For Immediate Release
Contact: Communications Director, Samantha Graubard
Sgraubard@dccouncil.gov
PRESS RELEASE: COUNCILMEMBER PINTO INTRODUCES BILL TO IMPROVE AND PROTECT ACCURACY FOR 911 CALL CENTER RESPONSES
Washington DC — Today, Chairwoman of the Committee on the Judiciary and Public Safety Brooke Pinto introduced the “Emergency Medical Services Clarification Amendment Act of 2026” to improve and protect accuracy for emergency and non-emergency call responses to the Office of Unified Communications (OUC), which operates our 911 and 311 call centers.
This bill makes two key changes:
1. It clarifies the Fire & EMS Medical Director statute to explicitly codify that the Fire & EMSMedical Director is also the Medical Director of OUC. This is necessary to ensure there is no confusion or delay regarding decisions for all clinical aspects of pre-hospital emergency and medical services.
2. It codifies the training requirement that, within one year of being hired (or for current employees, within one year of this act going into effect), call takers and dispatchers be certified in Emergency Medical Dispatch (EMD), which is training for handling calls for emergency medical services. Although currently OUC requires call takers and dispatchers to be EMD-certified, this requirement is not codified. Therefore, this change is necessary to ensure OUC has national best practices training regardless of agency leadership.
This bill would ensure that accuracy and transparency in call responses match the current gains in efficiency and speed that OUC has achieved in recent years under Chairwoman Pinto’s leadership.
“All residents and visitors in the District deserve a 911 call center that is efficient, speedy, and accurate,” said Chairwoman Pinto. “While I am encouraged that there have been significant improvements in efficiency and speed at OUC, we must pass this legislation to further protect the public interest – any mistake or delay can have life-altering consequences.”
The“Emergency Medical Services Clarification Amendment Act of 2026” is part ofChairwoman Pinto’s ongoing oversight of OUC. Chairwoman Pinto’s Secure DC legislation required OUC to create a public dashboard reporting 911 call errors to increase transparency and drive down errors by showing which areas or systems have reported problems. She conducted biweekly unannounced visits to OUC’s 911 call center and held monthly public oversight hearings. In 2023, only 74% of calls the agency received were answered within20 seconds or less. Following Chairwoman Pinto’s rigorous oversight, of the 1.4 million calls the agency received in FY2025, 98% were answered in 20 seconds or less, well above the national standard.
Councilmembers Janeese Lewis George and Anita Bonds co-introduced the legislation.
You can read the full bill here.