Percy Scott 1985 Demand Processing and Performance in Public Service BOOK

Demand Processing
AND
Performance
IN
Public Service Agencies

Stephen L. Percy
AND
Eric J. Scott
We Dedicate This Book to Our Parents and to Our Friends and Colleagues at the Workshop in Political Theory and Policy Analysis, Indiana University
Copyright 1985 by The University of Alabama Press University, Alabama 35486 All rights reserved Manufactured in the United States of America
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Percy, Stephen L. Demand processing and performance in public service agencies.
Bibliography: p. Includes index. 1. Police administration. 2. Communication in police administration. 3. Municipal services. I. Scott, Eric J. II. Title. 361 .0068 83-9325 HV7921.P375 1985 ISBN 0-8173-0204-2
Contents
Acknowledgments Part I. Demand Processing in Public Service Delivery 1. The Key Role of Demand Processing in Service Delivery Processing Demands for Service 4 Central Research Questions 5 Dimensions of Service Production Technology 7 Conceptualizing Demand 8 Characteristics of Service Demands 9 The Implications of Service Production Technology and Citizen Demand Patterns 11 Overview of Chapters 12 A Final Note Formulating a Process Model 13 2. The Anatomy of Demand Processing: The Gatekeeping and Response Coordination Functions The Gatekeeping Function 15 Eligibility Requirements and Selection of Consumers 16 Interpretation and Coding of Demands 20 Selection of Response Alternative 22 Transmission of Demand Information 23 Provision of Information to Consumers 24 The Response Coordination Function 26 Receipt and Review of Demand Information 26 Deciding the Specifics of Organizational Response 27 Communication of Demand Information to Street-Level Bureaucrats 28 Monitoring and Coordinating Staff Activities 28 Overview of the Demand Processing Function 28 A Recurrent Theme: Discretion in Demand Processing 30 The Impact of Gatekeeping and Response Coordination Functions on Service Organization Performance 31 3 xiii
15
33 34
3. Information Transmission in Demand Processing Organizations Stages of Information Flow in Demand Processing Approaches to the Study of Information 34 Characteristics of Information Flow 37 Mode of Communication 37 Message Duration 38 Message Authority 39
viii Contents 40 Contents
ix
Influences on Information Flow in Demand Processing The Coding Process 40 Demand Characteristics 42 Information Overload 44 Participation in Message Construction 45 Information Distortion 46 49 51
Part N. Demand Processing in Police Agencies
Response Articulation 102 Information Exchange during Demand Articulation 102 Information about the Complainant 1 04 Information about the Location 105 Information about Participants or Specific Problem/Incident Details 106 Demand Articulation Reviewed 108 Information Flow in Police Demand Processing 108
4. An Overview of Police Service Delivery Changing Conceptions of the Police Role 52 The Variety of Citizen Demands for Police Services 53 Service Demands in a Medium-Sized Police Department Overview of the Police Communications Study 60 56 63
114 8. Demand Processing and Police Performance A Process Model of Police Demand Processing 115 Police Gatekeeping and Performance 115 Impact of Demand Processing on Street-Level Officers 116 Impact of Demand Processing on Organizational Resources 118 Demand Processing and Performance in Fort Worth 119 Demand Processing and Performance: The Officer Perspective 120 Demand Processing and Performance: The Citizen Perspective 121 Part UL Implications for Public Service Organizations 125 127
5. The Gatekeeping Function in Police Agencies Police Gatekeeping Activities 64 Receiving Service Demands 64 Determination of Eligibility 65 Interpreting and Coding Demands 68 Selecting Initial Police Response 75 Providing Information to Callers 79 Police Gatekeeping Personnel 80 83
6. Response Coordination in Police Agencies Police Dispatchers as Response Coordinators 84 Receipt and Review of Demand Messages for Suitability of Police Response 84 Determining the Specifics of Police Response 85 Communication of Demand and Response Information to Patrol Officers 88 Monitoring Field Activities 91 Dispatcher Training, Status, and Supervision 92 94
9. The Importance of Demand Processing in Service Organizations: Realities and Prospects Demand Processing and Performance 127 The Prevalance of Discretion 129 Demand Processing and the Distribution of Services Information Flow in Public Services 136 Considerations for Public Policy 137 Ouestions for Future Research 141 References Index
134
143 150
7. Information Flow in Police Response: Exchange, Loss, and Performance Divergent Views on the Importance of Information 95 Information Cost 96 Information and Demand Processing 97 The Changing Form of Citizen Calls for Police Service 99 Demand Articulation 99 Internal Relay 100
Tables and Figures

Tables 38 58 67 70 71 72 78 87 89
91 104 106 107 110 112 123
3 1 Common Communication Modes in Public Service Organizations 4-1 Distribution of Citizen Calls for Service in Fort Worth, Texas 5-1 Reasons why Service Not Provided by Fort Worth Police Department to Some Calls for Service 5-2 Means by Which Demand Information Was Acquired by Police 5-3 Signal Codes Used by the Fort Worth Police Department 5-4 Distribution of Service Requests Classified as Disturbances (Signal 14) by the Fort Worth Police Department 5-5 The Distribution of Fort Worth Police Department Operator Responses to Calls for Service 6-1 Mean Dispatch Time of Fort Worth Police Department to Intermediate Priority Calls, 1980 6-2 Dispatcher Assignment of Backup Patrol Units, by Selected Fort Worth Police Department Complaint Codes 6-3 Extent to Which Fort Worth Police Department Dispatchers Furnish Detailed Location/Participants/Problem Descriptions to Responding Officers 7-1 Frequency and Source of Call Taker Information about Complainant 7-2 Frequency and Source of Call Taker Information about Incident/Problem Location 7-3 Frequency and Source of Call Taker Information about Incident/Problem Details/Participants 7-4 Loss of Information about Incident/Problem Details or Participants during Initial Police Demand Processing 7-5 Loss of Specific Information about Incident/Problem Location during Initial Police Demand Processing 8-1 Reasons for Citizen Dissatisfaction with Police Operator Responses
xi
Tables and Figures
Acknowledgments
Figures 10 29 34 101 117
1-1 Typology of Problems/Needs Based on Intensity and Immediacy 2-1 Stages in Demand Processing in Public Service Organizations 3-1 Information Flow in Demand Processing 7-1 Fort Worth Police Department Complaint Card 8-1 Linking Gatekeeping and Response Coordination Activities to Performance
This book and the research efforts underlying it would not have been possible without the valuable assistance and cooperation afforded us by a large number of people. We would like to thank them and express our appreciation for their efforts. The research for this study, including the collection of data on calls for service in Fort Worth, was funded by a grant (80-IJ-CX-0014) from the National Institute of Justice (NIJ) to the Work shop in Political Theory and Policy Analysis at Indiana University. We appreciate this support and the substantive as well as administrative assistance provided by our program monitor at NIJ, William E. Saulsbury. We are greatly indebted to our field research hosts at the Fort Worth Police Department (FWPD), who could not have made our research tasks easier or more enjoyable. Without their permission to monitor tape recordings of calls for service and dispatch transmissions, our study would not have been possible. We wish to thank Chief H. F. Hopkins for allowing us to conduct the study and for providing us with office space convenient to the departments communication center. We owe a large debt to many officers and civilians in the department who provided technical assistance and cooperation. Lt. David Dees and Officer David Garrett were especially helpful in initiating the project. Deputy Chief B. M. Kennedy of the Technical Services Bureau and Lt. Ben Dumas of the Communications Division facilitated our monitoring of calls. Ser geantsJ. R. Brizendine and M. M. Gresham and Officer Chris Drake were particularly gracious in explaining complicated telephone and dispatch ing procedures and the computer-aided dispatch system. Deputy Chief Homer Clark facilitated the distribution of the officer survey. To the FWPD call takers and dispatchers we extend our sincere appreciation for their assistance throughout the project. We also wish to thank the many citizens of Fort Worth who agreed to be interviewed regarding their contact with the police and to the officers who completed and returned our quest,onnaires. Our efficient and personable Fort Worth research staff unit carried out their assigned tasks with ability and good humor. Asha Swarup filled the role of citizen-interview coordinator and general resource person with much skill and vitality, She was instrumental in all phases of the project, from survey design through data collection and analysis. A number of people at the Workshop in Political Theory and Policy Analysis at Indiana University contributed to our research efforts and to preparation of this volume. We wish to thank Elinor Ostrom for her continual support and guidance, not only during this project, but also throughout our careers at Indiana University. She has been an inspira tional source of intellectual stimulation as well as a wise counselor and xiii
xiv
Acknowledgments
Part I
Demand Processing in Public Service Delivery
good friend. Without he this book would not have been written. Vincent Ostrom and Roger B. Parks also provided encouragement and support throughout our tenure at the university. We are indebted to other colleagues at the workshop who stimulated our thinking and reviewed our work, especially John Mclver, Judith Gillespie, and Rick Wilson. The workshop has been a unique place to work: a home as well as an office. We salute it. Rida Scott of the workshop staff not only assisted in instrument design, but also super vised the data entry staff and created a data base management system that smoothly and efficiently transformed raw data into analyzable format in record time. Carol Lambert also provided computer expertise. Gillian Nevin and Barbara Hassell managed project accounts and gave valuable administrative assistance. Patty Smith was primarily responsible for word processing and editing the manuscript; she deserves our special thanks for her expert help and patience. She was ably assisted by Teresa Therrien, who also aided in editing and proofing. Marsha Ellis has been an ideal secretary and merits particular gratitude. Without the assistance of all these people, this volume would not have been possible. We wish to thank them all while retaining all responsibility for its contents.
0I The Key Role of Demand Processing in Service Delivery
Organizations that deliver public services are pervasive in modern soci ety. These agencies endeavor, among other things, to protect citizens from crime, provide housing to the poor and elderly, prevent and sup press fires, educate children, and treat the sick and injured. Given the broad scope of services provided in American communities, it is clear that individuals are directly or indirectly affected by such organizations on a daily basis. The delivery of public services has been closely scrutinized in recent years by officials, researchers, administrators, and citizen groups. One stimulus to these efforts has been an erosion of citizen satisfaction with public services. This dissatisfaction is manifest in growing complaints and pressures for improvements. A second stimulus has been the tre mendous growth of services as a proportion of total public employment and governmental budgets. Study of service delivery has also been prompted by budgetary concerns; facing stagnant or shrinking reve nues, many governments have sought ways to maintain current opera tional levels despite lower expenditures. All these factors have stimulated research about the programs and arrangements used to deliver services as well as the impact of delivery systems on organiza tional performance and citizen well-being. The examination of service delivery has proceeded from several per spectives. Some researchers have concentrated on the interactions be tween individuals consuming services and agency personnel who provide them (bee, for example, Lipsky, 1980, and Goodsell, 1981). An other topic has been the comparative efficiency of public and private service producers (e.g., Savas, 1982). Urban scholars have examined the distribution of services to community residents in an effort to explain who obtains them and why (e.g., Jones, 1977; Jones, et al., 1980; Levy, Meltzner, and Wildavsky, 1974). And still another research question has focused on the consequences of increased bureaucratization on agency responsiveness and efficiency. To a much lesser extent, analysts have studied the initial interaction between bureaucracies and individuals requesting services. For exam-
The Key Role of Demand Processing
pIe, few studies of public welfare have considered the procedures used by intake workers, nor have studies of police services paid much atten tion to the processing of calls for service. During this initial interaction, citizens articulate their needs, and agencies process them as the first step in providing services. Delivery often commences only when an agency is contacted for assistance. Agency personnel, acting as gatekeepers, receive these requests, screen and process them, and initiate organizational response. Next, other individuals in the demand processing system assign personnel and coordinate response efforts. Their actions precede the subsequent face-to-face encounters between citizens and agency representatives. The premise of this book is that the initial interaction between service seekers and organizational gatekeepers has important implications for service delivery and therefore deserves close scrutiny. The purpose of this volume is to explore the initial exchange between citizens and agencies, consider the processing of service demands, and trace the impact of demand processing on subsequent actions of organizational representatives, such as police officers, teachers, and welfare caseworkers.
Processing Demands for Service
coding demand information, and activating response. These activities, though seldom examined in organizational studies, exert a significant impact on organizational responses to service demands. In some in stances, gatekeepers not only mediate but also directly provide service, such as giving needed information. This, too, points to the importance of the gatekeeping function. Unlike gatekeepers, personnel assigned to response coordination seldom interact with individuals needing services. The primary purpose of response coordinators is to review demand information received from gatekeepers and determine the specific dimensions of organizational response. They decide, for example, the order in which demands are serviced and the assignment of personnel to handle them. Once these decisions are made, response coordinators communicate demand infor mation to the delivery staff and coordinate their efforts. The case of police services may help to clarify these two functions. Telephone operators, serving as gatekeepers, gather service request information from callers, and make some initial determination of eligibil ity as well as agency response (e.g., whether or not a police officer should be sent). Next, this information is routed to the police dispatcher, who, as response coordinator, makes further decisions about response and forwards data concerning demands and responses to officers who will respond to the call. Police agencies may be more structurally differentiated as to gatekeeping and response coordination functions than other service organizations, where both functions might be performed by the same official. This seems to be the case in some welfare offices where the intake worker both obtains information on service requests and forwards the client (or his file) to a caseworker. The point here is that two separate functions are involved in processing service demands and they may or may not be performed by the same official.
Demand processing refers to the system by which agencies receive and interpret service request signals and activate response. Two primary functions are involved in demand processing: gatekeeping and response coordination. Gatekeeping may be thought of as boundaryspanning activities that mediate agency contacts with service-seeking individuals. Response coordination involves determination of the nature and scope of organizational response and communication of demand and response information to the street-level personnel who provide assistance. Both gatekeeping and response coordination functions are basic in service agencies; they cannot operate effectively without them. Gatekeepers serve primarily as people-processors, by determining the appropriate status of persons demanding service in terms of agency rules, priorities, and constraints. Functioning as intake workers, gatekeepers differ somewhat from street-level bureaucrats (Lipsky, 1980), who act as people-changers, by performing direct activities to change the attributes or behavior of individuals. Personnel engaged in gatekeeping mediate the relationship between consumers and streetlevel personnel, who ultimately provide services. The functions of gatekeepers include determining eligibility for service, gathering and
Central Research Questions

