in an interview with this publication last week that she has enjoyed almost 20 years in the field; views her co-workers as a second family; and plans on filling in on a limited basis post-retirement, but wants to spend more time with her children and grandchildren than she has been able to for the past decade and a half. 

“Washington County is very unique and very fortunate in that we have [several] dispatchers that have worked there [at the RCC] for over 30 years,” Redman said, noting that statistically, dispatchers generally only stick with the job for a year and a half. She referred to longtime dispatcher Larry Hayward of Lubec who retired after 33 years, fellow dispatcher and local photographer Phil Roberts who has worked RCC for 30 years, and other longtime co-workers who have not only defied the statistics but become family. “I absolutely loved the crew that I worked with. They were phenomenal, and I’m really going to miss them -- and I told them, ‘expect me [to drop in] for lunch.’ You spend twelve hours a day with these people, and they very much become a family. 98 percent of the time you get along great, and you might have a moment where you’re stressed and snap at somebody, but you get by it. You keep going. You do your job.”

Unlike police, fire, and ambulance workers, most people do not put names and faces to the voices on the other end of the line when they’re calling for help. Yet, as Redman said, dispatchers really don’t have time to stop, collect their thoughts, and process the emergencies they are being asked to respond to with split-second clarity and professionalism. That highwire act can, and often does, lead to burnout, making the tenure of Washington County’s RCC crew even more remarkable. 

“People don’t begin to realize when they call and scream and holler at us because they don’t think people are moving fast enough -- they have no idea that they’re not the only person in the world we’re dealing with right then,” she said. “There’s three to four of us in there and six 911 lines, not to mention the landlines, and the [police] radios. And if one of them hollers to us on the radio, they come first.” 

“There can be breaks, but you don’t want to relax,” she said, adding that the next fire, overdose, or car accident can come in at any time, and you have to be ready to respond. “It’s a highly, highly stressful job. And this county sees its share of highly stressful calls. And for me, that’s a part of it [why I’m retiring]. I’ve taken a few calls that have really put me over that edge of what I feel I can take personally; I’ve taken some really bad ones involving close friends and loss. That goes with it, but those are the ones that hit me the hardest.” 

Redman said she also has some health-related issues that are causing her to slow down and is really looking forward to being more of a part of her grandkids’ lives, school events, and sports and appreciates the flexibility of being able to fill in on a per diem basis. 

“I have severe arthritis in my hands, and I just can’t continue to do day after day on the multiple computers and multiple phones [we have]. I just can’t continue to do that pace,” she said. “You’ve got to keep pace. You can’t just sit back and slow down [when lives are on the line].”

Working dispatch, Redman explained, is not like other jobs where you can take scheduled lunch breaks, but, she said, the crew makes the best of it, oftentimes eating meals together onsite, further strengthening their bonds with one another, and the first responders they interact with on a daily basis. 

“I had a fantastic crew that I worked with, I couldn’t say enough [good] about them,” she said. “And we often fixed lunch right there for the crew, and any road [patrol] officers that wanted to pop in and eat with us were more than welcome to. Going and getting meals or getting a lunch was not always an option. Our crew often brought food in to fix right there, and there was enough for everybody who came in.” 

Redman said that some of the hardest calls she took were calls involving infants, close family members, and friends, adding that her supervisors and crewmates were always good about letting her leave in those circumstances, but that she was reluctant to do so as she felt she could be more help organizing the response to whatever emergency arose. 

“My youngest son lost a good portion of his hand in a fishing accident,” she said. “And I didn’t even realize it was him at the time of the call. [My husband] called me, and I put the pieces together. All I knew [at the time of the call] was that it was a 23-year-old male, and we needed to get LifeFlight moving. [After my husband called] I’m putting this together in my head, and I’m thinking ‘what in the world?’ Everybody was saying, ‘go, go, go!’ and I said that I might as well be here because I can coordinate on this end. I can get this stuff moving, but if I leave, there’s nothing I can do.” 

Redman went on to say that she is slowing down and not able to keep up with the pace like she once did. 

“I’m slowing down, and I really want to be in there 100-percent [or not at all],” she said. “And I really, really am at a place where I want to spend more time with my family and my grandkids especially; and be available for their school activities and games. Working 7-to-7 you miss a lot of that,” she said. “I don’t want to miss it. I don’t want to miss anything more.” 

But, she said, she fully expects she’ll get the call to fill in every so often when somebody else needs a break for a few days here and there. 

“I’m staying on per diem, so I’ll be around there now and then to help out, especially during hunting season when everybody wants to go on vacation with those moose permits,” Redman said.

Redman started with dispatch in 1999, worked part-time through 2005, left to raise a family, and worked a year in Penobscot County dispatch before returning to the Washington County RCC in 2009 as a part-timer. She took a full-time position in 2010 and has been on the front lines of emergency response ever since. Redman and her husband Ben live in Marshfield.