Analyzing the demand processing function through which service agencies receive and respond to demands is the purpose of this volume. Demand processing sets the overall work agenda and determines which demands are serviced and which are not. In the chapters that follow, each of the demand processing functions_gatekeeping and response coordinationis explored in detail, first from the general perspective of public services and then in the specific context of police service delivery.
6 possible forms of individual interactions with organizations. Demand characteristics, both at the individual and aggregate levels, pose impor tant contingencies for organizations providing public services. After con sidering these topics, we assess the relationships of technology and demand characteristics to demand processing and organizational performance.
The activities of each function are outlined and related to agency performance. In reviewing gatekeeping and response coordination tasks, attention is given to the personnel who perform these functions. These individuals are usually situated in the lower echelons of organizational bureau cracies. Yet, despite their position, which is often accompanied by low status and remuneration, they exercise substantial discretion in the way they carry out job tasks. This has major implications for the overall process of handling demands. Our analysis will also consider the interrelationships among demand processing tasks. The actions of gatekeepers and response coordinators are usually sequential, and the impact of early decisions and actions can influence subsequent decisions governing organizational response. Thus, the flow of decisions and tasks must be traced through the response process. Recognition of the sequential nature of demand processing leads to another central question, namely the structuring and flow of information, which is the key input, or resource, in demand processing. After all, it is information that service seekers communicate to gatekeepers, and in formation that enables gatekeepers to determine eligibility and activate agency responses. This flow guides the decisions and actions of other agency personnel and affects service delivery in a multitude of ways. This brings us to the ultimate question of our inquiry: how does demand processing affect the overall performance of agencies and the individual services received by citizens? Although many reform efforts and research studies have examined the influence of agency activities on performance, few have explored the effect of demand processing func tions. Gatekeeping and response coordination have usually been seen as support services that impact only slightly on the actions of street-level bureaucrats, which are often presumed to have the most significant bearing on performance. The chapters that follow will demonstrate that demand processing affects the performance of service delivery organ izations and will identify key places where organizational reform in de mand processing may improve service quality. Before we directly consider these research questions, two topics related to the structure and functioning of service agencies should be reviewed. The first concerns service production technologies, or the means by which organizations transform individual attributes and behav iors. Although these technologies remain somewhat indeterminate, they influence the design and operation of service-providing organizations. Second, we consider the definition and characteristics of demands. The concept of demand is rather amorphous because it connotes several Dimensions of Service Production Technology
Technology refers to knowledge about transformation activities that change one object or attribute into another. Hasenfeld (1972> dis tinguishes between organizations that are people-processors and people-changers. The former act to change the status or classification of individuals, and the latter attempt to modify human behaviors. Public service agencies usually act as both processors and changers; the processors receive and channel service requests, and the changers assist those needing aid. To say that service organizations transform human beings rather than physical objects is as significant as it is simplistic. Human beings are heterogeneous creatures, possessing a large set of identifying traits, attitudes, values, experiences, and behaviors. The diversity of individual attributes creates major contingencies for the organization. Production of services requires assisting unique and differentiated persons who require varying amounts and types of services. Because of the complex ity of human characteristics and problems, it is usually impossible to identify one or a few production methods that will universally generate desired service outcomes. Instead, a large number of technologies is required, and the selection of appropriate production activities becomes a key organizational function. The fact that human beings are the raw materials of service production highlights a second point: production necessarily involves the interaction of agents with persons receiving services. Consumers are rarely passive participants in the process of service production. Instead, human beings are self-activating entities whose responses are determined not only by what is being done to them, but also by their own desires, motivations, attitudes, and past learning (Hasenfeld and English, 1974: 8>. Not only do individuals possess unique characteristics, but they are also neces sarily part of service production because they are the objects being transformed. The cooperation and participation of service consumers, or clients, what some have called coproduction, creates another con tingency for service producing organizations (Brudney and England,
8 service-related assistance based upon individual need or want. De mands are thus overt service requests initiated by individuals for the purpose of triggering a response by one or more agencies. One can debate the sources of citizen needs and hence the determin ants of service demands. Jones and colleagues (1980: 44) argue that needs are usually determined by location rather than by personal charac teristics. Although locational factors can affect needs, it seems unwise to ignore individual characteristics, which may be more important than location in determining some consumer demands. As described above, the attributes, predispositions, and other characteristics of individuals represent significant elements of service production. Individual needs for health and psychological services, for example, are usually influenced as much by personal attributes as by locational factors. Other organizational analysts have argued that demands can be af fected by factors such as consumer information about services ren dered, stigmatization associated with consumption of services (e.g., level welfare), past negative interactions with the service agency, and the of bureaucratization and impersonality (Katz and Danet, 1973a; Greenley, 1980; Oyen, 1980; Lipsky, 1980; Prottas, 1981). The question of the determinants of consumer demand for human services is an interesting one, yet it will not be pursued in this study. For our purposes, we will consider demands as more or less given for all service organizations. Although in some sense they need demands in order to justify continued existence and funding, most of them do not need to stimulate demand. Instead, they face excessive workloads and are concerned with distributing limited services.
1983; Percy, 1983; Percy and Baker, 1981; Parks, etal., 1981; Whitake 1980; Sharp, 1980). Unless consumers are willing to participate in the process of production, service activities will probably not yield any fruit ful results (Parsons, 1960; Katz and Kahn, 1966; Parks, et al., 1981). Indeed, as Garn and colleagues (1976: 1415) note, the person being served (the client or consumer) is inevitably part of the production process, if there is to be any production whatsoever, The nature of service productionthe attributes or behaviors of indi viduals to be transformed-_is a major technological consideration. Greenley and Kirk (1973) term an organizations sphere of activity as its domain. Organizations and their production technologies vary signifi cantly in terms of domain, that is, in terms of the particular statuses, attributes, or behaviors with which they are concerned. Psychiatric clinics and hospitals transform mental perceptions and thought pro cesses. Hospitals are concerned with human biological processes, and schools deal with intellectual and social growth. Organizations may also be concerned with stimulating behavioral changes. Schools teach so cially accepted behaviors, and criminal justice agencies work to dis courage and punish antisocial actions. Thus, although all service organizations are concerned with transforming people, the focus and scope of such efforts are often quite different. As we shall see, these dimensions of service production technology influence organizational structure and operation, including the manner in which demands are processed.
Conceptualizing Demand Characteristics of Service Demands Consumer demands have multiple characteristics or dimensions that pose various implications for demand processing systems. Demands vary in terms of at least three factors: intensity, immediacy, and specifici ty. Intensity refers to the seriousness of the signaled want or need to an individuals well-being. Clearly the intensity of demands received by g service organizations varies widely. At one extreme are life-threatenin of nance mainte to crucial be can ntion situations where agency interve individual health and well-being. At the other extreme are demands that, if left unmet, will be of slight detriment to those requesting service. A second demand characteristic is immediacy which refers to the speed to which needs must be attended. Some require rapid response to sustain or improve an individuals well-being; others do not require
A requisite task of an analysis of demand processing is to define the concept of demand. Consumer demands for services can be viewed in several ways. At a broad level, they may be conceptualized as citizenagency contacts aimed at affecting general policies and procedures related to service delivery. Lobbying efforts, voting, complaints about service, and other kinds of citizen participation directed at influencing the operation of service organizations might be considered as measures of demand. Another concept of demand denotes particular requests for service made of public agencies by individuals or groups. This notion is similar to the concept of consumer demand used by economists and is appropriate for our analysis. A service demand may be thought of as a signal commu nicated to express a need or desire for some kind of resource or as sistance. A demand upon a service agency is a signaled request for
lo The Key Role of Demand Processing
11
Figure 1-1 Typology of Problems/Needs Based on Intensity and Immediacy
INTENSITY High Illiteracy; life-threatening illness; welfare assistance Fire in an apartment building; heart attack; motor vehicle accident with injuries The Implications of Service Production Technology and Citizen Demand Patterns
Low
sources within the confines of excess demand. The sequencing of demands also represents a problem; patterns of incoming demands may produce unpredictable levels of requests for organizational resources and efforts. Demand patterns may vary randomly, by time of day, day of week, season, and other factors. Effective response to these varying patterns requires the careful allocation of organizational resources.
Low
Insufficient skills in geography
IMMEDIACY
High
Fire in an abandoned shack; school breakin signaled by an alarm
instantaneous attention. Although immediacy is often correlated with intensity, the two can vary independently, as suggested in figure 11. Some needs or problems require immediate attention if service is to be provided, though the potential impact on individuals is relatively low (e.g., a fire in an abandoned shack). Other needs, such as illiteracy or chronic illness, exert a highly significant impact on human welfare, yet do not necessitate rapid response. A third demand characteristic is the specificity of individual needs or wants. Some are clearly and concisely communicated, such as requests to a library for a certain book or to a hospital for dispatch of an ambulance to a specified location. Demands in other instances consist of general statements of problems instead of specific requests or desired re sponses. Where demand is relatively nonspecific, the requesters may expect the organization to interpret the problem and select an appropri ate response. This type of demand is quite typical of those made to several types of service producers. Patients can often describe only general symptoms to their doctor, whom they expect to determine the exact nature of the problem and take appropriate medical action. Police agencies, too, often face nonspecific demands. Callers may report a family disturbance next door or state that a strange person is wander ing in the neighborhood. These callers expect the police to determine whether or not a problem exists, and, if so, to take care of it. At a more aggregate level, the volume, array, and sequencing of demands produce important contingencies for service organizations. The public expects that they should be able to handle all legitimate demands relevant to specified domains. However, scarcity of resources usually precludes service provision for all demands. These limitations require organizations to establish rationing mechanisms to allocate re
Service production technology and demand characteristics influence many aspects of organizational structure, operation, and performance. Our concern here is with their impact on demand processing. The technology and demands associated with service production require organizations to establish people-processing mechanisms that mediate relationships between the persons signaling demands and the streetlevel bureaucrats (people-changers) who ultimately deliver services. Al though people-processing has been relatively ignored in treatments of public service delivery, it is an integral part of organizational response and performance. The characteristics of demands and technological consid erations have five major implications for the demand processing function. First, the diversity of technologies and demands points to the need for organizations to devise screening mechanisms. Their purpose is to make sense of diverse demand signals and examine their legitimacy in terms of organizational domain, A central task in screening is to determine the characteristics of service demands that are most relevant to organiza tional response, including the nature, immediacy, and intensity of the problem being signaled. The information obtained through screening is used to determine whether or not and how the organization might respond to individual demands. As we shall see, screening is a primary purpose of the gatekeeping function. Second, the volume and variation in demand patterns require creation of rationing mechanisms to buffer the organization from an uncertain, demanding environment (Prottas, 1981). These mechanisms may be thought of as the ru:es and routines that guide service allocation. They take on prime importance when an organization faces high demand relative to supply capacity. Several analysts have argued that demand for services usually grows so as to match, if not surpass, the supply of those provided. Many agencies face relatively high demand loads compared to their resources and personnel. Given conditions of excess demand,
12 response coordination function outlines central research questions and discusses the effects of service demands and production technology The next chapter examines the gatekeeping and response coordination functions in detail, focusing directly on the tasks performed and their relationship to overall organizational response. The central role of infor mation processing and flow as it applies to organizations is analyzed in chapter 3. Part II applies the concepts of demand processing to one specific service the police This is an appropriate area to apply arguments about demand processing because the police face a large and varied pattern of citizen demands and because their gatekeeping and response coordina tion tasks are functionally separate in all but the smallest departments Chapter 4 considers the service role of the police and documents the types of services they are asked to deliver. The next two chapters analyze how the gatekeeping and response coordination functions are performed in urban police agencies. Chapter 7 focuses on the flow and channeling of information associated with responding to calls for police service The intimate relationship of demand processing and information flow to performance is considered in chapter 8 The purpose of part Ill is to relate demand processing to the perform ance of several kinds of public service organizations. It synthesizes our analysis and highlights conclusions about the impact of demand pro cessing on performance. Also considered are the consequences and structuring of discretion, implications for public policy that result from our analysis, and suggestions for organizational changes that might lead to improvements in service delivery
13
rationing is required to determine how scarce resources will be distributed. Third, because of the nature of service production and the diversity of human needs, demand processing activities ordinarily involve substan tial discretion. The persons who perform demand processing functions are usually considered to be low-level bureaucrats. But, unlike their counterparts in traditional bureaucracies, they exercise considerable latitude in performing demand processing tasks and activating the provi sion of services. Discretion is a necessary by-product of service technol ogy and the diversity of human needs potentially relevant to service production. People-processors must handle exceptionally diverse de mands from persons needing multiple kinds and amounts of service. Diversity in human problems requires that demand processors interpret demand signals and make decisions as to the appropriate agency re sponse; these actions involve substantial levels of choice and selec tivitythat is, discretionary decision making. Fourth, the existence of low-level discretion in service organizations suggests problems for maintaining organizational supervision of workers in demand processing roles. Widespread discretion makes evaluation of performance more difficult because no clear set of appropriate work behaviors and decisions can be formulated. Monitoring or supervising work effort is also complicated where discretion is prevalent in each and every organizational interaction with the environment. Thus, a recurring problem for organizations is maintaining effective control of the demand processing function. Finally, consideration of the demand processing function points to the significance of information flow and processing in public service organi zations. Literature on organizations has extensively examined the flow of messages and control across hierarchical levels. Howeve little attention has been given to the horizontal flow of information in demand-related transactions between service organizations and the persons they serve. Demand signals are composed of facts that are primary organizational inputs. Processing demands entails the receipt, interpretation, coding, and transmission of information at multiple points in the organization. Its flow, affected by all of these tasks, is critical to organizational operation and effectiveness in responding to consumer needs. A Final Note: Formulating a Process Model
Overview of Chapters
Part I of this volume examines demand processing in organizations that provide public services. Chapter 1 identifies the gatekeeping and
Our analysis did not begin with a well formulated theory or set of propositions. Because demand processing is relatively unexplored in service producing organizations, no concise theory exists that explains how it works or how it is related to performance, Our research reflects a more inductive approach. In previous research studies and through con versations with public administrators, we found evidence and arguments to suggest that the activities of street-level personnel, which have re ceived widespread attention and study, are influenced by the initial screening and processing of demands. Given this evidence, we set out to explore how demands are processed and how that affects the activities and performance of street-level personnel.
14
2
The Anatomy of Demand Processing: The Gatekeeping and Response Coordination Functions
This volume represents an effort to create a process model of demand processing. That is, it provides a framework describing the component tasks of demand processing and their interrelationship. We concur with Whitaker and colleagues (1982: 108) that formulation of process models is a necessary first step in understanding organizational operation and performance. Readers will find in this volume a descriptive model of the tasks of demand processing, both generally within public service organ izations and specifically in police agencies. Empirical evidence from a major study of police communications is used to document demand processing activities in police agencies. Later chapters turn to argu ments about how various tasks in demand processing can individually and cumulatively affect organizational performance. This book repre sents an effort at theoretical development through careful delineation and description of demand processing tasks, consideration of influences on the way these tasks are performed, and linkage of tasks to the performance of service delivery organizations.
4
Organizations that provide public services require demand processing systems in order to operate efficiently. Without gatekeepers and re sponse coordinators, they would be overloaded with individual demands and incapable of activating and coordinating effective response efforts. Together, these two demand processing functions structure the opera tional agenda of agencies and influence delivery efforts in ways that affect organizational performance. This chapter presents a detailed de scription of demand processing in service agencies, its component tasks, and its relationship to overall response activities.
The Gatekeeping Function The concept of gatekeeper has been used in several organizational contexts. Media analysts have used it in studies of newsmen who make decisions about what is published, most often focusing on the editor see, for example, Carter, 1958). Lewin (1947) used the gatekeeping idea when considering social channels that affect a populations food con sumption habits Thompson (1967) formulated the notion of boundary spanning similar to that of gatekeeping in discussions of how organiza tions seek to adapt to an uncertain task environment. Political scientist David Easton used the concept of gatekeeper in his analysis of political systems. For him, gatekeepers function at the bound ary of systems, potentially initiating political demands as well as guiding them through the response processes of the systems (Easton, 1965: 8796). Gatekeepers are seen as key agents in maintenance of political systems through their role in satisfying political demands originating in he environment. The gatekeeping and intake concepts have been employed in analyses of access to and distribution of public services. Deutscher (1968) used the gatekeeper idea in a study of a housing authoritys distribution of subsidized housing. Others have applied gatekeeping, or intake, notions n studies of social services, including health and hospitals (Scott, 1967;
16
The Anatomy of Demand Processing
17
Prottas, 1979) as well as welfare services (Stark, 1959). These studies have been largely descriptive, involving detailed characterization of gatekeeping activities but paying little attention to the consequences of the gatekeeper function for organizational performance. Gatekeeping is defined in this analysis as the boundary-spanning activities through which agencies receive and interpret demand signals and initiate (or refuse) organizational response. The gatekeeping function involves several steps or processes through which the organization mediates interactions with its environment: determination of eligibility, coding demand information, selection of response alternatives, trans mission of demand messages, and provision of information to consumers.
Eligibility Requirements and Selection of Consumers
One primary boundary-spanning task performed by gatekeepers is determining whether persons seeking service and/or their needs are legitimate in terms of organizational rules and policies governing domain. When communicating with those seeking services, gatekeepers seek data in order to assess eligibility. As Nagi (1974: 48) notes, determination of eligibility is a quasi-legal decision: Gate-keeping decisions in service organizations are similar to legal decisions and are often termed quasi judicial. These decisions are primarily oriented to establishing rights of applicants and determining their entitlement to services or benefits for which they apply. The quasi-legal nature of eligibility determination results from the application of more or less formally established rules and procedures about what needs constitute legitimate domain for organizational functioning. The principal purpose of eligibility rules is to guide gatekeeper selec tion of consumers, or clients, from the full set of individuals demanding service. Selectivity is a necessary organizational function, especially given the frequent situation of excess demand. As Greenley (1980: 79) notes: The services provided by social welfare organizations are dis tributed selectively, This is both necessary and desirable. Certain people need these services and others do not. Since the amount of service any social service agency can supply is limited and usually must be rationed, difficult selection decisions must be made. Selectivity usually cannot be avoided because of high demand levels and limited resources. The difficulty lies in devising eligibility requirements that both protect the organization from an uncertain, demanding environment and provide adequate services to persons needing assistance.
The criteria used for determining eligibility are varied, but often include reference to geographic boundaries, service domain, and seriousness of need. The physical positioning of those needing service in terms of geographical boundaries is one common form of eligibility requirement. Selectivity in providing services often represents an effort to limit con sumption to persons who have financed them through payment of taxes. Citizens are assessed by governmental units for service delivery costs through a variety of taxing schemes, including income, property, and sales taxes. Given that citizens within some political jurisdiction have financed service delivery, one purpose of eligibility requirements is to limit consumption to residents of the jurisdiction. Municipal police and fire departments, for example, will seldom respond to requests made by individuals outside of jurisdictional boundaries (e.g., city limits). Similarly, children will usually not be admitted to a public school unless their family resides within the school district. A second set of eligibility requirements relates to service domain. Organizations select or are charged with producing some general type of service. Fire departments deal with fire prevention and suppression, police with crime and law enforcement, and hospitals with enhancing human health. Within these broad domains, however, organizations must define what particular set of services will be provided and are considered part of their legitimate responsibility. Hospitals must deter mine what set of health-care activities and facilities will be provided, and schools must decide which subjects to include in their curricula. These selected services and activities become a prime basis for judging the appropriateness of demands; requests that are not included within the organizations domain will seldom be handled. Agencies facing high demand relative to available resources may choose to restrict the number of services offered. Some police agencies facing manpower shortages have begun to refuse nonemergency ser vices, such as performing vacation checks on residences and assisting motorists locked out of vehicles. Similarly, schools facing budgetary constraints have begun to reduce the subjects taught and the extracur ricular activities sponsored. Through enforcement of eligibility require ments, gatekeepers assist in the process of rationing scarce services. A third group of eligibility requirements employed by agencies is related to seriousness of need, including consideration of immediacy and intensity. Persons judged to be the most needy according to specified criteria are most likely to receive services. Specialized educational pro grams, for example, may be made available only to those with the greatest need. Reading programs are often open only to persons judged to have serious reading deficiencies. Recently some schools have cre
18 The Anatomy of Demand Processing become a tenantall of these depend, in large part, upon the impression he makes on the gatekeeper at initial contact. Similarity between con sumer and gatekeeper attitudes and characteristics may thus subtly act to enhance eligibility. Also, the values of the gatekeeper can affect orientations toward clients needs, worthiness, and likelihood of being successfully served. Professionalism has been identified as another variable that may enter gatekeeping decisions about consumer eligibility (Deutscher, 1968; Katz and Danet, 1973a; Lipsky, 1980; Bidwell and Vreeland, 1963; Hasenfeld and English, 1974). Professional training may be associated with accept ance of a particular set of approaches, values, and activities related to service production. These influence orientations toward who should be served and how they should be served. Professional biases can affect boundary-spanning decisions, both in terms of the formulation of eligibil ity rules and their application by gatekeepers. In many demand contexts, personal and organizational biases may interact to impact on eligibility decisions. Numerous studies have shown that consumer characteristics, such as race, income, ethnic background, intelligence scores receptivity to treatment and social status affect gatekeeping decisions (Nagi, 1974; Greenley and Kirk, 1973; Deutsche 1968; Sjoberg, et al., 1966; Hasenfeld, 1972). The research does not clarify the motivations underlying these discriminatory biases. Both personal and organizational factors are apparently at work in a complex pattern. Two other points should be made before leaving the topic of eligibility determination. First, gatekeeping activities may discourage consumers from continuing their quest for services. The process of applying may entail substantial costs to them, including monetary, time, informationgathering, psychological, and opportunity costs (Lipsky, 1980: 8894). The extent of these costs are a function of several factors related to consumer-gatekeeper interaction, or more specifically, of queuing rules, eligibility requirements, organizational facilities and routines, and gatekeeper treatment. Especially significant in many social services are the psychological costs associated with seking them. In a study of local welfare officers, Pesso (1978: 322) identified several factors that influ ence applicant dignity and self-esteem: 19
ated special classes for gifted students. Seriousness of need is also an important criterion in assessing eligibility for welfare and housing pro grams designed to assist poor and low-income families. Enforcement of eligibility requirements is one means of service ration ing that buffers organizations from demands they judge to be outside the specified domain. They may thus avoid responding to particular kinds of demands that they do not wish to handle. Rationing through eligibility requirements also tends to reduce the overall volume of demands to a more manageable level. Determination of eligibility might seem to be more or less a routine function involving little discretion on the part of gatekeepers. This is often not the case, however. Although some eligibility rules are specific, oth ers, especially those related to seriousness of need, are not precisely specified. The problem of concretely defining or measuring the extent of human needs makes the formulation and application of eligibility require ments quite difficult in many service contexts. Where eligibility guide lines are less exact, gatekeepers exercise more latitude in making decisions about access to services. For this reason, the extent of gatekeeper discretion in granting access to the organization tends to vary inversely with the specificity of eligibility requirements that it establishes and enforces. Where discretion in determining eligibility is high, decisions about whether or not the organization accepts the demand and activates a response are made more or less subjectively by the gatekeeper. Both personal and organizational biases, in addition to formal rules and rou tines, may influence eligibility decisions. One organizational bias is the selection of consumers who are most likely to be successfully serviced or treated (Hasenfeld, 1972; Greenley and Kirk, 1973; Lipsky, 1980), Lipsky (1980: 107) refers to this process as creaming. The incentives for creaming rest on the assumption that either bureaucrats within the organization or the organization itself will be rewarded for successfully assisting consumers. Organizational rewards include increased or main tained budgets; personal rewards include promotions or salary increases. Personal biases and predispositions of gatekeepers may similarly in fluence admitting demands to the process of organizational response. The demeanor and appearance of service seekers have been identified as factors that affect gatekeeping decisions. Deutscher (1968: 40) de scribes how personal evaluations by the gatekeeper play a key role in determining eligibility for housing: Whether or not the prospective applicant becomes an eligible applicant, whether or not the eligible applicant becomes a tenant, and in which project he is most likely to In performing their routine duties, intake workers may affect participants sense of dignity in a variety of ways. The intake workers general ac cessibiiity to applicants, the manner in which applicants are summoned from the waiting room, whether the door is left opened or closed, the
20
21
interviewing technique and the intake workers overat manner toward applicantsall have an impact on applicants self-esteem.
These costs may be so great in initially seeking access that consumers select themselves out, terminating their demand-seeking efforts (Kirk and Greenley, 1974). Prottas (1981: 528> refers to this phenomenon as elopement and argues that elopement rates of 10 percent are common in welfare agencies. Thus, intake facilities, processing rules, and gatekeeper treatment are organizational factors that can intentionally or unintentionally diminish demands by discouraging consumers from making them. A second point is that organizations can provide limited assistance in cases where demands are judged ineligible for organizational response. One aid often provided to ineligible applicants is some form of referral, including the provision of information about or formal connection with some other service-providing organization. Referral represents one means of refusing major organizational response while assisting con sumers in locating other agencies that may provide requested or needed help. In reviewing major studies of the outcome of service applications, Kirk and Greenley (1974) found that on the average about a third of all applicants were referred to another source by the agency to which they first applied. In a sense, some assistance is provided through referral activities, though admission is denied to organizational service. Referral can serve as one means of rationing services by means of shifting demands to other agencies.
Interpretation and Coding of Demands
Once eligibility is determined and granted, a second gatekeeper task is interpretation and coding of demand messages. Incoming requests may be simple or complex, depending upon the nature and seriousness of the needs involved as well as on the communication skills of the consumer. Demands are originally articulated by consumers from their point of view in their terminology, and based on their expectations about response. The gatekeeper must make sense out of these communications by determining what needs are represented and their urgency. This inter pretation function can be difficult where needs are complex or im precisely articulated by consumers. Gatekeepers employ various means to clarify and make sense of unclear demand messages. The techniques used to decipher them vary in terms of communication mode and the degree of gatekeeper par-
ticipation in the exchange. In face-to-face contexts where demands are verbally communicated, consumers can be questioned to clarify problem situations, For example, during face-to-face interactions in screening interviews, gatekeepers in welfare offices can probe more deeply (Pesso, 1978). Gathering and deciphering information is somewhat more difficult where consumers and gatekeepers do not interact face to face. Demands for police or fire protection are usually made verbally by tele phone. Gatekeepers still have the opportunity to probe, but the verbal exchange may be less organized and focused. The impact of communi cation mode and potential for gatekeeper interaction during demand articulation is discussed further in the next chapter. Not only do gatekeepers endeavor to clarify demand messages, but they also usually obtain other relevant information and details about consumers and their situations. For most requests, gatekeepers gather basic information, including consumer name, address, and telephone number. Often facts about the need situation are sought. Welfare agen cies solicit data on consumer assets and income; hospitals, on health background and current symptoms; and the police, on criminal prob lems, their location, and whether or not any weapons are involved. The types of information sought are influenced by the recording instru ments employed by the organization. Intake workers in welfare agencies usually help potential clients complete detailed forms. Hospitals require admittance forms to be completed before treatment is rendered, and police operators record information either on paper cards or computer terminal screens. The information items on these instruments affect the type and extent of data gathered by the gatekeeper. Organizational policies and routines, as well as structured record forms, shape the kinds of information sought and recorded by the gatekeeper. Agencies may demand that certain kinds of data be obtained before any service is rendered. Welfare agencies may require income and asset data before determining benefit levels, and police may insist on callers providing their name and address as a prerequisite to responding to their request. Before receiving some services, consumers are re quired to provide information on means of payment or insurance. Gatekeepers not only gather information about consumer circum stances and needs, but also record it for administrative purposes related to response. Demand messages are often complex and reflect the consumers perspective and language. Once information is obtained, the gatekeepers task is to code it in efficient and agency-relevant terminol ogy. Long conversations and communications must be truncated and translated into terms pertinent to organization operation. Most agencies establish sets of terms, codes, and categories that are used to simplify
22 also outline appropriate responses to articulated demands. The applica tion of these rules over time may evolve into standard operating prac tices. For example, rules may specify that individuals seeking medical assistance for internal injury be sent for x-ray examination as the first step in treatment. Similarly, some police agencies have established a rule that an officer be dispatched in all cases where the caller specifically asks that one be sent. As with other gatekeeping activities, however, discre tion is often exercised in choosing among response alternatives. The varied and complex nature of demands often precludes formulation of a rigid set of response alternatives applicable to all situations. Discretion operates where response guidelines are nonexistent, vague, or unenforced.
23
more complex situations and needs. This simplification increases effi ciency in subsequent demand processing, but may also increase error in and distortion of the original message. Codes and categories vary in terms of specificity and number. Police agencies, facing a large set of possible crimes and problems, usually formulate a set of codes that operators use to classify requests. Some agencies employ a small set; others, many categories. Coding catego ries also classify the urgency and other dimensions of demands. Priority codes denoting seriousness and urgency are routinely used in agencies facing high demands. Not only do most agencies formulate formal codes to classify con sumer needs and characteristics, but employees may also devise infor mation typologies to characterize the persons they serve. Mennerick (1974) suggests that at least five typological dimensions are involved in service worker characterization of clients and consumers: facilitation of work, control, gain, danger, and moral acceptability. Several studies have documented the use of social typologies by these workers. McCleary (1978), for example, has described how parolees are typed according to the extent of trouble they are likely to cause for the parole officer. Another example is the study of public defenders by Sudnow (1965). He found that they characterize clients in terms of crimes committed, ease by which cases can be disposed, and willingness to accept plea bargaining, These typologies may be idiosyncratic to individual service workers; however; classification norms are often shared by organizational mem bers. These informal social typologies, as well as those used formally by the organization to code demand information, may influence the behav ior of gatekeepers and other organization members. 7ansmission of Demand Information
Selection of Response Alternative
As part of demand processing, gatekeepers select one of a set of response alternatives to apply to requests. Organizations usually devise multiple response choices that may be activated to provide services. The alternatives are a function of service domain, technology, and organiza tional rules. Obviously, the nature of demand and relevant information about service production technology influence the initial selection of response alternatives. The nature and extent of injury, for example, affect gatekeeping decisions about the type of treatment that emergency rooms initiate. Organizational rules also guide the selection of response alternatives. Just as rules may clearly specify determination of eligibility, they may
Once eligibility is granted, demand information interpreted and coded, and a response alternative selected, gatekeepers transmit the informa tion to response coordinators or other internal units Often this transmis sion is routine in that organizations set up standardized routing procedures Agencies have traditionally created systems for routing paperwork through various stages and personnel in the response pro cess Some agencies have begun to use computerized systems for recording and routing demand information. The routing is usually determined by the selection of response alterna tives. Demand information is sent to the response coordinator if the organization has chosen to deliver services through street-level person nel. In these cases, the response coordinator selects and coordinates the efforts of those assigned to provide service. In other cases, requests may be routed to other internal units of the organization for review In instances where determination of eligibility or selection of appropriate response is difficult gatekeepers may route the demand to supervisors who make further decisions about the case Still other service demands may be funneled to internal units that provide specialized services. These units may employ a secondary gatekeeper, who determines eligi bility. A parent seeking specialized instruction for a child entering school, for example, may need to seek not only admittance to the school but also to the special program. Thus, although most requests granted access to the organization are routed to response coordinators, some of them may be sent to supervisors or specialized internal units
24 The Anatomy of Demand Processing subsequent use and evaluation of services. Empirical research on police services, for example, has shown expectations about response time to affect subsequent evaluation of police efforts (Percy, 1980; Pate, et al., 1976; Kansas City Police Department, 1977>. In some situations, gatekeepers provide information not only about organizational response, but also about what consumers should do until assistance is rendered. This information is often important to consumers where response is relatively slow or delayed. In the case of an accidental poisoning, an emergency room gatekeeper might tell a caller about what immediate procedures should be taken prior to arrival of an ambulance and trained personnel. Similarly, police operators might instruct callers on what to do until officers arrive at the scene (e.g., protect the crime scene and request witnesses to remain present> (Scott and Percy, 1980>. Consumer efforts performed as a result of information provided by the gatekeeper may enhance individual well-being and the effectiveness of 25
Provision of In formation to Consumers
Provision of information to individuals demanding services is another gatekeeper activity. Information can be of several types, but usually concerns demand processing procedures and organizational response. Gatekeepers frequently participate in the demand articulation process, both by asking clarifying questions and by providing information about the organization and services rendered. The types and extent of informa tion given can impact a variety of outcomes, including consumer willing ness to seek services and evaluation of organizational response. Provision of information about the gatekeeping function can shape consumer attitudes and behaviors about the organization. Because con sumers often have little knowledge about demand processing, they may be confused, unsettled, or angered by the procedures used to gather data. Failure to provide information on demand processingfor example not explaining why certain types of data are requested and how they are usedmay increase consumer apprehension and concern. Pesso (1978: 309> describes how incomplete explanation of intake procedures in a welfare agency can generate significant problems:
In general, intake workers conducted interviews by asking applicants the questions on the departmental application forms, usually without ex plaining the reasons for the questions. As a result, a great deal of misun derstanding occurred. For example, when a social worker asked an applicant it she owned a car (a standard question> the applicant became nervous and defensive because she feared the answer would either disqualify her from welfare or that she would have to forfeit her car. Neither was the case, but she had no way of knowing it. Frequently applicants misinterpreted the intent behind the questions, appeared un comfortable, and possibly distorted the truth in their answers.
In extreme cases, lack of knowledge and the resulting apprehension may lead consumers to terminate demand-seeking efforts, even though they are eligible for services. Gatekeepers may or may not provide information concerning organiza tional responseinformation that may influence consumers in several ways. Information on organizational response may affect consumer ex pectations about response, which may be more or less formulated prior to seeking services. Often citizens have some notion about how the organization will react to their request. Provision of information by gatekeepers can elaborate, clarify, and possibly correct the expectations of consumers about service delivery, which in turn may influence their
subsequent services. Some demands primarily concern requests for information. Citizens call the emergency room to find out how to treat minor burns or call the fire department for guidance in selecting fire extinguishers. Gatekeepers, by providing such information, are performing a direct service function analogous to the actions of street-level personnel. Or dinarily, no further organizational response is provided to these types of requests; the gatekeeper is the only service provider. Even where service-seeking candidates are judged ineligible for organizational services, gatekeepers may provide useful information. As noted previously, gatekeepers may inform them about and assist them in contacting other agencies that produce desired services. Referral is a common form of information provision. Gatekeepers can also advise candidates as to why they have been ruled ineligible and why no organ izational response is forthcoming. This information allows consumers to understand procedures better even though they may not agree with them. Explanation of why the organization cannot (or will not> provide service and furnishing information about alternative service suppliers may mollify consumers who might otherwise react negatively to the organization. Furnishing information on organizational procedures and responses is a significant component of service provision, though this is seldom recognized in organization and management literatures. It is difficult to develop administrative rules about providing information because of the variety of service demand and problem situations that gatekeepers con front. In her study of welfare agencies, Pesso (1978> found that the attitudes of gatekeepers, rather than organizational factors, determined
26 The Anatomy of Demand Processing demand is appropriate for those delivered by field personnel. In some cases they override gatekeeper decisions and do not activate response; however, this is usually the exception and not the rule. If initial eligibility screening has been properly conducted, then there is seldom reason to override the gatekeepers selection of a response alternative,
Demand Processing in Pubhc Service Delivery
27
the kinds and amount of information provided to clients, In fact, she found no formal rules governing the provision of eligibility or referral information The multitude of demand situations and the volume of potentially relevant information, therefore, are factors that prevent the establishment of easily specified and enforced arrangements governing information provision to consumers, Deciding the Specifics of Organizational Response
The Response Coordination Function
The second major function of demand processing is response coord nation. The primary purpose of response coordinators is to determine the specific elements of organizational response and to coordinate the efforts of workers. Through this function, the initial response alternative selected by the gatekeeper is translated into concrete, service-rendering action. The response coordination function consists of at least four components: receipt of demand information from the gatekeeper, deci sion making about organizational response, communication of demand and response data to street-level bureaucrats, and continuous monitor ing of their status and activity.
Receipt and Review of Demand In formation
The inputs of response coordinators are demand messages forwarded by gatekeepers that note the nature of the service request and other relevant details. The message may also include some reference to the response alternative initially selected by the gatekeeper, though this may be more or less obvious upon message receipt. The message is commu nicated through a written application or other organizational forms. Mes sages may also be transmitted orally or electronically through computerzed nformation systems. Organizational procedures for rout ing messages vary, depending upon technology and established rou tines. Police operators, for example, sort requests by geographic location. Welfare agencies forward applications to caseworkers on the basis of programs involved (e.g., food stamps, AFDC) or the language spoken by the consumer, After examining information about requests, response coordinators review the response alternative selected by the gatekeeper. Routing the message to the coordinator indicates that the gatekeeper has initially determined that services should be provided by street-level personnel. Response coordinators may perform a second review to determine if the
The gatekeeper selects a general response alternative, but the re sponse coordinator determines the specific components of organization action. These components include the sequencing and speed of re sponse, the number and type of personnel assigned, and possibly the equipment used. Where demands consistently or temporarily exceed response capacity, a key response coordination function is the sequenc ing of responses to service demands. Often in cases of excess demand, queues form. Queue discipline, or the rules by which consumers in the queue are served, may be more or less precisely specified in organiza tional rules. Common queuing rules include first in, first out (FIFOI and prioritization by seriousness or status. For some services, it is difficult to specify and adhere to one queuing rule, especially where demand types and loads are widely variant. In these situations, the sequencing of responses is left to the coordinator who must make decisions about allocating scarce resources. Response coordinators often have discre tionary latitude in this task. The coordinators also assign personnel to respond to service re quests. Assignment may be based upon a matching of employee exper tise with stated problems or needs. For example, the assignment of a physician in an emergency situation may be made on the basis of type of illness or injury. An orthopedic surgeon is designated for cases involving bone damage, and a psychiatrist for situations concerning mental illness. Where street-level personnel possess similar skills, assignments are made with reference to employee availability and/or proximity to those needing service. Police and fire units, for example, are usually assigned on the basis of availability and proximity to the scene of the fire or crime, The response coordinator also frequently determines the number of employees or units assigned. In many situations, including emergencies, more than one unit or employee may be required. A key response coordination function in these cases is selecting multiple response units. In some situations, the response coordinator stipulates the actions to be taken by street-level personnel. More frequently, however these personnel exercise discretion, especially where services are rendered in
pu
28 Figure 2-1 Stages in Demand Processing in Public Service Organizations

[RvCE SEEERj
locations physically separate from organizational offices. Again, the com plexity of human needs and problem situations, coupled with incomplete knowledge about the situation, often prevent organizations from pre scribing response actions. The general tendency in demand processing situations is for the response coordinator to assign personnel to handle the situation with the expectation that they are most capable of deciding the appropriate kinds and amounts of services to provide.
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A third task of the response coordinator is transmitting information on service demands to field personnel. These transmissions provide them with knowledge about both the demand situation and planned response. Information on demand is useful to these personnel in that it allows them to prepare for situations in advance. Preparation takes many forms, depending upon the service in question, but may include gathering relevant application forms, mentally preparing for a difficult situation, obtaining or readying equipment, and taking self-protective actions. De mand information also assists field personnel in making faster determin ation of problems and needs, thus reducing service time.
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In addition to coordinating responses to specific service requests, response coordinators may also monitor, oversee, and coordinate the activities of workers. In an office situation, coordinators may direct work flow to maximize efficient use of time and personnel. The response coordination function is particularly significant in services where employ ees perform activities outside of organizational offices. In these in stances, coordinators continually monitor the status of personnel in an effort to determine who is available to handle service demands. They also perform a management and control function by overseeing the activities of employees who operate largely outside of supervisor pres ence. In emergency situations, response coordinators may provide im portant help by rapidly routing additional assistance.
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Overview of the Demand Processing Function

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After examining the component tasks of gatekeeping and response coordination, we feel that a brief reexamination of the overall demand processing function is appropriate. Figure 2-1 is a flow diagram of the different stages involved. The arrows indicate the movement of de
30 izational leaders, nor with achieving efficiency or equity in performance. Recognizing the widespread nature of discretion, service organizations might reduce it through formulating new rules, increasing supervision, and aggressively enforcing rules. In some contexts, these efforts may bring the behavior of employees more in line with the goals and expecta tions of top administrators. In other cases, however, efforts to reduce discretion can be counterproductive. Lipsky (1980) warns that they may limit the capacity of workers to respond effectively to diverse human needs and situations, harm their morale as well as productivity, and reduce citizen beliefs that assistance can be provided. Most analysts would agree that in some contexts it is desirable to limit discretion. The difficulty is in selecting areas where this will enhance organizational effectiveness without otherwise diminishing perform ance. Tensions will always exist in service producing organizations be tween worker discretion and organizational control; both elements are required. The challenge is to select the balance between the two that maximizes organizational performance.
31
mands through the screening and response processes. Note that multi ple response dispositions are represented, including provision of service, referral, and taking no action, The proportion of demands receiv ing each type of disposition vary among and within organizations de pending upon demand processing activities. Eligibility screening reduces the overall number of demands that will receive service, and response decisions by both gatekeepers and response coordinators influence service activities. Although figure 2-1 is suggestive of the people-processing that takes place in service organizations, it is in some ways oversimplified. The individual steps in the process may not always be performed separately or in the precise order indicated. Response coordinators, for example, may make several related decisions at the same time, perhaps simul taneously deciding the sequencing of responses and thp type of person nel needed. Also, the diagram does not adequately represent the information provision function of gatekeepers, who may provide several types to callers regardless of decisions about organizational response. The flow diagram is suggestive of the many facets of demand processing and the ways in which they can affect dispositions, organizational efforts, and performance. The Impact of Gatekeeping and Response Coordination Functions on Service Organization Performance
A Recurrent Theme: Discretion in Demand Processing
Throughout the discussions of gatekeeping and response coordina tion, a continuing theme has been the presence of discretion in demand processing. Discretion is found where employees enjoy latitude in mak ing decisions. It may be relatively narrow, limited to selection of one of a small set of alternative actions. In many service organizations, however employees, including demand processors, possess relatively wide dis cretion in response to consumer demands. Lipsky (1980) notes several reasons why it is difficult, if not impossible, to restrict discretion in these agencies: work patterns are usually too complicated to reduce to programmatic formats; responses are required to the human dimen sions of situations; and discretion not only stimulates the self-regard of workers but also encourages clients to believe that they hold the key to their well-being. For these reasons, discretion is clearly a necessary component of service production. Discretion presents difficulties in organizational management and control, Without clear and enforceable behavior rules, workers can em ploy personal judgments when making decisions and taking actions. These judgments may not always be consistent with the goals of organ-
The foregoing descriptions of gatekeeping and response coordination functions suggest several significant linkages to organizational perform ance. Although most service literature has focused on the activities and importance of street-level personnel, it is clear that gatekeepers and response coordinators significantly influence response. First, gate keepers affect performance through determination of eligibility. Deciding (within the confines of rules and priorities) which persons are granted or denied services, they influence both the kind and volume of requests handled. Secondly, gatekeepers affect performance through interpretation and coding of demand messages. They translate often complex situations into agency-relevant terminology and codes. This information structures subsequent decisions and actions of the response coordinator and street-level bureaucrats. Thirdly, gatekeepers impact on performance through initial selection of response alternatives. For requests granted access, gatekeepers select an alternative and initiate service-rendering activities. Should the response be inappropriate, the organizations ac tions may not only be ineffective but also occasionally detrimental. Fourth, gatekeepers affect performance and consumer evaluation through information provision. By disseminating information on demand
32
3
Information Transmission in Demand Processing Organizations
processing procedures, they can obtain consumer cooperation instead of hostility or indifference. Through providing information on organiza tional response, they can enhance consumer well-being until services are rendered. In some cases, demands center primarily on information. Here the gatekeeper performs an important direct service to consumers. Response coordinators can also substantially influence organizational responses and evaluations. Through selection of specific elements of the response, coordinators may affect the quality and quantity of services rendered. Through information provision, they help prepare street-level personnel for handling demand situations and thereby affect service outcomes. Response coordinators also assist organizational manage ment through monitoring and supervision of street-level employees. Gatekeepers and response coordinators shape the performance of agencies through their effect on various components of the service response process. The processing of demands, though seldom dis cussed or recognized, can have as significant an influence on outcomes as the more studied actions of street-level bureaucrats: These response activities, along with the flow of information associated with them, can exert substantial impact on subsequent actions and organizational per formance. We shall see more clearly how these processes work when they are examined in the context of police service delivery.
Most human interaction involves communicative acts in which informa tion is exchanged. This is as true of behavior in organizations as in other social contexts. Communicationthe exchange of information and the transmission of meaningis the essence of any organization or social system. Organizations, including those established for the provision of public services, absorb, exchange, and distribute information. Its trans mission is a social process underpinning the functioning of any group, society, or organization. The importance of information transmission and communication to social systems has been extensively chronicled. Disciplines from organ ization and management theory to social psychology to cybernetics and information theory have highlighted the role of information in structuring and maintaining social systems. Its importance has been discussed at both macro and micro levels, in laboratory and field settings, in small and large groups, and as the subject of formal and informal communication. Information related to processing demands in service organizations, however, has not received the scrutiny it deserves. Information is a necessary input for demand processing organizations. If no data about a demand-generating situation reach an agency that can handle the problem, no response will be forthcoming. Service organiza tions gather information either by relying on citizens to initiate contacts (calls to police or fire departments) or by engaging in routine search behavior (building inspections, garbage collection, police patrol) (Jones, et al., 1980). Our concentration here is on information provided by cit izens through service demands. Once this information reaches an agency, how it is absorbed, coded, and channeled significantly influ ences organizational response. Key actors in the response process must make individual determinations of the meaning and value of particular facts. Their evaluations are affected by factors such as communication mode, message duration, message authority, coding, demand charac teristics, and demand volume. The first two chapters introduced the concept of demand and identi fied activities involved in processing demands. This chapter takes a
34 Information Transmission
Demand Processing in Pubhc Service Delivery
35
Figure 3-1 Information Flow in Demand Processing

(3)
(2)
Ctizen Req uest(ng 1 Service Street-LeR Breaccrat
ponsl Coordinator
Step 1, Demand Art(cuation Step 2. nterna( Re(ay Step 3: Response Articulat(on
different approach by considering the flow of service-related information through the demand processing system. In particular, it discusses the way demand information is structured and channeled as well as how its flow affects subsequent agency actions and performance. Influences on effective information transmission are introduced and special emphasis is placed on loss resulting from the coding process.
Stages of Information Flow in Demand Processing
Thus far we have considered the activities associated with various transfer points in a demand processing system. We now turn to the characteristics of and influences on information transmitted between these nodes. Information flow related to demand processing is a three step procedure, as shown in figure 3-1. In the first step, demand articula tion, citizens communicate requests to agency gatekeepers. ln step two, internal relay gatekeepers transmit coded information to response coor dinators. In step three, response articulation, response coordinators transmit demand and response data to street-level personnel. A feed back loop is included to indicate that street-level bureaucrats may return information to those requesting service. Note also that the doubleheaded arrow in step one indicates a return flow from gatekeepers to citizens. This transmission is especially important for demands that can be handled solely by gatekeepers.
Approaches to the Study of Information
The characteristics of information transmitted at each stage of de mand processing affect the way it is perceived by the receiver, the manner in which it is coded, the amount and type forwarded to the next stage, and ultimately the nature of organizational response. To help
identify and assess these characteristics as well as to locate influences on information flow, literature from four different fields is considered: organization theory, information theory, cybernetics, and social psychol ogy. Underlying all these approaches is the notion that communication is central to human organization, to the creation and maintenance of social systems. Most of this literature does not deal directly with information inputs that can be characterized as consumer demands, that is, with signals expressing a desire for some type of service. Nevertheless, some of the concepts discussed are useful in describing information flow in demand-processing organizations, Every major treatise on the theory of organization has cited the value of communications to system function (see, for example, Barnard, 1938; Blau and Scott, 1962; Guetzkow, 1965; March and Simon, 1958; Simon, 1957; Tullock, 1965; Downs, 1967; Cyert and March, 1963). Discussion has focused primarily on the importance of information to maintenance of executive authority and control, especially as it relates to hierarchy and organizational size. Also considered are communications as message flows, message content, motivational biases of individuals in message transmission, and the effects of internal structure on information flow. More recent literature on bureaucratic theory has examined organiza tions as information-processing mechanisms (see Inbar, 1979; Dunsire, 1981), This literature deemphasizes the Weberian specifications of hier archy and specialization and replaces the pyramid image with a net work image of channels, nodes, transformation points, and communication flows instead of ranks and levels of hierarchy. Among the most influential work on information flow is that known as in formation theory It is basically concerned with mathematically precise measurement of the information content of signals and the message capacity of channels (Shannon and Weaver 1949; Cherry, 1957; MacKay, 1969). The output of a communications system is treated in relation to input signals and their disturbance by the transmission system. Receiv ing information requires interpreting these signals. Simply put, informa tion is transmitted when senders encode messages and receivers decode them. A third approach to the role of information is that of cybernetics. The major theme of the cybernetic paradigm is that the decision process is organized around the problem of controlling inherent uncertainty by means of highly focused attention and highly programmed responses (Steinbruner, 1974: 86). This approach suggests that human information processing is limited by memory capacity and that forces exist to help decision makers correct errors and instill organizational equilibrium (Ashby, 1956; Beer, 1959).
36 Information Transmission
37
Characteristics of Information Flow

Mode of Communication
Literature from social psychology focuses on biases in information exchange resulting from identifiable human tendencies. Social an thropology and social psychology have considered communication to be the organizing principle in understanding human interaction and in defin ing the nature of relations, both among clients and between clients and caseworkers. Campbell (1958> and Katz and Kahn (1966) provide excel lent reviews of psychological studies inspired by communications the ory. This work has been summarized in Glanzer and Glaser (1961) and in Guetzkow (1965>. The role of information in maintaining executive authority and control in hierarchical organizations and in shaping their environments is well documented in the literature. Unfortunately, scant interest has been shown in its flow between organizations and their constituencies. Some theorists have discussed attempts by organizations to control their en vironments, or what are called boundary-spanning activities (Thompson, 1967>. March and Simon (1958; 127> argue that the greater the number of environmental sources of communication, the greater the differentiation of perceptions of incoming information within the organization. When one unit has an acknowledged monopoly over incoming messages, however, communication throughout the organization tends to be more uniform (Guetzkow, 1965; 550). However little research has been undertaken on the flow of informa tionboth between citizens and agencies and within agenciesresult ing from citizen demands. As Katz and Danet (1973a; 667> point out;
It is surprising to note that students of formal organizations have not focused in depth on general problems of the relation between organiza tions and their environments or more specifically, on the social psychol ogy of official-client relations, In general, the object of analysis has been what goes on within the organization. Neither of the two most com prehensive overviews of the field of formal organization [BIau and Scott, 1962; March, 19651 treats problems of communication with clients in any detail. Each contains a chapter on communication, but deals only with communication within organizations.
Also missing is any consideration of the effects of information flow resulting from citizen demand on either the initiators or receivers of message transmissions. The above literature, howeve yields several concepts applicable to an analysis of demand processing, including mode of communication, message duration, and message authority.
Different modes of communication, or media, through which informa tion is transmitted, affect the manner in which it is exchanged among key actors in the three stages of demand processing. Mass communications literature is replete with discussions of the different effects of interper sonal communication by telephone, written message, or face-to-face contact (Rogers, 1973). Mode of communication can influence the ways in which service organizations are structured to process demands. Table 3-1 indicates common communication modes for the three demand processing stages in different types of service organizations. Gatekeepers in police and fire departments are equipped to handle demands articulated by telephone, though police do receive some walkin complaints and both receive electronic alarm signals. Telephone com munications preserve most of the auditory content of reciprocal, face-toface interaction, but remove the nuances created by visual contact; gestures, body language, eye movement, and other ways of conveying and amplifying meaning. Welfare agencies normally screen demands through face-to-face interaction between clients and caseworkers. Most demand articulation in hospital emergency rooms involves face-to-face interaction. Most agencies rely on multiple modes of communication; the mode may change as information passes through the stages of demand pro cessing. In the internal relay step for welfare agencies, written reports are usually completed for eligible clients and forwarded to caseworkers for action. The latter may also rely on additional verbal data from intake clerks to determine the extent and type of service allocated. In police agencies, complaint operators pass on information from callers to dis patchers in written form via dispatch ticket or computer terminal display. Internal relay transmissions are usually transmitted in written form for several reasons. First, written transmissions can be saved as permanent records and referred to when necessary. Second, although they rarely maintain the richness of expression characterizing oral communication, they retain the semantic content of the message. Third, written mes sages are more difficult to lose track of than verbal ones, especially in times of high demand. Fourth, they can be used, at least by emergency service providers, as visual monitors of current demand levels and re source availability. Finally, written messages for services such as welfare or hospitals can serve as the initial permanent entry in individual case files.
38 Information Transmission 39
Tabie 3-1 Common Communication Modes in Public Service Organizations
Stage of Information Flow Response Articulation Radio trans mission to patrol officer
Service Demand Organization Type Articulation
Internal Relay
Police department
Telephone call, alarm signal, walk-in face-toface conversation Radio trans mission to station house
Written message from complaint card, computer ized record from terminal screen
Fire department
Telephone call, alarm signal from fire-alarm box Written form to caseworker Face-to-face conversation with doctor
Written message from dispatch card, computer ized record from terminal screen
Welfare agency
Face-to-face conversation
Written form, telephone call
Hospital emergency Face-to-face room conversation
Written form
Mode of communication can change again from internal relay to re sponse articulation (table 3-1>. Information transmitted during response articulation can be written (welfare agencies>, verbal (police and fire departments>, or some combination (hospital emergency rooms>. Case workers receive written applications, police officers and firefighters are dispatched by radio, librarians take requests face-to-face, and emer gency room doctors receive both intake forms or charts and verbal assessments from trained attendants.
need, the shorter the duration of the information flow. This is not always the case, however; some demands stem from such complex situations that they require relatively long periods to articulate despite their imme diacy. Certain calls for police service, such as child custody and abuse cases, may fit in this category. Duration is of particular importance to agencies that must process information rapidly or that handle frequent emergency situations. Mode of communication may influence demand duration. For example, face-to-face verbal demands may be more diffi cult to limit in length. Internal relays are usually designed to be of shorter duration than demand articulations; the message has already been truncated by the gatekeeper to make response more efficient. Also, less time is normally required to read a coded written message than to listen to a verbal one, especially because relays tend to be short and receivers have less opportunity to participate in the message exchange. Information in cluded on a preliminary welfare application, for example, may be quite lengthy, but still should require less time to peruse than to listen to and record. Of course, written internal relays for emergency services may be much shorterthan those of other services in order to hasten response. The duration dimension says nothing about the value of the information content for the agency, however. Response articulation is also likely to be of shorter duration than demand articulation. By the time information reaches the response coordinator, it has been distilled and refined. It usually requires little further interpretation, for it has already been transformed into agencyrelevant terms and considered in light of existing workload constraints and available resources. For fire and police departments where informa tion is dispatched by radio, communication time is limited. Dispatches are short, factual, and transmitted largely in code. Even methods of sending and acknowledging signals are coded. Duration is a critical element for emergency services such as police or hospitals; it could mean the difference between rapid or slow response, and ultimately, life or death. For nonemergency services, duration may be somewhat longer. Welfare or housing agencies may employ longer demand pro cessing messages, containing more information, because they do not need to provide services immediately upon receipt of the demand. Message Authority A third characteristic of information flow is the authority of the mes sage as perceived by receivers. Channels of communication can be defined in terms of the authority of the sender vis--vis the receiver. In
Message Duration
A second characteristic of information flow is message duration, orthe length of time required for it to pass from one point to another. Duration can be affected by type of demand, immediacy (speed of response required>, intensity (seriousness of need>, or specificity (precision of the
40 Individuals, groups, and organizations share a general characteristic which must be recognized as a major determinant of communication: the coding process. Any system which is the recipient of information, whether it be an individual or an organization, has a characteristic coding process, a limited set of coding categories to which it assimilates the information received. The nature of the system imposes omission, selec tion, refinement, elaboration, distortion, and transformation upon the incoming communications, (Katz and Kahn, 1966: 227)
Information Transmission
41
ered to be from the top down, though information entering the organiza tion from the environment flows upward from lower-level bureaucrats. Thus, information flowing up carries less authority than that flowing down. In demand processing, information flows horizontally and may be subject to perceived authority. Requests from persons in official posi tions or who are well known are likely to be readily accepted; included are demands from government officials or business representatives who frequently contact the police. Response to authoritative demands is not likely to be delayed for a long period. Rhodes (1978) argues that the kinds of information coded during demand articulation are influenced by the perceived authority of the communicating parties. If a person of authority requests service, message flows during demand processing will likely reflect the demand situation as stated by the requester rather than as distilled by the gatekeeper. In general, response articulation is more authoritative than any other message flow in demand processing. By the time information has reached the response coordinator and been considered in light of work load and available resources, it has attained an authority that may have been lacking earlier. According to a police adage, the dispatcher speaks with the authority of the chief. When officers are dispatched, they are given a direct order and are responsible for obeying it and for explaining all actions relating to it. The dynamic here is much different than in demand articulation, where gatekeepers are allowed to make outright challenges to citizens and may reject some demands as unreasonable or spurious. Authoritative demands reduce discretionary decision making and limit response options, in effect acting as a constraint on the organization.
. . .
Influences on Information Flow in Demand Processing
Information flow and organizational ability to convey meaning through symbolic representation are affected by several factors. Demand char acteristics, initial coding, demand overload, receiver participation in message formulation, and information distortion all determine the effectiveness of organizational information processing. These factors influence how citizen demands are perceived and processed, and ulti mately whether or not and how services are provided.
The Coding Process
Coding refers to the process by which input information is transformed into appropriate agency-defined output language. It is a process endemic
Or, as Cyert and March (1963: 12425) note, Any decision-making system develops codes for communicating about the environment. Such a code partitions all possible states of the world into a relatively Thus, if a decision rule is designed small number of classes of states. to choose between two alternatives, the information code will tend to reduce all possible states of the world to two classes. In demand processing organizations, most coding occurs as a result of demand articulation; as noted in the last chapter, coding determines the structure and content of information flow. The process may vary widely in its complexity, often in direct proportion to the complexity of demands. Sometimes coding involves converting complex inputs into simple out puts, perhaps in the form of a polar decision (yes-no, stop-go). At other times, it includes comparison of inputs with constantly changing stan dards of output. In either case, information reduction is involved; coded output is less complex than uncoded input. Information loss, transforma tion, and possibly distortion are inherent in the notion of coding. Effective transmission and use of information requires a system of communication that identifies, codes, and channels it. Organizations faced with diverse demands must selectively filter the mass of incoming demand information. Its reduction through coding implies a net loss that, coupled with the resulting potential distortion, can influence the mean ing of a message. The central problem in communication is to streamline the message while maintaining its meaning, or to carry larger amounts of meaning with relatively fewer symbols (Guetzkow, 1965: 551). Implementing a coding system is difficult, In coding inputs, be they simple or complex, into a discrete code or set of codes, the human is subject to systematic fluctuations in coding standards, in that the coding thresholds employed tend to be relative to recent inputs rather than constant for physical attributes of the stimulus. This holds true even where the coding assignment clearly calls for absolute coding (Camp bell, 1958: 353). Thus, a police telephone operator who had just received ten calls reporting the sound of gunfire and who had indicated the noise was actually caused by detonation of confiscated fireworks by au
42
Demand Processing in Public Service Delivery Information Transmission
43
thorities, might give the eleventh caller the same explanation even though he or she might be reporting actual gunfire. Similar shifts in perceptions and standards would be expected for all persons involved in coding. Without efficient coding during demand articulation, problems of clear communication and information flow arise within an organization as well as between it and its environment. Messages passed from one part of an organization to another often require translation to be fully effective. If demand information is not properly communicated, required services may not be performed. Messages could be sent uncoded, but the resulting oversupply of data would be extremely inefficient or difficult to comprehend by response units. Coding entails both costs and benefits. It is more costly to establish and maintain a complex language or scheme than a simple one. Person nel must be carefully trained and their performance monitored. Even when applying a complex scheme, the potential for error remains. Just as there is greater opportunity for increased specificity of information or more congruence between actual events and coded representations, there is increased likelihood of applying an improper code. The problem is to settle on a coding scheme that is cost-effective, one that provides the most detail while engendering the fewest errors and imposing the least cost. Information-gathering functions may be evaluated according to their effectiveness in providing a basis for actions that might differentially affect desired outcomes (Montias, 1976>.
Demand Characteristics
A second influence on information flow is the characteristics of the demand message: intensity, immediacy, and specificity. Intensity indi cates the seriousness of the situation leading to a service request; it involves individual well-being. Immediacy is the speed of response required to handle the request. Specificity is the precision with which a request is communicated. These attributes affect the flow of information related to demand articulation and can shape that related to internal relay and response articulation as well. Demands can vary widely according to these three characteristics, as can the resulting information flow. Intense or immediate demands are likely to generate a rapid, though not neces sarily accurate, flow designed to facilitate response. Nonspecific de mand information may not convey the meaning of the message accurately, and thus require additional probing and time or result in distorted information.
Demand processing agencies must adopt procedures for dealing with information flow resulting from the variety of demand characteristics. Different combinations of characteristics may engender different re sponses. Emergency service providers are more likely than others to receive both intense and immediate demands, which in turn increase the need for short and specific internal information transmissions. Agencies providing nonemergency services experience considerable variety in demand specificity. Libraries receive requests for particular books as well as general questions on what books are relevant to particular topics. Internal relay and response articulation messages usually mirror the demand characteristics that created them in terms of intensity and immediacy, but can vary significantly in specificity. Demand articulation and coding can alter specificity. Citizens may call the police to report prowlers in the front yard, for example, but information passed on by the gatekeepers may indicate that an officer should proceed to an address to conduct an investigation; a specific problem is thus transformed into a more general one. Welfare intake clerks may fail to note that an applicant has responsibility for young children, which makes him or her eligible for aid for dependent children instead of other programs. Specificity of demand may be altered during response articulation. Codes assigned by gatekeepers to describe the nature of a problem are seldom altered by response coordinators because they do not have access to the original information. Response coordinators, however, frequently reduce the impressionistic content of the message by elim inating all details except those deemed essential to placing street-level personnel in contact with a person requesting service. Police dis patchers, for example, may radio only a location, name, and signal code to officers; other details about the incident are eliminated. Response coordinators may increase specificity to limit the duration of the trans mission. They may feel it contains information that is extraneous or that their workload does not permit taking time to pass along additional descriptive material. At this stage of information flow, messages are much more likely to experience an increase in specificity than a reduc tion. As studies of information flow in hierarchical organizations have suggested, the further information travels from the original source the greater the likelihood of its being altered or distorted. An aggregate demand characteristic affecting information flow is the volume of messages being processed at any given time. Volume is a contextual factor that is a constant influence on flow. Gatekeepers faced with high demand volume may make hurried decisions or coding errors that result in improper service provision. Organizational pathologies may result from a situation of excess demand; response may sometimes be
44 load. The more complex the information, the earlier the omission and the larger the loss at each succeeding step in the transmission (March and Simon, 1958: 166). Most likely to be omitted is unfamiliar information or that not easily recognized and coded by the receiver.
45
slowed or eliminated altogether by the press of demands and the result ing overload situation. Demand processing agencies must find means of adjusting. Strategies for dealing with high demand volume such as screening and queuing were discussed in chapter 2. Screening is com monly employed during demand articulation, and queuing is frequent during response articulation. Another response is to speed up the flow of information by reducing message duration, employing additional person nel or channels, or improving technology. Installation of computer-aided dispatching systems in police and fire departments is seen as an attempt to decrease internal relay time (among other intended effects) by routing demand information through computers. Still another response to high demand volume is to adopt means of reducing inputs, such as restricting organizational domain. Most organ izations cannot control the environmental demands which are made upon them, except by eliminating some functions of their own (Katz and Kahn, 1966: 233), This is especially true for organizations whose major purpose is to distribute public services. A more likely response to over load is to attempt a planned reduction in demand and information flow once it has reached the organization rather than to try to suppress demand at the source. Participation in Message Construction
In formation Overload
A central problem in communications is preserving as much of the meaning of a message as possible without overloading the system. When information items are too numerous within a single demand for individuals to process accurately, information overload exists. The amount of material that can be effectively received, coded, and handled by any one individual is limited. When input exceeds capacity, selective loss is normally the result. So much data can be furnished to decision makers that they spend most of their time screening it, selecting what they need, and discarding the rest. This process can divert them from their original purpose. Most of the literature on information overload concentrates on possi ble individual responses and their implications for organizations. Miller (1960) identified several adjustment mechanisms, the most commonly recognized of which is omission, or the purposive deletion of certain portions of a message. Omission can occur during demand articulation or at other stages of information flow. If all capacity to process messages is being used, data may simply be neglected at the point of entry. At other points during transmission, omission of details may help reduce over-
A fourth influence on information flow is the extent of receiver par ticipation in message construction. The flow is sometimes considered a one-way transmission; references to senders as opposed to receivers reinforce this distinction. Communication, however, may also involve exchange, a sharing of information. During demand articulation, gatekeepers usually do not passively receive data about service re quests, but actually participate in obtaining it. The extent of their par ticipation in message construction is a function of the mode of communication. Verbal messages involve significant interaction be tween sender and receiver; gatekeepers can request clarification and extract relevant information. They can interrupt irrelevant discourse and probe to obtain more specific data. Often their participation affects the flow of information and the classification of demand, which in turn may affect the level of service provided. Welfare agency intake clerks, for example, by discussing clients problems, can focus their requests and help to formulate agency response. Unlike gatekeepers during demand articulation, response coordina tors enjoy little opportunity to participate in message construction Un less they are located in close proximity to gatekeepers have sufficient time or feel that the information they receive is inadequate to formulate response coordinators rarely attempt to structure the content of internal relay messages Instead they normally accept the data transmitted and determine a response based on information available in the message and their knowledge of current agency resource allocation If questions arise and time or space constraints permit response coordinators may ask gatekeepers for amplification or translation of a message; otherwise, their responses are limited by the information contained in the relay. Street-level personnel can take part in structuring response articula tion, especially where transmissions are verbal. Their participation is not as extensive as that of gatekeepers during demand articulation because they generally do not have access to the original demand information. They do, however, participate more than response coordinators in inter nal relay In verbal interaction street level personnel can ask questions request clarifications and reach consensus with the sender about mean
46
47
ing; this opportunity is rarely present during written communication. Because street-level personnel are accustomed to receiving coded infor mation, a short coded message is usually sufficient to initiate the desired res p0 n 5 e.
Information Distortion
ors. The steps of information flow in demand processing are consider ably fewer than those discussed by Downs and Tullock, but can still introduce distortion into messages and affect the structure of agency response. Demand messages can conceivably be distorted through coding, information loss, or individual incentivesso that their initial meaning is significantly altered and the response alternatives applied are inappropriate. Demand processing organizations have devised few antidistortion techniques. Most cannot afford the luxury of creating multiple channels of communication that can reduce information loss or individual bias, thereby countervailing distortion. Some organizations may be the sole source of a requested service, especially those of an emergency nature. Additionally, when time is limited and a response strategy must be formulated, opportunity to verify information accuracy is limited. A fire department, for example, cannot take the time to determine whether an alarm is false or not; it must act immediately. Occasionally, a response
coordinator may ask a gatekeeper to verify an information item before
Studies of organization have identified some maladaptive effects of hierarchical organization on internal information flow. One of the most frequently discussed is distortion. Factors identified in this literature can apply to horizontal flow as well. Distortion is defined as any change in message meaning from the original as a result of its transmission into and through an organization, Information loss can occur without distor tion. Coded information, for example, is often reduced from the original but the meaning of the message is not significantly altered. Several factors influence distortion in communications. Williamson (1967: 26) noted that the reliance of hierarchical organizations on serial reproduction for their functioning exposes them to what may become serious distortions in transmission. Meaning may be changed as infor mation passes from point to point. Distortion may also be introduced because of individual incentives. Officials tend to exaggerate data that reflect favorably on themselves and to minimize those that reveal their own shortcomings (Downs, 1967: 77). Selective emphasis of certain data may affect organizational performance. Both Tullock (1965) and Downs suggest a link between distortion and organization size. Tullock hypothesizes that distortion is predictable in large public bureaus and can be expressed as an increasing function of size. Downs (1967: 143) proposes a Law of Diminishing Control: the larger any organization becomes, the weaker the control over its actions exercised by those at the top. Loss of control results from distortion as data are transmitted across successive hierarchical levels, lop officials receive lower-quality information because of loss resulting from serial reproduction and distortion. Distortion is also a problem in demand processing. The consequences of serial reproductionincreased distortion as information flows from one point in an organization to anotherare found in horizontal as well as vertical flow. There seem to be few incentives to alter information as it moves through the steps in demand processing, however. This is largely because gatekeepers do not depend on response coordinators, nor response coordinators on street-level personnel, for promotion, tenure, or perquisites nearly so much as do most lower-level officials on superi
determining agency response, but rarely in emergencies. Some agen cies have eliminated middlemen by combining gatekeeping and re sponse coordination functions, which may reduce distortion stemming from serial reproduction. This alternative is limited to small organizations that are not functionally specialized, however. Another antidistortion device adopted by demand processing agencies is extensive use of numerical codes, which are designed to speed response and eliminate consideration of superfluous material. There remains a trade-off be tween information reduction and maintenance of relevant detail, how ever, that can make coding both a source of and an antidote for distortion.
Part II
Demand Processing in Police Agencies
I
4
An Overview of Pohce Service Dehvery
Urban residents are directly or indirectly affected by police service delivery on a continual basis. Although they may seldom require fire suppression or welfare services, they are likely to require some form of police aid frequently. Urbanites travel to work on roads monitored by police, When accidents occur, the latter are expected to provide assistance and rapidly restore traffic flow. At various events, officers control crowds and traffic. Neighborhoods receive some level of patrol that may deter potential crime. In cases of emergency, individuals expect police to respond and supply needed help. They are also called on to locate missing persons and even animals, as well as to quiet noisy neighbors. And, when crime occurs, citizens rely on law enforcement officers to gather information, apprehend offenders, and locate and return stolen property. The provision of community safety and security is in many ways the most basic public service. Little meaningful activity can be undertaken in areas lacking a minimal level of public safety. The lifeblood of societysocial and economic transactionscannot be freely performed without an underlying level of public order. Although several public agencies are charged with enhancing the well-being of community residents, none of their services are as basic as those provided by the police. For other reasons, police services is an appropriate area for consider ing demand processing and applying concepts and models discussed in previous chapters. Police agencies face diverse service demands that vary dramatically in terms of intensity, immediacy, and specificity. These demands are documented in detail in a later section of this chapter. Policing also involves relatively imprecise technology, which rases major contingencies in the delivery and management of services. The organization of most departments allows for relatively clear identi fication and analysis of the gatekeeping and response coordination func tions. Whereas the functions may be fused in some service agencies, they are distinct in all but the smallest police departments. Telephone operators (call takers) perform the gatekeeping function; they receive and interpret demand signals and initiate or refuse response. They deter mine which service requests are eligible, code demand information into
52
Demand Processing in Police Agencies An Overview of Police Service Delivery
53
understandable terminology, transmit relevant data to dispatchers, and provide response information to callers. The dispatchers serve as re sponse coordinators. Taking coded information from operators, they determine the specifics of response: whether or not a patrol unit will be dispatched, which one shall handle the call, and when it is sent. Dis patchers broadcast information to field officers and continually monitor their status. The distinction between operators and dispatchers permits examination of the specific activities, outcomes, and dilemmas of each demand processing function. Finally, we have selected policing for detailed analysis because of access to extensive data relevant to demand processing. This book grew out of research in which both authors were involved, the Police Com munications Study (PCS>. The project, funded by the National Institute of Justice, analyzed citizen demands for service, information flow, and response. Through this study, described later in the chapter, data were gathered that allow empirical examination of police activities related to demand processing.
Changing Conceptions of the Pohce Role
I
1
tioned. This can be seen clearly by examining the types of problems citizens call upon police to handle. As we will demonstrate in the follow ing section, the variety of demands is immense and is certainly not limited to crime-fighting. The police help resolve conflicts that threaten public and private peace. They provide a wide range of social services: from administering first aid to accident victims to referring alcoholics to treatment centers to removing the proverbial cat from the tree. The police are available, and they are empowered to use force or the threat of it to respond to criminal or public disorder situations. Other reminders indicate that the police are being asked to do much more than fight crime. Many urban departmental budgets contain re quests for appropriations to support such functions as family crisis intervention units, detoxification centers outside the local jail, and tele phone report-writing stations. Additionally, current examinations of po licing argue in favor of alternatives to dispatching patrol cars to all calls for service because a large proportion of them are unrelated to crime and can be handled efficiently through other means. The traditional concep tion of the police has been shaken, if not totally discredited. Most attempts to categorize the role have met with mixed success, largely because of its complexity. Herman Goldstein warns that anyone attempting to construct a workable definition of the police role will typically come away with old images shattered and with a new-found appreciation forthe intricacies of police work (1977: 21>. Goldstein argues that the police function has only recently become the subject of system atic study. Historically, public interest in policing intensified sporadically, in response to sensational crimes or public revelations of corruption. The newly emerging image of police is one as multiservice provider; they still fight crime, but they also furnish numerous other services (see the discussions in Goldstein, 1977; Manning, 1977; Reiss and Bordua, 1967; Reiss, 1971; Rumbaut and Bittnec 1979; Silberman, 1978; and Wilson, 1968). Undoubtedly, some officers and administrators still as cribe to the old conception. Some citizens, too, encouraged by the image cultivated through the popular media, may still see the police primarily as crime-fighters. The growing preponderance of evidence, however, sug gests that many calls for service and much of the time officers spend on patrol involve noncriminal incidents.
For many years, an enormous gulf has existed between the image and reality of policing. As Silberman (1978: 200> points out, next to public schools, the police are the best known agency of government; they are also the least understood. As a result, Americans have come to expect than they can possibly deliver. The prevailing view of the far more police role, as held by both the police and the public, is one of crime prevention, or, barring that, of apprehending criminals. The evidence is overwhelmingin the form of increasing crime rates, fear of crime, and general public disaffectionthat the police are fighting a losing battle to reduce criminal violence. Nevertheless, the police have often surrounded themselves with an aura of professional invincibility, to encourage an image of themselves capturing criminals through a combination of hard work, bursts of intui Unfortunately, the tion, and the use of arcane scientific methods. police have become prisoners of their own mystique (Silberman, 1978: 202). Their role has been influenced by fictional accounts of their prow ess as crime-fighters. Detective stories, television shows, and films usually portray them as supersleuths, who always get their man, Their image as foot soldiers in the war on crime is powerful and enduring; it has achieved an almost mythical quality. In recent years, however, this traditional view has often been ques
The Variety of Citizen Demands for Police Services Police responsibilities are extraordinarily broad and at the same time unbelievably complex. An observer monitoring calls to the switchboard
54 comparison is virtually impossible. Nevertheless, one consistent and significant finding does emerge: the demand for noncriminal services represents a large proportion, sometimes as much as 80 to 90 percent, of the total demand for service. This finding has cast doubt on the conventional wisdom that police are primarily asked to fight crime and apprehend criminals. What are some of these noncriminal services that comprise such a significant portion of citizen demand and patrol officer time? Although agreement among observers about call classification is lacking, some types of demands are usually considered to be noncriminal. Among them are calls for information or assistance of various types: queries about social services, problems with animals, public utility matters or hazards (broken water mains and downed power lines), requests for directing traffic, and pleas for medical assistance. Calls that involve either requests for information unrelated to police business (Why are the flags flying today?> or those that apply to a specific case (Do you have John Doe in jail?> are not dispatched and have been largely overlooked by analysts. Yet, Lilly (1978> found that they comprised nearly 60 percent of calls to one medium-sized department, and Antunes and Scott (1981> noted that they represented nearly 30 percent of calls to twenty-one departments of varying size. Calls for assistance can involve a myriad of problems ranging from medical emergencies to helping someone accidentally locked out of a car to providing vacation checks on homes. Many types of assistance have been performed by police for years, but have gone unrecognized. The same is true for provision of traffic-control services. Americans are more likely to come in contact with the police through requests for information or assistance than through involvement in criminal matters. Of course, some calls that are considered to be noncrirninal have the potential for escalating into violence. Officers may make no arrests in family disputes, especially if they see no crime committed or if one party refuses to press charges, but they are normally sent to these incidents because of their crime potential. The same is true for some public nuisances or distur bances, such as complaints about gangs of youths or noisy neighbors. The police social service role has received increasing attention (see the review of some of this literature in Scott, et al., 1979). Some departments have established family crisis intervention teams. Others have created programs for referral of juveniles and alcoholics to helpthem avoid criminal justice processing. Because of recent legislation that decriminalizes public drunkenness in many states and the passage of local ordinances decriminalizing possession of small amounts of marijuana, the noncrimi nal portion of citizen demand for police services will likely increase.
An Overview of Police Service Delivery
55
of any American department would immediately be struck by the im mense variety of the requests. No other service organization receives so many diverse requests, one after the othe twenty-four hours a day. The popular conception of the police has been that they deal only with murderers, muggers, and robbers; with prostitutes, drug dealers, and gangland hoods; with the unpredictable and the bizarre; with the sordid side of life that is far removed from the daily lives of most Americans. This conception would probably be enhanced by looking at the complaint code lists used by departments to classify calls for service. Most of the codes show a legalistic, crime-based orientation that reflects prevailing state laws and local ordinances, Always specified are codes for homicide, rape, assault, burglary, and other serious crimes. Rarely do these lists contain codes for describing what many think has become the majority of police business: providing noncriminal service and assistance. When these codes are included, they are likely to be so general that they could refer to airnost any incident; information, meet complainant, or in vestigation are examples. Yet, precisely because of the volume of the noncriminal requests, police administrators are searching for efficient means of managing demand. Because the police respond to citizens calls for help and are held accountable for their disposition in many cases, many (and perhaps most> citizen calls are neither crime- nor law-relevant but represent various kinds of public and private troubles about which the individual citizen can do little or nothing (Manning, 1977: 12>. Determination of demand patterns for police service has been a popular topic since the 1960s. Because of the intense focus on the role of the polce that stemmed from the social changes of that decade, it was natural to examine the demands that were being placed on them, Some of the earliest work provides very general breakdowns of calls received. Cum ming, Cumming, and Edell (1965), for example, discuss calls for support and calls about things. Later work offers considerably more detail; Scott (1981)describes calls forservice undertwelve major categories, which are divided into seventy-five subcategories. Some demand studies examine calls forservice (see, forexample, Bercal, 1970; Reiss, 1971; Meyer, 1976; Lilly, 1978; Levens and Dutton, 1980; Antunes and Scott, 1981; Cahn and Tien, 1981; and Sumrall, Roberts, and Farmer, 1981>. Others look at the distribution of dispatches (Wilson, 1968; Bercal, 1970; Webster, 1970; Ress, 1971), and still others discuss the variety of tasks confronting patrol officers and the time required to complete each of them (Misner, 1967; Webster, 1970; Reiss, 1971; Levens and Dutton, 1980>. Determining systematic findings from this diverse literature is difficult, largely because no two studies have adopted the same scheme for classifying calls for service. Most, in fact, are so incompatible that
56 An Overview of Police Service Delivery
57
Accompanying the growing awareness that police are expected to provide services unrelated to the traditional law enforcement function is the realization that current methods of handling many demands are increasingly inefficient. Traditional patrol-car response may be an inap propriate or inefficient means of handling a large proportion of citizen calls. In many instances, there is no suspect to be detained, no witnesses to be interviewed, and no evidence to gather. In fact, officers often serve a clerical function when responding to calls, such as when they complete a theft report. Recognition of this factor has resulted in the inauguration of programs of alternative responses to calls; of prioritizing calls based on factors such as immediacy, intensity, and likelihood of criminal apprehen sion; and of attempts to manage demand efficiently in a time of fiscal constraint. Police have been unofficially providing alternatives to patrol-car dispatch for years. Now systematic attempts are being made to initiate and apply programs of call prioritization, call taker referral, telephone or walk-in reporting, and delayed formal response (Cahn and Tien, 1981). Current call classification schemes may no longer, be operationally relevant. For example, should a patrol car be sent in response to crimerelated calls, such as a report of a burglary that occurred several days before, when all relevant information can be gathered by telephone? Of course, police must still be prepared to respond quickly to acts of violence and crimes in progress. To facilitate this, they must devise alternative means of dealing with noncriminal service requests that will produce citizen satisfaction with reduced expenditure of scarce depart mental resources. The mere classification of criminal may not be sufficient grounds for determining the importance of a request for police service or the best mechanism for responding to the call (Sumrall, Roberts, and Farmer, 1981: 14).
Service Demands in a Medium-Sized Police Department
Detailed examination of demands on one medium-sized American police agency provides a general picture of the diversity of requests made of police. Data on calls for service that will be reviewed in this section were gathered in a study of police communications conducted in Fort Worth, Texas, in early 1981. This study is described in more detail later in the chapter. Part of this research effort involved listening to and coding information on incoming calls for service that were received and recorded on tape by the Fort Worth Police Department (FWPD). Among the information items coded was the nature of the crime or problem as
reported by the caller, The study utilized more than 230 problem and crime categories to classify requests. Table 4-1 presents the distribution of requests made through tele phone calls. The large set of problem/crime classifications has first been grouped into ten general categories, each of which is subdivided into more specific components. Review of table 4-1 demonstrates the dver sity of citizens service demands to urban police agencies. The first problem category listed in the table includes serious prob lems and crimes involving persons, such as fights, simple and aggra vated assaults, robbery, rape and sexual attack, and sucide. Overall, these types of calls account for about 6 percent of those receved by the FWPD. Fights and assaults were the most frequently reported. Less serious problems and crimes concerning personswhich include dis turbances, arguments, nuisances, family and neighbor trouble, and juve nile problemsmake up the second problem category. It accounts for slightly more than 14 percent of the monitored calls. The third category of demands concerns serious property problems, which accounts for 9 percent of calls for service. These calls dealt with break-in, burglary, theft, and arson; burglary and theft were the most frequent. About 16 percent of monitored calls concerned less serious problems with property, including missing property, attempted theft, attempted break-ins and alarms, and vandalism. Vandalism and at tempted break-ins, both of residences and commercal establishments, were the most frequent problems reported in this category. Requests for some form of assistance, including help rn medical emergencies, represent another type of demands on police. The fifth problem category listed in table 4-1 includes requests for a variety of general, nonemergency services, such as surveillance and vacatton checks, animal problems, reports of man down (unidentified person injured or unconscious), and calls for transportation and other types of assistance. Together, these requests account for about 5 percent of all calls. Less frequently, in about 3 percent of calls, pleas for assistance were related to medical and other emergencies, such as traffic accidents involving personal injuries, fires, mental disorders, and other serious medical situations. Some calls concern suspicious problems, persons, or circumstances that citizens feel may generate a crime or problem situation requring police attention. These calls, included in the seventh category, account for 8 percent of monitored calls. Reports of suspicious persons were the most frequent. Traffic problems represent still another set of requests. About 16 percent of monitored calls in Fort Worth concerned the reporting of
TaWe 41 Distribution of Citizen Calls for Service in Fort Worth, Texas (N = 5,092)
Problem Category
5.3
71
Percent of Number of Calls All Calls

100.0
Percent of Calls n Category
Problem Category
295 100.0 386
26.1
15.9
Percent of Number of All Calls Calls Percent of Calls in Category

General Assistance Missing person Animal problem Request surveillance Request transoort Request assistance Man. down Other 36 34 30 25 23 Emergency Assistance 2.6 133 26.1 132 12.5 11.0 9.2 8.5 19.5 100.0 272 114 77 47 24 14 7 6 6 8.1 4.7 2.4 2.0 2.0 Traffic accident with Injury Medical assistance Mental disorder 62 41 13
Serious Problems with Persons
5.8
Fight Simple assault Robbery Aggravated assault Child abuse Sexual attackrape Suicideattempted suicide Kidnapping
Less Serious Problems with
46.6 30.8 9.8
Persons 721 13.5 11 .4 Suspicious Person or Property Suspicious person Suspicious property condition Suspected violator Prowler Gunshot Traffic Problem 16.5
,
14.2 100.0 Fire Other 7.9
12 404 188 95 41 40 40 838
3.8 9.0 100.0 46.5 23.5 10.1 9.9 9,9 100.0
Drunk/disorderly Obscene activity Family trouble Argument Keeping the peace Juvenile problem Subject of police concern Harassment Neighbor trouble Gambling, prostitution Vagrancy Other 97 82 59 55 38 37 34 159 21 8 4 127
8.2
7.6 53 5.1 4,7 22.1 2 9 1 .6 17.6 100.0
Serious Problems wth Property 477
9.4
60.5 8.6 8.1 7.3 6.0 Accident no iniury Parking violation Moving violation Obstruction Abandoned vehicle Assist motorist Signal disorder
Other Citizen Wants Information 17.4
507 72 68 61 50 39 13
28 886
1.6
3.3 100.0
Theft Burglary Break-in Motor vehicle theft 126 118 104 72 26.4 24.7 21.8 15 1
7.1 4.2 .6 34 20 3
Shoplifting Purse snatched Arson
Less Serious Problems with Property 838 100.0
16.5
Police-related information Contact police unit Contact individual Nonpolice information
534 139 102 71
60.3 15.7 11.5 8.0
Attempted break-in Vandalism 362 142

128 15.3
43.2 16.9 7.3 5.3

4.8 .8 6.4
Directions
Citizen Gives Information 4.3
40
218 100.0
Attempted theft
Missing/lost property Refuse to pay 61 44

40 7 54
Information on a case Hospital reports

Cancel request for service Complaints Other
107
40 45 21 15
46.9
17.5 19.7 9.2 6.6
Trespassing Dangerous property/ substance Other
60
An Overview of Police Service Delivery
61
some form of traffic problem, including property-damage traffic acci dents; parking, vehicle, and moving violations; disabled motorists; and traffic obstructions or signal disorders. A final group of calls, seldom recognized in discussions of demands on police, concerns requests for or provision of information. Requests listed in category nine, representing 17 percent of the total, included those concerning specific police cases, road directions, and nonpolice-related topics. Citizens also called to report tips, cancel earlier service requests, pass on reports from medical facilities concerning cases of inflicted injuries, and complain about or compliment the police. About 4 percent of the calls represented situations where callers wanted to give some type of information. A few general comments on the demand patterns reflected in table 4-1 are relevant. First, it is important to note the relatively large volume of information-related calls received by the FWPD. More than a fifth of the monitored calls were of this type. This relatively high percentage is consistent with that received by other urban police departments. Pre vious studies of service demand, many of which have centered on police dispatch data, have overlooked the array of information-related calls received on a regular basis. Second, a large proportion of calls are not crime-related. This comes as no surprise to police personnel, but does contradict the popular conception of their role. Many requests for assistance and information involve social problems totally unrelated to crime. Another set of calls, though potentially related to crime, more often pertains to unfounded worries or concerns, Reports about suspicious persons or circum stances, more often than not, are unfounded or ambiguous as to criminal involvement. Thus, although police continue to perform significant func tions related to the prevention and handling of criminal situations, they are also asked to perform a variety of tasks unrelated to crime, including the provision of information and assistance.
Overview of the Pohce Communications Study
In this and subsequent chapters, data gathered as part of the Police Communications Study (PCS) are utilized as empirical evidence relevant to discussions of demand processing in police agencies. The PCS was conducted by the Workshop in Political Theory and Policy Analysis at Indiana University through a grant from the National Institute of Justice. The principal focus of the study was on processing citizen demands for police service, and special emphasis was placed on the roles and prob lems associated with the flow of demand-related information. The pro-
ject was also concerned with assessing demand patterns, in terms of geographic and demographic variations in the community. Research was conducted for a three-month period in the FWPD. Because this study was the first of its kind, conducting comprehensive research in a single agency was considered an appropriate research strategy. The department was selected as the research site for several reasons. First, it utilized a computer-assisted dispatch (CAD) system, which provided the attendant ability to generate useful research data. This system also assisted in triangulating different elements of the demand processing function for individual calls. Second, the population of Fort Worth provided a social and economic diversity well suited to a comprehensive study of demand trends. Third, crime patterns in the city were sufficiently varied to generate a variety of demands. To study the research issues of demand processing and information flow, data were gathered through a variety of methods. A primary research interest was the examination of individual service demands, or calls for service, as they were processed. This involved monitoring communica tions between citizen-callers and police operators, between operators and dispatchers, and between dispatchers and field officers. A three-step data collection strategy was devised to obtain information on each of the three communication linkages associated with initial police response. In step one, data were gathered on citizen-police operator interactions through listening to and coding information about their tape-recorded conversations. Most police departments, including the FWPD, tape all incoming calls, both to serve as a backup in case information is garbled or confused and as evidence for cases of citizen complaints about police efforts. After listening to individual calls, staff members coded several types of information about the call, including available data on: Caller name, address, phone number, and current location. Perceived caller characteristics (age, sex, race, and emotional state). Description of location scene. Nature of the problem or crime involved. Description of participants. Police operator response to the call. All available information was coded on the first part of a research form. The second step involved gathering data on the exchanges between the operator and dispatcher for individual calls. These data were gathered by examining and coding CAD records. When judging a call appropriate for dispatch, operators in the FWPD entered relevant information about it into the CAD system through computer terminals. This material was subsequently routed to police dispatchers for use in making decisions about dispatching units. Records maintained in the CAD system pro-
62
5
The Gatekeeping Function in Police Agencies
Police departments in American cities receive thousands of requests for service each day. As described in the last chapter, these vary from the urgent to the mundane, from reports of homicide to requests for street directions. Each call is individually handled by telephone operators. De spite the often routine nature of call processing, they must screen each request and decide upon an appropriate response, which might include dispatch of a police unit, referral to another agency, transfer to another departmental office, or refusal of service. Police administrators have seldom viewed telephone operations as critical elements of service delivery. Instead, call processing has been seen primarily as a routine support function, a means to deliver officers to the scenes of crimes and other citizen problems. This perspective ignores the important role of operators, who serve as organizational gatekeepers. An actual case provides a dramatic example of the possible consequences of the decisions of police gatekeepers and their direct relationship to performance:
The girl reported [to policel that a neighborhood youth was trying to break into her house. She was babysitting for her mother and was alone at the time. The operator took the girls name and number, determined that the youth was known to the girl, and told her he would dispatch a police officer to her home. The operator classified the call as a 34, a routine
disturbance call not requiring immediate response. The call was put in the queue to be answered when a squad car became available. The gins mother came home 40 minutes later to discover that her daughter had been slain. We get a lot of such calls, said the division chief. Usually it is a pretty routine matter of neighborhood kids pestering a babysitter. The opera tors mistake was to assume that was the case and not to elicit more information. (Police Magazine, 1981: 4)
vided data on the information recorded about particular service requests by operators and routed to dispatchers. The second research step in volved matching particular monitored calls with calls listed in CAD rec ords furnished by the department. Matching was done on the basis of the time a call was received and the incident location, Calls to which no unit was dispatched, including those concerning only information re quests, could not be matched because they were not recorded in the CAD system. When matching was achieved, data from the CAD records were entered on part two of the research form. The final step in tracing the progress of calls through the initial re sponse process involved monitoring and coding the radio transmissions made by dispatchers to officers in the field. As with incoming calls, the FWPD tape-recorded all radio dispatch transmissions. Researchers matched individual monitored calls with resulting dispatches, again on the basis of time and location. When matches were successfully made, researchers coded information related to the request and response on part three of the research form. Information concerning the nature of requests can be used to assess patterns of demand. By comparing the information items recorded on different parts of the research instrument, the flow of demand and response information can be traced through the stages of the initial response process. The question of information flow in police response will be addressed in subsequent chapters. During the course of field research, more than 1000 hours of taped calls were monitored. Data were collected on more than 5,700 calls during the three-month period of fieldwork. About 2,300, or 40 percent, of them were matched with CAD records and taped dispatches. Most of the remaining calls did not involve a dispatch. In addition to tracing individual calls through the initial process of response, the project undertook other research efforts. A mail survey of patrol officers was conducted to study their assessment of information received from dispatchers. Also, a survey was conducted of individuals who had recently called the police for assistance. It focused on citizen perceptions and evaluations of their interaction with operators; more than 1,200 such interviews were completed. Finally, data were gathered from departmental records on over 150,000 calls for service received by the FWPD in 1980. This brief overview of the Police Communications Study is intended to provide the reader with a conception of the overall purpose and research effort of the project. Subsequent sections of this volume, when present ing relevant empirical data, will provide additional descriptions of data collection procedures. A complete methodological overview of the study
nfliinr
hc
-,d ;,. O,,-,t+
O,r,r,,,,
,,
110011
This tragic case highlights how gatekeeping activities can directly th nriiic Hn ir fail tn Ho In this situation the oneralor
64 The Gatekeeping Function
65
failed to obtain sufficient information and misclassified the nature of the incident, which resulted in dispatcher delay in sending a squad car and consequently to its arrival too late to prevent the tragedy. To be sure, many calls do not involve life-threatening problems nor do most gatekeeping errors yield such calamitous consequences. Yet, this exam ple indicates the potential effects of gatekeeper decisions on police efforts and performance. The purpose of this chapter is to explore the gatekeeping function described in chapter 2 within the context of police service delivery. It is the gatekeeper, in this case the operator or call taker, who is the first police representative to receive service demands. The operator initiates demand processing, first by evaluating demand eligibility, and then, for those demands ruled eligible, by obtaining and coding relevant informa tion, selecting and activating agency response, and providing informa tion. This chapter also considers operator training and supervision.
Police Gatekeeping Activities
Receiving Service Demands
telephone numbers, telephone directories, city maps, departmental pro cedures manuals, directories of social service agencies, and copies of state penal codes or local ordinances. These sources allow call takers to verify and supplement the information provided by callers. Incoming calls are routed to operators through automatic assignment mechanisms built into the telephone system. In traditionally structured departments, operators are connected to dispatchers through a conveyer belt system. For those calls meriting dispatch, operators record information on complaint cards and route them to dispatchers on the basis of incident location. Each dispatcher is assigned a geographic area of the community. Many departments, es pecially the larger ones, have installed computer-aided dispatch (CAD> systems that involve the computer in processing calls, Instead of record ing information by hand on computer cards, operators in CAD depart ments enter information by keyboard onto a preformatted computer screen, After verifying that the location address is in the jurisdiction and that essential information is included, the computer automatically routes the data to the appropriate dispatcher. CAD systems also provide other advantages, including allowing the dispatcher to check the status of all calls currently being handled by the department. Operators can also tie into various state and local data files to obtain information on vehicle registration or outstanding warrants for arrest. Although CAD systems do not completely automate call receipt and handling, they provide additional services that enhance both gatekeeping and response coordi nation tasks.
Police agencies receive most service demands through telephone calls, though this has not always been the case. Before the widespread use of residential telephones, demands were communicated by hailing the beat officer on neighborhood patrol, using public phone boxes linked to the police, or contacting officers face-to-face in local police stations. The proliferation of residential telephones led to the creation of communications centers, through which those needing service can contact the police. Many departments have also installed direct tele phone lines to major businesses, public institutions, or service-providing agencies that facilitate rapid communication in times of emergency. Among the frequent users of these lines are ambulance companies, fire departments, hospitals, banks, major public institutions such as mu seums, and private alarm companies. Call takers work in a central location, usually at the departments main headquarters. They usually sit at a series of carrels or work stations located in a single room. The typical complaint room features several operator stations, each of which has the same equipment. Stations are normally arranged in rows or in small clusters. Each station contains a telephone panel or headset; a medium for message transmission <either complaint cards or computer terminals>; and sources of frequently needed information, such as lists of departmental and other often-called
Determination of Eligibility
One of the first tasks performed by police gatekeepers in the process of handling individual calls is assessing the eligibility of requests for agency response. Of the varied demands received, most are consistent with the types of services that police provide. A few, however, involve functions they cannot or will not perform, and a fundamental gatekeep ing task is to weed out these requests. Call takers are assisted in eligibility determination by criteria established by law, tradition, and administrative guidelines. Common eligibility criteria used by police include geographic boundaries, service domain, and urgency. Practically without exception, requests related to problems or crimes located outside the agencys legal jurisdiction will be ruled ineligible. Although officers of one jurisdiction may assist those of another as part of mutual aid agreements, a department rarely responds to demands
66 Table 5-1 Reasons Why Service Not Provided by Fort Worth Police Department to Some Calls for Service (N
=
The Gatekeeping Function
67
488 calls, 9.6% of all monitored calls for service) N Percent
Reasons Service Not Rendered

Problem/crime not currently taking place
Police can do nothing until citizen takes action

Problem/crime located outside of jurisdiction
Civil mattet not appropriate for police response

Police offices closed; officer not on duty
Requested service not provided by police

Problem/crime located on private property Operator does not have requested information No crime or problem involved
93 89 67 53 53 48* 25 18 12 30 488
Other reason
Total
19 18 14 11 11 10 5 4 2 6 100
Service requests in this category include needing assistance because iocked out of car (13), needing police to stand by for protection (121, requests for license registration informa tion (6), escort/transportation (4l, vacation checks (3), and other requests (10),
originating in other jurisdictions. Most operators do, however, assist those ruled ineligible on the basis of boundary criteria to contact the law enforcement agency that serves their location. Other boundary criteria relate to property ownership. Some police agencies will not respond to noncriminal problems that occur on private property, such as minor accidents at a home driveway or store parking lot, because they are located on private property and involve civil rather than criminal factors. Many departments devise eiigibility criteria that provide some specifi cation of service domain, that is, what services will or will not be provided. Generally, the service domain of American police agencies is both vague and extremely broad. Legal statutes usually describe it in nonprecise terms, including references to protecting the public wel fare. keeping the peace, and suppressing crime. The police role, as described in the previous chapter, has tended to expand over time and encompass services related to law enforcement, public order mainte nance, traffic control, crime prevention as well as deterrence, and social services. The breadth of domain has meant that police receive relatively high demand loads that increasingly exceed response capacity. Partially to cope with this problem, police agencies have begun to specify domain more clearly and to eliminate some service functions. Some have de cided they will not provide nonemergency services such as vacation checks of residences, assisting motorists locked out of vehicles, and providing transportation for disabled persons. Operators receiving these types of calls will refuse response, though they may assist callers in obtaining service from other agencies. Eligibility criteria can also be related to the seriousness and urgency of requests; for the most part, they serve to screen out minor problems. For example, call takers might refuse to send officers to respond to reports of a minor noise disturbance or of hot-rodders. Although these problems are technically related to service domain, they are perceived by operators to be so minor as to render action ineffective and wasteful. If the police were sent, they could do little about the matter. Critera based on seriousness may be stipulated in agency guidelines, but more often they evolve through informal practices. Data gathered as part of the Police Communications Study (PCS illustrate the use of eligibility criteria in assessing the appropriateness of response. While monitoring calls for service in the Fort Worth Police Department (FWPD), researchers noted both the nature of the request and call taker response. Empirical findings indicate that some form of police serviceincluding sending a unit, referral to other agencies, and provision of informationwas provided in more than 90 percent of the
monitored calls. In the remainder, the caller was informed that the police would not respond to some aspect of the request. The reasons given for the refusal of service are listed in table 5-1, Multiple reasons account for call takers judging requests as ineligible for response. Several are related to the eligibility requirements previously outlined. Fourteen percent of the calls for which services were not provided involved a crime or problem located outside the jurisdiction. In other instances, response was refused because requests dealt with noncriminal problems located on private property. Calls in these two categories were ruled out on the basis of boundary criteria. Call takers in the FWPD also employed domain criteria when evalu ating the eligibility of requests. These criteria were invoked when ref us ing response on the basis that the requested service was not provided by the department (e.g., assistance to motorists locked out of vehicles and vacation checks) or involved a civil matter not appropriate for police action. Domain criteria were also invoked in calls judged ineligible be cause no crime or problem was at issue. These calls usually related to some citizen concern that was technically not a criminal incident; for example, a caller might report that a car had been parked in front of his or
68
69
her house for several days without being moved. A police operator would likely respond that no law was being violated if it was properly parked in a designated parking zone, and hence the department could do nothing about the matter. Although the police might conceivably intervene in such instances, few agencies define their domain so broadly as to include these types of citizen concerns. Another reason for not initiating response was that the problem or crime being reported was not occurring at the time of the call. Implicit in this rationale is the idea that the problem is minor and that the caller lacks sufficient evidence. If the call is of a serious naturefor example, about a threatened robbery or homicideit is clear that the police and possibly other law enforcement officials will immediately investigate. But, where the matter is not serious, police may not take action until such time as they can witness the problem/crime or gather evidence, A caller report ing that children have been playing on his lawn or throwing trash in the yard, for example, will likely be told to call back when the offenders are present because immediate response is apt to be fruitless. That some requests were denied response should not overshadow the fact that nine out of ten of those received by the FWPD did receive some assistance. That some calls were judged ineligible does not mean that the police were unconcerned or unwilling to aid callers. In many cases where direct response was refused, they were given some expla nation for this action and were referred to other agencies that might help them. Compared to other public service agencies, police agencies, in cluding the FWPD, respond to a high proportion of requests.
Interpreting and Coding Demands
After determining eligibility, police gatekeepers interpret and code requests. As with other public services, citizen demands vary dramat ically in type and seriousness. Interpretation involves determination of their exact nature, their seriousness and urgency, and other related information. Operators must translate the situation into one or more codes that describe it in agency-relevant terminology; codes may in clude reference to problem or crime type, urgency, location, and partici pants. Coding distills and structures demand data to facilitate response.
sense of this articulation, that is, to process demand information from the agency rather than consumer perspective. Callers may not provide descriptions in sufficient detail for the operator to comprehend the situation from the agency perspective. Often gatekeepers must probe for more complete understanding of the demand. Probing centers on obtaining the knowledge needed to classify the incident and initiate appropriate response. The minimal amount usually required, which necessitates probing if it is not provided by the caller, includes a concise description of the incident and its location. Without these facts, police cannot determine an appropriate response or know where to provide it. For many incidents, operators will probe for other types of potentially relevant information, including de scription of suspects or witnesses, presence of weapons, and descrip tions of property or vehicles. This is subsequently used in coding the request as a precondition for response. Data from the Police Communications Study indicate that operators in Fort Worth questioned callers for many types of information. While monitoring incoming calls, researchers noted both the items exchanged and whether the caller volunteered them or operators requested them. The context through which items were exchanged is presented in table 6-2. Operators probed for information when it was not provided by the caller during the initial rendition of the problem. Call takers in Fort Worth most often sought personal and business phone numbers, information on injuries, home addresses, and descriptions of vehicles or weapons. This probing resulted from operator perception that the information was relevant though it was not volunteered. Less often, call takers requested the street address of the incident, information on suspects and other participants, and the complainants name; callers were more likely to volunteer this information. By employing interpersonal communication skills, operators can rapidly obtain needed information while maintaining the cooperation of callers. Probing may necessitate interrupting their rendition of the prob lem, and, unless handled carefully, may irritate them. Unfortunately, few departments have established either basic or in-service training pro grams to provide guidelines on effective means of probing for informa tion. Most call takers must learn ways to do so from experience and peer observation. Some analysts have called for more training in communica tions skills for police telephone operators (Scott and Percy, 1980; Burton, 1973). Incident or Complaint Codes. Once relevant information on service requests has been gathered, operators must code and record it in police
Interpretation. Interpreting demands is often a difficult task. Persons requesting police service articulate them from their own point of refer ence, in their own words, and with a multitude of expectations about what should be done in response. The gatekeepers task is to make
70
The Gatekeeping Function 71
Table 5-2 Means by Which Demand Information Was Acquired by Police (N = 5,106 calls for service) Table 5-3 Signal Codes Used by the Fort Worth Police Department
Percent of Calls Where Information Acquired Through:
Information Item 53.9 54,0 97.9 13.6 49.1 92.1 38.5 41.9 33.9 25.4 17.8 62,4 47.7 46.6
N*
Caller Initiative Operator Request
Complainant name Complainant home address Complainant phone number Business name Business address Business phone number Location street address Suspect description Other suspect information Other participant description Other participant information Information on injuries Description of vehicles Information on weapons
2,664 1,162 1,429 1,387 668 541 3,815 887 977 279 1,024 452 1,107 356
46.1 46.0 2.1 86,4 50,9 7.9 61,5 58.1 66.1 74.6 82.2 37.6 52.3 53.4
*N refers to the number of monitored calls for service in which the listed information was exchanged between callers and police operators.
terms. The coding schemes used in most departments partition all possible requests, no matter how complex, into finite, usually short, sets of numerical codes. These complaint, or incident, codes are subse quently used to represent the nature of the problem. They are often legalistic, crime-oriented schemes that reflect penal codes; although they include categories for noncriminal services, these are usually out weighed by codes related to specific types of crimes. The complaint codes used by the Fort Worth Police Department (FWPD), called signal codes, are illustrative of those used by many urban police departments (see table 5-3). Note that a large number of the codes refer to crimes: assault, burglary, rape, and robbery. Multiple codes for several crimes provide more detailed classification; for example, five signal codes (7, 8, 9, 10, and 67> deal with burglaries, each reflecting different possible situations a responding officer might encounter. The FWPD codes contain some entries for service-related functions. For example, three codes deal with dog problems, one with escort, and one with vacation checks. There is even a code for loose cattle. Still, the
1 Accidentminor 2 Accidentmajor 3 Accidenthit & run 4 Assault S Assaultcriminal rape 6 Abandoned bicycle 7 Burglar alarmsilent 8 Burglar alarmaudible 9 Burglar in a building 10 Burglary investigation 11 Cutting 12 Deceased person 13 Demented person 14 Disturbance 15 Disturbancedomestic 16 Dog bite victim 17 Mad dog 18 Dog ordinance violation 19 Drunk 20 Drunkdown 21 Drunkin a car 22 Drunkdriving (DWI) 23 Fight 24 Fightgang 25 Fire call 26 Hospital call 27 Injured person 28 (Meet) ambulance 29 Meet complainant
30 Parked car or parking violation 31 Officer-initiated traffic stop 32 Person with a gun 33 Prisoner pickup 34 Prowler 35 Prowler in yard 36 Robbery 37 Shooting 38 Suspicious person 39 Suspioous person in car 40 Theft investigation 41 Abandoned car 42 Abandoned property 45 Canceled call 47 Escort/transport 50 Information 51 Investigation 52 Loose stock (cattle) 53 Malicious mischief 54 Meet 55 Missing person 56 Open door 57 Open window 60 Stolen car 61 Others 63 Assist (backup) 65 Vacation check 66 Business house check 67 School burglary in progress
set of codes places more emphasis on crime rather than service-related functions. It is not clear how the department might classify calls dealing with sick persons, utility problems, or other assistance-related problems. Unfortunately for the efficient processing of requests, human beings and their problems are of infinite variety. No matter how comprehensive the set of codes devised by police agencies, some demands always defy neat and easy classification. Recognizing this problem, most agencies use one or more broad categories as residual codes when no other more specific one is appropriate. A few of FWPD codes are general ones, including meet complainant, information, investigation, and others. Calls classified with one of these general codes together account for 22 percent of those deemed eligible for officer dispatch. The investigation category, by far the most
72
Demand Processing in Police Agencies The Gatekeeping Function 73
Table 5-4 Distribution of Service Requests Classified as Disturbances (Signal 14) by the Fort Worth Police Department Percent of Calls in Category 13.1 8.0 6.6 5,5 5,5 5.1 5.1 5.1 5.1 4.7 4,7 3.6 3.6 2.9 21.2 100.0
Problem Type
Number of Calls
Noise problems Trespassing/unauthorized presence Harassment Fight Assault Public nuisance Drunk/disorderly Juvenile problem Vandalism Suspicious persons Argument Family/neighbor trouble Threaten physical injury Vehicle violations Others Total
36 22 18 15 15 14 14 14 14 13 13 10 10 8 58 274
codes may pose problems for subsequent handling of the matter by dispatchers and responding officers who may have only the code with which to understand and react to an incident. Again, these empirical illustrations of coding are not intended to sug gest that determination and classification of demands is poorly or im properly undertaken by Fort Worth operators. To the contrary, our experience indicates that they undertake this task seriously and code incidents as accurately as possible. The difficulty they and other gatekeepers face is the problem of trying to classify extremely varied and complex social phenomena using a finite list of codes. Coding and classification decisions will always introduce some loss or distortion of information. Obviously, some trade-off occurs between the extensiveness of codes and the ease and efficiency with which they can be used. The more comprehensive the set of codes, the more difficult to memorize and correctly apply them as rapidly as required in high demand situations. Yet the shorter the set, the more difficult it is to describe service requests concisely. What police have sought is a set of codes that balances these two dimensions. The fact that police agencies use so many coding systems, varying significantly in extensiveness, suggests that an ideal set has yet to be formulated. Priority Codes. Not only do operators determine problem or incident codes, but in many police agencies they also provide some indication of the priority or urgency of service requests. According to a study con ducted by the Police Executive Research Forum (PERF), about 70 per cent of studied departments used some form of priority coding (Sum raIl, Roberts, and Farmer, 1981). Usually, a short set is employed to character ize the seriousness of requests. Although prioritization schemes vary among departments, most em ploy some means of identifying urgent or emergency calls, such as a robbery in progress. Some systems also attempt to identify routine, nonemergency requests, to which rapid response is unnecessary. The remainder of incoming calls is usually assigned an intermediate priority ranking. Police agencies have found it difficult to define a coherent set of rules to assess priority effectively. It has been easier to assign priorities to those calls at the extremes of a seriousness continuum. In emergency situations, where rapid response can significantly affect outcomes, a top-priority classification is clearly appropriate. Similarly, where rapid response will exert little or no identifiable impact, such as in a case of cold burglary (one that happened substantially before being reported), a service request ordinarily deserves low priority. The problem is with
frequently used of these residual groups, represents approximately 12 percent of all dispatched calls, Examination of the more detailed codes assigned by Police Communications Study (PCS) researchers to calls classified by FWPD operators as code 51, investigation, show that a wide variety of problems are included. The most frequent ones include sus picious persons, gunshots, threatened physical injuries, attempted break-ins, and puzzling circumstances. Obviously, these requests were somewhat vague, which accounts for their general classification. Their inclusion here is not meant as an indictment; the complexity of human demands often precludes precise coding. Recognizing this, operators rely on general, or residual, categories, which may or may not be of much value to the dispatchers and officers who eventually deal with service requests. Even the more speci.fic code categories may be relatively broad. A case in point is the code for disturbance, signal 14. Examination of calls so classified, in terms of the problem codes assigned by PCS researchers (table 5-4), shows that a variety of requests are included under the disturbance heading. Demands in this category include noise problems, harassment, trespassing, fights, assaults, and many others. General
74 on patrol officer decision making is equally applicable to call takers: The exercise of police discretion is fundamentally a matter of deciding how to treat ambiguous information. Operators normally have more than one coding category to which they can assign several different types of calls, and their decisions can have significant consequences.
intermediate-priority calls. Here a fairly rapid police response may make much difference, yet the operator does not feel a top-priority rating is justified. Not surprisingly, the intermediate category tends to be used most frequently. Again, the FWPD provides an illustrative example. It employs a threetier system of priority codes. Code 1 is used for top-priority emergency calls (e.g., burglar in building, cutting, robbery), code 2 for important but not emergency calls (e.g., traffic accidents, disturbances), and code 3 for routine calls (e.g., burglary, theft investigations). The departments aim is to dispatch code 1 calls as rapidly as possible; code 2 calls may be retained in the dispatch queue for up to four minutes; and code 3 calls may be held up to twenty-five minutes before dispatch, but callers are to be informed of the delay in response. Examination of the PCS data allows us to consider the relative use of different priority codes by the FWPD. As expected, the intermediate code was used most extensively, in about three-fourths of the calls considered appropriate for response. Of the more than 2,300 calls in which a unit was dispatched, 5 percent were given priority code 1; 74 percent, code 2; and 21 percent, code 3. Selecting Initial Police Response
Coding Other In formation. Operators often gather data about calls other than that necessary to assign incident and priority codes. If gathered, this informationdealing with matters such as the address and nature of the incident, presence of weapons, and description of participantsis usually listed in some form on the service request record (e.g., complaint card or computer terminal screen). It is usually abbrevi ated and may or may not be translated into numerical codes. The street address is often used to assign a code that designates the beat from which the request originated. Departments may also use specialized codes to indicate other significant dimensions of an incident, for exam ple, whether or not a weapon is involved. These codes allow for rapid communication of important facts and may do so in a way that precludes those who do not know the codes from comprehending the situation. Especially because communications with responding officers are trans mitted by radio and can be openly monitored, police agencies may devise codes for the purpose of maintaining some secrecy about operations. The process of coding demand and response information necessarily involves discretionary action by gatekeepers. Call takers are faced with information that is frequently ambiguous; they have little but their intui tion to indicate whether or not that reported by the caller is true. Because of the uncertainty involved, discretion will always be required in deter mining how to code any given situation. Pepinskys (1975: 23) statement
After determining eligibility and the nature of the request, operators select and initiate one of a repertoire of response alternatives. The selection determines subsequent activities. Historically, both citizens and officers have shared the conception that the police should respond to all requests by sending personnel to the scene. It is increasingly being realized, however, that the ability to respond rapidly to calls by dispatch ing personnel has been eroded by ever-growing demand volume matched only in part by increased resources. This realization is docu mented by research indicating that a substantial proportion of calls do not result in the dispatch of a unit (Antunes and Scott, 1981; Cahn and Tien, 1981; Lilly, 1978; Bercal, 1970). If response to all demands by sending a unit is impossible, what other alternatives are available? Several options are being used and still others have been advocated. One already discussed is referral, or provision of information about and direction of callers to other agencies that might provide desired services. Referral is common in calls where demands are judged to be ineligible for officer dispatch. Even where some response is forthcoming, call takers may provide additional information to assist a caller. For example, they might initiate the dispatch of personnel to a domestic disturbance while at the same time suggesting that the caller contact the crisis intervention team as soon as possible. Another response alternative is transferring or referring callers to report writers. For many types of crimes, including those that are cold and where evidence will not likely be obtained, all that responding officers can do is make a report that will be filed or forwarded to detec tives for investigation. Faced with high demand loads, some depart ments have established report-writing offices where personnel complete crime or incident reports over the phone. This is seen as more efficient than sending an officer to the scene to make the report because it frees him or her for other duties and speeds the information to detec tives. Obviously, this type of response is not appropriate for situations where important evidence might be gathered or where callers might need direct assistance. However, in calls such as the report of a missing
76
77
person or a bicycle theft, police can gather necessary information and commence investigation without needing to dispatch a patrol officer. The report-writing alternative frees responding officers to handle more sign if icant matters, though less tangible benefits derived from direct contact with the public may be forfeited. Some departments offer the reportwriting alternative as an option, but will dispatch a patrol unit if the caller so prefers. Other variations in this report-writing function are possible. Some departments have established walk-in reporting facilities. Operators re quest that persons reporting less serious matters, where immediate response is unnecessary, come to the station and complete a report. Other departments mail report forms to complainants and ask that they complete them and mail them back. This procedure is used in cases such as minor thefts and traffic accidents. Another response alternative, one seldom recognized in discussions about managing demand and formulating alternative approaches to re sponse, is operator provision of information to callers. In some cases, they only seek answers to questions or explanation of police policies; road directions or interpretation of parking regulations are examples. Here operators perform a direct service function by providing the re quested information, which precludes further response. In other cases, operators might inform callers about how to handle situations on their own. This type of activity is evident during times of emergency or heavy demands on police. For example, during major ice or snow storms, they cannot possibly respond to all the minor accidents that are reported. Call takers in these situations issue instructions for the involved parties to exchange information and then contact their respective insurance agen cies. Thus, the participants handle the problem themselves. Consideration of these response strategies suggests that gatekeepers perform a variety of service-related roles. For some requests, operators serve as information conduits, through which demand data are gathered, structured, and transmitted for the purpose of activating direct response. Another role is that of direct service provider. Although this function is relatively unrecognized, call takers directly provide service in contacts involving requests for general or police-related informationall the caller wants in these situations. By providing it and satisfying citizen demands, operators perform a direct rather than support service function. A third operator role is that of intermediate service provider. The nature of some calls precludes the direct provision of service or relaying the requests to response coordinators. An example would be someone who needs help in obtaining food stamps. Obviously this is a matter outside the police domain. In cases like this, operators usually refer the caller to
N
other governmental or community social service agencies. Thus, they serve as intermediate service producers. It is difficult to document empirically the overall pattern of response to calls for service. Those who have used police records have been ham pered because information is usually maintained only about those calls likely to result in dispatch. It is not recorded for calls involving requests for information or other services where dispatch is deemed inappropri ate. Another means of studying response is to monitor calls and analyze operator responses. From this perspective, we gain information on all calls for service, not just those that are subsequently dispatched. How ever, a problem occurs with interpreting response to calls where operator responses are vague, such as okay or well take care of it. Here it is not clear what will be done about the matter, including whether or not an officer will be dispatched. Examination of operator responses to callers, data collected as part of the Police Communications Study (PCS), highlights the selection of response alternatives by gatekeepers. PCS fieldworkers recorded ver batim what, if anything, operators told callers would be done about the reported matter. Subsequently, these responses were grouped into a set of categories. Although examination of the responses is quite illuminat ing, it reflects what the operator told the caller; which usually but not always indicates what actually occurred. The pattern of responses of FWPD operators to calls for service is reported in table 5-5. More than 40 percent of the callers were told that officers would respond. The number of units dispatched may actually even be higher because they may be sent even if callers are not specifically told this. Here operators acted as information conduits by gathering relevant de mand information and routing it to dispatchers. Call takers served as intermediate service providers when transferring or referring callers to other units or agencies for assistance. About 12 percent were transferred, mostly to the departments report-writing station (7 percent> or to other internal units, such as detectives (5 percent). Another 12 percent of callers received a referral, that is, the operator provided the citizen with information (including name and/or phone number) of other agencies that might offer needed services. Of these, 6 percent were referred to internal sources, 3 percent to other law enforcement agencies, and the remainder to other private and public agencies, Operators directly provided services in two contexts involving no other intervention, First, they recorded information that citizens wanted to relay to the police and forwarded it internally. For example, callers gave tips on the whereabouts of suspected felons, reported alarms acciden
78
Demand Processing in Police Agencies The Gatekeeping Function

79
Table 5-5 The Distribution of Fort Worth Police Department Operator Responses to Calls for Service Number of Cases
2,105
(N
5,106) Percent of Cases 41.2 Providing Information to Callers

(595) 336 245 14 (11.7) 6.6 4.8 0.3
Operator Role/Response Category
gory alone accounts for more than 10 percent of all monitored calls. Most of them involved operator responses that were vague and indeterminate. Simple phrases such as okay or Ive got it were rather common; sometimes units were dispatched and sometimes not. The caller may have presumed a unit was to be sent even though this was not directly stated. These vague phrases not only make precise determination of initial response difficult, but also suggest that operators do not always clearly instruct callers about the services they are likely to receive.
In formation Conduit
Police unit promised
Intermediate Service Pro v:der Call transfer: Transfer to report writer Transfer to internal units Transfer to other agencies
Referral of Caller:
131 71 55 5.9 2.6 1 .4 1.1 1.5 132 4.0
07
(636) 300
(12.5)
Referral Referral Referral Referral Referral
to to to to to
internal units other law enforcement agencies other governmental agencies community social service agencies other agencies
79
677) 205 472 (1,093) 271 540 :21.4) 5.3 106 5.5 100.0
Direct Service Provider
lnformation taken and internally relayed General information provided
Other Pesponses 282

5,106
Police cannot handle no referral lnformation takerno action promised Other response, dont know response
Tota
tally triggered, requested that previous requests be disregarded, or asked that a message be forwarded. In 4 percent of monitored calls, the caller wanted only to relay information to police; operators performed this service by noting it and routing it to appropriate offices. Secondly, call takers provided direct service by giving information sought by the callers, This occurred in 9 percent of monitored calls. Other responses are less easily classified. As noted previously, some requests did not meet eligibility requirements and were denied service. Those that received a referral are counted in the intermediate service provider category, and the remainder are included in the the other responses group. The information takenno action promised cate
In previous sections, we have discussed how gatekeepers provide information to callers in a variety of contexts. Many requests center specifically on the acquisition of general or police-related information, and operators perform a direct service function in disseminating it. They may also provide useful information through referral. Yet, these are not the only ways in which police operators can provide this sort of as sistance to callers. Provision of information about the gatekeeping function itself may influence citizen attitudes about and behavior toward the police. Callers often lack knowledge about procedures for processing requests, and as a result, may be confused, unsettled, or angered by the way demand information is gathered. For example, those who are faced with serious problems may be upset when operators interrupt and ask numerous questions about the incident before promising to send a unit. They do not understand that these are routinely asked to assist responding units. Failure to provide some explanation of call-processing activities may increase apprehension and diminish cooperation. Few guidelines exist on the provision of this kind of information, and therefore operators exercise widespread discretion in this area. Similarly, call takers can provide citizens with information on response, which allows them to understand more clearly what will be done about their problem. This knowledge may calm or reassure the caller who is upset about a matter although it is also possible that he or she might be angered by the type of response. Information about response may also allow preparation for police arrival at the scene. For example, callers who are expecting a unit might watch for it and help direct it to the scene. In some cases, operators might provide instructions about what to do until officers appear. This might benefit the caller (e.g., telling someone to stay inside until the unit arrives) or the police (e.g., having the caller protect the crime scene to avoid destruction of evidence). Provision of informa
80
tion about response, therefore, may help callers in several ways and possibly enhance subsequent interactions with police personnel. The data on call taker responses reported in table 5-5 indicates that the Fort Worth police regularly provide several types of information. They offered the general and police-related type in 9 percent of the monitored calls and the referral variety in another 12 percent. Even for other re sponses, including promising that a police unit would be sent, operators provided information. In 17 percent of dispatched calls, operators told callers something about the speed of response, either giving a time estimate or informing them of some delay. In another 3 percent of dispatched calls, other kinds of response information were given, includ ing explanation that police were already on the way or about what should be done until they arrived. The information provision function of police gatekeepers has usually been neglected by police administrators. Most attention has been focused on calls requiring further action. No record is kept of information calls, despite their volume, and little recognition is given to this form of service provision. This neglect is unfortunate, not only because this is an important and frequent activity, but also because it can affect police performance and caller well-being.
Police Gatekeeping Personnel
Given the scope and centrality of gatekeeper actions in the process of response to calls, one might imagine that call takers receive considerable training. Yet, on the contrary, in most departments they are among the least trained personnel. Their training, if any, normally consists of on-thejob instruction from peers, or less frequently, from supervisors. It may consist of an introductory period of observation by veteran call takers, followed by a period of answering calls in the presence of a training officer or supervisor. The 175-city study conducted by the Police Executive Research Forum (PERF) found that less than 70 percent of surveyed departments pro vided any operator training; those that did normally offered only one to two weeks of basic indoctrination (Sumrall, Roberts, and Farme 1981). New operators are normally instructed in the use of the departments phone console, and in the operation of call-handling equipment specific to the department, such as conveyer belt or CAD systems, Rudimentary guidelines might be given on proper phone-answering procedures, but rarely any concentrated training in dealing with irate, abusive, or upset callers. Operators are taught to become proficient in the use of demand
processing equipment, but learn little about proper techniques for effec tive interpersonal communication. This lack of formal training can be explained in several ways. The major reason is the long-held and widespread police perception of the role of call takers, who are often held in low esteem. They enjoy little status and are paid on a lower scale than patrol officers, even though both interact with the public and make key discretionary decisions. Some depart ments view operators as clercial staff, and they tend to be treated as such by officers imbued with their own sense of professionalism. Another factor contributing to the lack of training is that many call takers are civilians as well as female. The PERF survey revealed that 64 percent of sampled departments employed only civilians as call takers and that another 26 percent used both uniformed and civilian operators (Sumral[, Roberts, and Farmer 1981>. This finding is congruent with that of a thirty-two-city study which found that three-fourths of sampled agencies used civilians exclusively as call takers (Colton, Brandeau, and Tien, 1980). Both civilian and clerical workers, often females, are ac corded [ow status by officers and administrators alike. A pervasive atti tude in many departments is that it is ultimately officer actions that matter not what the telephone operator tells the caller or how a request s processed. Because call takers are often civilians, many officers feel they have only a limited knowledge of what occurs on the street. The lack of a professional imageenhanced by lack of status, low pay, and perceived unfamiliarity with or unsuitability for real police work probably has as much to do with the nature of the job as with any other factor. Answering calls can become a monotonous, numbing routine despite its often hectic pace. Requests are few that have not been heard previously. Listening to emotionally unnerving, occasionally pathetic re quests is the norm. The job is neither glamorous nor easy. The chances for advancement are limited for civilians, except perhaps to be upgraded to dispatcher status. Not surprisingly, the turnover rate among call takers is quite high. Supervision of the high volume of work activity is limited in communi cations centers, again a result of the low perceived salience of gatekeeper processing of calls. The supervision that does occur is usu ally Imited to a cursory check of current operator activities, such as noting who is answering calls and who is out of service. Most telephone systems provide a master console through which supervisors may listen to citizen-operator conversations. Also, many departments tape-record calls, which allows for after-the-fact monitoring and evaluation of opera tor performance. Most departments, however, engage in little continu
82
6
Response Coordination in Police Agencies
ous supervision and review operator performance only in cases of citizen complaint or gross error. Faced with tight budgets, rising crime rates, and increased public clamor for better protection, and affected by the relatively low status afforded police communications, few departments have allocated much money or personnel time to training or supervising call takers. If the choice is to add patrol personnel or pay the cost of formulating and administering a training course for call takers, the decision is simple for most police chiefs. In fact, many departments have considered the complaint room to be an ideal assignment for officers who are injured and are on light duty or who are disciplinary problems. The attitude of some of these personnel and their accompanying poor qualifications as call takers have served to point out even more the lack of a rigidly prescribed training program. The thirty-two-city study mentioned earlier suggests that the practice of using the communications center as an assignment for officers with disabilities or discipline problems may be declining, however. Few de partments surveyed still use the center as a repository for the lame, the halt, and the blind. Although no data that bear directly on the quality and training of call takers were presented, the study concluded that many departments have begun to realize the importance of well-qualified, well-trained call taking personnel (Colton, Brandeau, and Tien, 1980>. This changing attitude is attributed to the need for qualified personnel to operate sophisticated CAD technology. The study does not indicate whether call takers are also being trained in proper telephone techniques or to make crucial decisions under pressure. Although police dispatchers do not directly interact with the public, they nonetheless perform a central function in responding to calls. Serving as middlemen in demand processing, they connect gatekeepers who gather information from citizens with officers in the field. As response coordinators, dispatchers perform several demand processing activities, including reviewing demand, determining the specific components of response, relaying information to officers in the field, and regular monitoring of the status of field units. All these actions affect the nature of response to citizen demandsand consequently organizational performance. The dispatch room is a departments nerve center. Dispatchers control and monitor the movement of the entire patrol force, Reviewing demand information and dispatching appropriate units, they link callers with field officers who can respond. They also connect officers with sources of information and support, both within and outside the department. Dis patchers, regardless of rank or status, usually act with the voice of the chief, and their instructions are so recognized. Wilson and McLaren (1972: 120) describe this function as the giving of orders by an agent who has no authority in his own right, but who performs the routine tasks of command as a service for his principal. In most departments, dispatchers are assigned to coordinate the activities of patrol personnel in a specific geographic area (often several districts or sectors>. They normally work in a single room, separate from but in close proximity to call takers. Each dispatcher sits at a console that contains radio apparatus for communicating with field units, a means of receiving demand information (conveyor belt or computer terminal), and a capability to track the status of both field units and specific calls. Dispatchers enjoy access to a variety of materials to aid them in perform ing their duties. Each station normally is equipped with a large map of the city highlighting the area for which that station is responsible, plus lists of the officers working each shift. 83
84 Response Coordination 85 Some calls routed to dispatchers do not involve the sending of units. Their purpose is to generate a general broadcast for officers to be on the lookout for a specific problem. For example, citizens might report hearing loud explosions or being annoyed by hot-rodders driving up and down the street; they usually want the problem to be corrected, but do not want to talk to an officer.
Police Dispatchers as Response Coordinators
Dispatchers receive information on service requests in one of two ways: handwritten complaint cards routed by gatekeepers via a con veyor belt or, in a CAD system, a message on the terminal screen. In processing calls, dispatchers perform several functions, including re ceipt and review of demands for suitability of response, determination of the specifics of response, communication of demand and response information to street-level bureaucrats, and continuous monitoring of work activity.
Receipt and Review of Demand Messages for Suitability of Police Response
Complaint Code Review Dispatchers perform another task upon re ceipt of demand information and prior to determining the specifics of response: reviewing complaint codes assigned by call takers. Although operators bear primary responsibility for designating the codes, dis patchers have authority to change them. They rarely exercise this pre rogative, however, and ordinarily dispatch units according to the code assigned by the gatekeeper who had access to more information about the problem. Dispatchers in Fort Worth altered complaint codes in only 3 percent of the calls routed to them. No pattern is discernible in the changes, except that general codes were likely to be redesignated to more specific ones. For example, the single most frequent change was from disturbance (signal 14) to domestic disturbance (signal 15). In some cases, a second call provided additional information about the matter and as a result dispatchers modified the codes.
Determining the Specifics of Police Response After a quick review of the demand message and its suitability for handling, dispatchers determine the specific components of response. These include sequencing and speed, the number and type of personnel assigned, and the equipment to be used. When demands consistently or temporarily exceed response capacity, queues form. This is a common occurrence, and dispatchers must decide the order in which queued demands are to be serviced. Sequencing Responses. The general policy of police agencies for determining the order in which calls are dispatched is that more serious ones are handled ahead of less serious ones. Beyond this broad rule, however, dispatchers are largely on their own in sequencing responses. They may be aided in their decisions by priority designations assigned by call takers and departmental policy regarding the length of time calls can be held in a dispatch queue. One guide to sequencing decisions is call-priority schemes, which are effective in separating emergency from routine calls. The majority of
The Decision to Send a Unit. On the basis of conversations with callers, operators decide which calls are eligible for dispatch. The infor mation is subsequently routed to dispatchers, who may first review it to be certain that the problem warrants intervention. In most cases, this review is pro forma; because a complaint message has been forwarded, dispatchers expect to send a unit. At times, howeve no unit is sent or a dispatch is canceled. First, dispatchers may engage in a second level of eligibility screening and override call taker decisions to send a unit, especially if they feel the problem is inappropriate for such action. For example, in Fort Worth an elderly lady called the police to remove an old refrigerator that had been dumped in her yard. Although the call taker indicated that the matter would be more properly handled by the Health Department, the caller insisted on seeing the police. When the informa tion reached the dispatcher, he felt that the case was not serious enough to warrant an officers time, dropped the call from the request queue, and contacted the Health Department about the matter. Second, on the basis of additional information about a change in problem status, dispatchers may drop a call from the queue prior to dispatch or cancel one to a unit already dispatched. Sometimes callers report that the problem that originally led them to contact police has dissipated; for example, a boyfriend harassing a woman might have left the scene. Other calls are quickly determined to be unfounded, This happened with some regularity in Fort Worth, where private alarm companies frequently reported business alarms being activated at store opening time. Usually police received a call informing them that the owner accidentally triggered the alarm while entering the premises, which rendered dispatch unnecessary.
86 Table 6-1 Mean Dispatch Time of Fort Worth Police Department to Intermediate Priority Calls, 1980 Selected Complaint Code 6.0 3.2
7 4 4.
Number of Dispatches
Mean Dispatch Time (minutes)
20,648 3,251 4,236 1,1 338 9,327 4,829

630
3.2 3.8
3.0
3,020
447
9.2 362
314 4 0 4.4 5.1
Accidentminor Accidentmajor Accidenthit and run Assault Assaultcriminal rape Burglar alarmsilent Burglar alarmaudible Burglar ip a building Burglary investigation Cutting Deceased person Demented person Disturbance
Disturbancedomestic
20,414 11,940 1 422 1:128

491
7.7 7.6 6.1 7.3

54
Drunk Drunkdown Drunkin a car Drunkdriving

gang
1
705 44
Fire call Hospital call

Injured person
277
954 79 1 165
39 129 69
4 5
calls, however, fall into an intermediate category; an immediate response is not required, but a unit should be sent as soon as possible. These types of calls reflect a wide variety of crime, traffic, and assistance situations. A second guide to dispatchers in sequencing responses is departmental policies on dispatch times, or the maximum length of time a call of a given priority should be held in the queue. The ideal is to respond to emergency calls immediately, to intermediate-priority calls within 515 minutes and to routine calls within 1530 minutes. These policies are more often statements of goals than of requirements, however. In penods of excess demand, the dispatch of a unit as rapidly as the goal is often impossible. Using priority schemes and policy guides while monitoring workload and availability of units, dispatchers sequence responses. Top-priority calls are handled as rapidly as possible, and low-priority ones wait in the queue until no important calls are pending. For intermediate-priority calls, dispatchers must determine which require more rapid response and which might safely remain a few more minutes in the queue. This category of calls in Fort Worth in 1980 waited an average of 6 3 minutes to be dispatched This compares with a mean dispatch time of only 3 3 minutes for high priority calls and 12 0 minutes for low priority Appar entl prioritization weeds out the most and least serious calls and leaves determination of the seriousness dimension to the dispatchers discre tion for intermediate priority calls Data gathered for the Police Communications Study provide evidence on how dispatchers sequence intermediate-priority calls. In general, sequencing was based on perceived call seriousness and relevance of rapid response. Table 6-1 shows the mean dispatch time for these calls dispatched in Fort Worth in 1980 (some 145,000 calls), organized by 10.0 5.4 5.0 5.9 5.2 3.5 6.3 6.8 8.4
694
17,794
IMeet) ambulance Meet complainant Parking violation Person with a gun Prisoner pickup Prowler Prowlerin yard Robbery Shootin Suspicious person Suspicious person in a car Theft investigation
2 1 509 609 2,873 902 3,932 1, 466 2,146 3,983 1,787
3.2
5.8
1,167 1064
9.0 84 1,528 8,887

School burglary in progress 151
Average dispatch time for intermediate-priority calls varied widely, from a low of 2.4 minutes for a report of a drunk driver to a high of nearly 13 minutes for a hospital request for an officer to sign the chart of a person injured in a potentially criminal situation. Other types of calls usually dispatched quickly (un,der 4 minutes) were reports of robberies, major accidents, shootings, fire calls, burglar alarms, and open doors. Calls of intermediate priority that were handled relatively slowly (longer than 8 minutes) involved unspecified requests to meet a complainant, malicious mischief, burglary investigations, and abandoned property. The patterns seem logical, based on criteria of seriousness and relevance of rapid response: more serious incidents and those where immediate response is apt to make the most difference are dispatched more rapidly.
perty Information (general broadcast) Investigation Malicious mischief Missing person Open door Stolen car Other
6.3
2.5
88
Table 6-2 Dispatcher Assignment of Backup Patrol Units by Selected Fort Worth Police Department Complaint Codes
Selected Complaint Code Number of Dispatches Percent of Dispatches n Which Backup Unit Assigned
Selecting Response Personnel. Determining the specifics of response also includes decisions about which patrol unit or units to send to the scene. Dispatchers have the right to assign jobs, and their directions are rarely refused. In this function, they enjoy some measure of discretion, though sending the nearest available unit is the usual decision rule. In emergencies, any available unit may be sent. For most calls, however, dispatchers wait until a unit in the vicinity of the problem becomes available. In certain situations, dispatchers send particular officers to calls that may require special knowledge or skill in handling. Some officers may have special training in family crisis intervention or juvenile counsel ing, for example, that is useful in particular incidents. Dispatchers also determine the number and type of units to be sent. They may feel that in certain situations specialized units (detectives, technicians) or patrol supervisors may be required, either in addition to or in place of patrol units. Although these units are most often sent upon patrol officer request, they can be assigned directly if the dispatcher feels the problem warrants their presence. Dispatchers also enjoy latitude in determining the number of units to send, and in designating particular ones as primary or backup. For calls perceived as potentially dangerous to the responding office such as armed robberies, and for those ob viously requiring several officers to handle, like major traffic accidents or large-scale public disturbances, more than one patrol unit is sent. Dis patchers select the number of units based on their knowledge of the situation and current unit status and location. Discretion in assigning backup units is clearly demonstrated by data in table 6-2, which shows the percent of Fort Worth calls of a given complaint code to which a backup patrol unit was dispatched. The calls one would expect to be more serious or dangerous as judged by the complaint codeburglar in a building, fights, domestic disturbances, robberies, rapes, and prowlerswere those to which backup units were sent most often. Complaint codes indicating that an officer would likely make a report onlyhit and run accidents, minor traffic accidents, mali cious mischiefor handle a minor problem, such as a parking violation, usually led to only one unit being dispatched.
Communication of Demand and Response Information to Patrol Officers
A third response coordination task of dispatchers is relaying informa tion about both the demand situation and organizational response to officers in the field. Obviously, patrol-unit response requires that details about the nature and location of the problem be communicated to mobile
Accidentminor Accidentmajor Accidenthit and run Assault Assaultcriminal rape Burglar alarmsilent Burglar alarmaudible Burglar in a building Burglary investigation Cutting Deceased person Demented person Disturbance Dsturbancedome5tic Dog bite victim Drunk Drunkdown Drunkin a car Drunkdrivuig Fight Oghtgang Fire call Hospital call (M.eet( ambulance Meet complainant Parking volation Person with a gun Prisoner pickup Prowler Prowler in yard Robbery Shooting Suspicious person Suspicious person in car Theft investigation Abandoned car Abandoned property Information (general broadcast( Investigation Malicious mschiet Missing person Open door Stolen car Others School burglary in progress
20,947 3,376 4,618 1253 359 12,915 5,901 858 16,947 491 387 330 20,711 12,053 156 1,642 1,391 500 174 1,693 737 282 3,994 1,201 8,602 2,305 647 5,749 927 4,105 1,957 568 2,179 4,030 5,701 1,623 716 2,010 18,442 3,113 1,507 383 2,700 12,917 208
7.9 46.2 4.8 36.2 50.7 67.5 60.8 80.2 14.8 60.5 10.6 69.7 64.7 69.2 4.5 39.0 30.7 47.8 10.9 68.8 73.7 20.6 1.3 33.3 10.1 1 .9 68.2 12.9 61.1 61.0 61.5 71.0 67.1 63.8 7.5 2.8 1.5 1.5 55.9 7.8 7.4 55.6 8.0 12.9 76.0
T
Response Coordination 91
N
90
Table 6-3 Extent to Which Fort Worth Police Department Dispatchers Furnish Detailed Location/Participants/Problem Descriptions to Responding Officers Percent of Cases in Which Available Information Is Dispatched
Information Item
213 183 115 431 1,025
84 91 83 90 93
Additional In formation about Location Nearby intersection Location on street or highway Location inside building Exterior location near building Named building, establishment, or area
485 544 99 269
93 92 86 84
Additional Information about Participants Description of suspects Other information about suspects Description, other participants Other information about other participants
43 94 53 428 202
71
Additional Information about Nature of Problem Personal injuries involved Description of vehicles involved Indication of weapons involved
officers. Dispatchers not only transmit information necessary to place them at the scene, but may include additional information that will help them prepare to handle the problem. Officers may also be informed about any other patrol or support units that have been dispatched. In addition to relaying the complaint code and street address, opera tors may provide additional details about the nature of the incident, the location, the persons or vehicles involved, or the presence of weapons. Dispatchers transmit these facts to responding officers if they are deemed to be relevant to their preparation for the call and to the way they will handle it. Few guidelines dictating when such data should be trans mitted are available. In fact, dispatcher dissemination to responding officers is subject to divergent points of view concerning the role of broadcast information, Some observers feel that providing officers with as much relevant intelligence about the problem as possible before their arrival at the scene will improve their preparation. Dispatchers who agree with this view transmit most of the information forwarded by call takers. Others argue that only location and complaint code should be dispatched because the veracity of other aspects of the situation must be deter mined by the officer on the scene. Despite differing perspectives on this issue, it is apparent that how much dispatchers communicate beyond the most fundamental demand and response information is subject to their discretion. Table 6-3 shows that, with few exceptions, dispatchers in Fort Worth transmitted to officers available data about location, participants, and the nature of the problem the majority of the time. They usually provided additional facts about location, including the name of a building or area; where it was situated on a street or highway; whether or not the incident occured inside a building (apartment, hallway) or on the exterior, near a building, such as in a yard or on the sidewalk; and a description of the nearest intersection. These additional facts may help officers locate the scene more rapidly. Dispatchers also relayed descriptions, names, and ages of suspects and participants. Certain details about the nature of the problem, used to supplement those provided by the complaint code, were passed on less frequently than those concerning location or partici pants. Although descriptions of involved vehicles were broadcast more than 90 percent of the time, information about weapons was dispatched less than three-fourths of the time and that about personal injuries was transmitted less than half the time it was available. Operators sometimes judge these data to be irrelevant to officer preparation and response. More will be said about this in the next chapter.
Monitoring Field Activities
A fourth task of dispatchers is monitoring and coordinating officer field activities. This task is particularly significant in policing, where most service provision occurs outside central headquarters and where the speed of response can be crucial. In most agencies, the dispatcher is the closest thing that exists in the police structure to a monitor of patrol activities { Pepinsky, 1976: 43). Dispatchers monitor the activities of field personnel and note their current status, i.e., handling a call, taking a meal break, or performing routine patrol. Dispatchers also keep track of officer-
92 of a departments patrol force at any given time. This could allow super visors to review dispatcher performance and decisions regarding unit dispatch. The use of dispatch supervisors is not common, however; the PERF study found that only 42 percent of responding departments employed them, and that not all were trained in supervisory techniques (Sumrall, Roberts, and Farmer, 1981). The importance of dispatchers has been largely overlooked in analyses of police performance. Studies of workload and patrol practices have focused on the effects of technology, including application of CAD sys tems, on patrol practices, but have not considered the critical response coordination functions of dispatchers. Regardless of the technology applied in police activities, dispatchers determine the specifics of re sponse, queue requests, communicate information to patrol units, and monitor their status. All these tasks directly affect the decisions, actions, work tasks, and responses of the officers who handle calls.
Demand Processing in Police Agencies Response Coordination
93
initiated activities, such as traffic stops. Careful monitoring allows dis patchers to know at any given time which units are available to respond to calls and which are closest to an incident scene. This is particularly important in emergency situations. Monitoring also provides a command and control function. Dis patchers oversee officers work activities, which occur largely outside supervisor presence. To maintain radio discipline, they must keep the airwaves clear for necessary traffic. They can request the location of a unit at any time, or send it from one area to another. Each change in unit status is noted; a record of the length of time each officer spends on a task or meal break is thus available for supervisory review. Careful monitoring also facilitates the sending of aid to field units should the need arise.
Dispatcher Training, Status, and Supervision
Most basic dispatcher training is conducted by peers in on-the-job situations. It concentrates on the technical aspects of operating radio and/or CAD equipment, on departmental policies governing call priority and radio traffic, and on the mechanics of monitoring unit status. The Police Executive Research Forum (PERF) survey of 175 police agencies found that three-fourths of them provided at least some basic training for dispatchers. It usually lasted for periods of from one to three weeks, and was augmented by occasional in-service sessions (Sumrall, Roberts, and Farmer, 1981). Most dispatchers begin by observing veterans at work, followed by a period of supervised work, and then move on to regular assignments. Most administrators and patrol officers accord dispatchers a higher status than they do call takers, possibly because dispatchers are often sworn. The PERF study found that officers were assigned to dispatch in about half of the surveyed departments, though some used civilians exclusively (Sumrall, Roberts, and Farmer 1981). Dispatcher status may also be enhanced because patrol officers have little choice in whether or not to accept a job assignment. They know that dispatchers can make their job easier by sending support units, providing requested informa tion, or covering for them if the need arises. Most departments possess the capacity to supervise their dis patchers, but few attempt to do so on a regular basis. Because so much of what dispatchers do is broadcast, they could easily be monitored and subjected to close supervision. Also, on account of the advent of com puter-assisted dispatching, it would be possible to reconstruct the status
7
The extent of data lost at each stage of call handling is described and assessed. We determine whether or not Silbermans observation about police crime prevention is also true of demand processing: do the police use only a portion of the information available to them during demand articulation? The characteristics of demand processing that inhibit infor mation flow or truncate portions of certain calls are identified. The ultimate goal is to examine the effect of information transmission during demand processing on police performance. We begin by considering two views on the importance of the data provided to dispatched officers.
Information Flow in Police Response
95
Information Flow in Police Response: Exchange, Loss, and Performance
In a recent book, Charles E. Silberman (1978) suggests that one reason the police have been ineffective in preventing crime is that they fail to take advantage of their principal resource: officer knowledge and exper tise. Most departments, he argues, have become so enamored with the technological trappings associated with rapid response that they have concentrated on achieving efficiency at the expense of effectiveness. Officers may arrive at the scene quickly, but are often inadequately prepared to handle the situation. One reason is that they have ignored the vast store of information available from the street, that is, from other officers. Past experience is ignored, and information is not shared:
Divergent Views on the Importance of Information
In the most basic sense of the term, police departments are informationprocessing organizations; but they have never thought of themselves that way Almost everything about the way most departments are organ ized and run serves to inhibit the flow of information and expertisefrom the community to the police, and from one officer to another. Thus, departments use only a minute fraction of the knowledge that is at their disposal. (Silberman, 1978: 244)
One factor that has caused police to ignore their role as informationprocessing organizations is their widely held belief that the best way to handle a problem is to dispatch trained professionals to the scene and let them determine the nature of the problem and the proper course of action. Nowhere is this belief more clearly delineated than in the dis agreement over dissemination of information to responding patrol of ficers. Some observers and police administrators believe that the more knowledge of apparent relevance that can be provided to officers before their arrival at the scene, the better prepared they will be. Call takers sharing this perspective tend to collect more data from callers; dis patchers transmit more of the information they receive. At the other extreme are those who adopt the view expressed by Rubinstein in his discussion of dispatch procedures in Philadelphia: that minimal informa tion should be provided to responding officers. In explaining why patrol officers are not told about the exact nature of the complaint and are instead given only a coded signal and a location, Rubinstein (1973: 92) argues that: The dispatcher has no way of knowing whether he has been told the truth and must leave that determination to the investigating officer. There is no purpose in mentioning the specific complaint since it will all be repeated
by the complainant when the officer arrives at the scene. The signal is also used to give an officer an assignment that involves a complex per sonal tale that the dispatcher cannot recount over the air or was unable to He simply uses the most general understand in the initial telling. terms available to him.
. .
Another source of street-level information for police is the requests of citizens for service, Few would argue that the police have placed much emphasis on obtaining and using all the data that are potentially available during calls. Instead, their focus has been on gathering only enough intelligence to determine eligibility; and, if a call meets established cnteria, to place a patrol unit at the scene as rapidly as possible. Callhandling technology is geared toward information reduction, speed of response, and allowing officers to handle the situation upon arrival. Thus, extraordinarily complex situations, as expressed by callers, are reduced to a single numerical code, to which a few explanatory remarks are attached. In this chapter; we show how decisions regarding information flow affect police actions and performance. In particular, we note the kinds of information exchanged during demand articulation and whether they are included in internal relay and eventually broadcast to responding officers.
Analysis by Rubinstein and Manning (1980) suggests that, because incoming information is initially ambiguous and often misleading, trans
96 Information Flow in Police Response to that necessary to determine call disposition. Will an increased amount improve response time or better enable an officer to prepare for an encounter? Will additional details alter complaint code assignment? How much will probing or time spent listening to callers improve overall response? A cost calculus is involved in nearly every demand. That calculus changes with any number of factors, including the urgency or intensity of the demand, the volume of incoming calls, the perceived time required to obtain the information, the operators affinity for or rapport with the calIe the latters location, the presence of a super visoror countless other factors that vary from day to day and from call to call. Call taker determination of the costs of obtaining and transmitting an additional fact may exert a significant influence on departmental activity and citizen satisfaction. One cost factor is the expense of the time involved in obtaining and coding information. If a major goal is to reduce response time to dis patched calls, it follows that an antecedent goal is to reduce telephone time, or the length of the conversation between the caller and the operator. This goal seems antithetical to operator probing for information other than that necessary for the dispatch of units. Additional descriptive elements may take considerably longer to obtain, and the costs of probing, measured in response delay and possible caller ill will, must be weighed against the perceived value of the information. Time costs affect not only demand articulation but internal relay and response artic ulation as well. Call takers and dispatchers must determine whether the costs of relaying and dispatching supplemental data outweigh the impor tance of that passed on to responding officers. Another significant demand processing cost involves coding. It stems in part from the incredible complexity of demands; time is required to sort them out and assign the proper code so that they will receive appropriate responses. In all calls to be dispatched, operators must gather enough data to assign a complaint code understood by dispatchers and patrol officers. Call takers decide how much information is sufficient for accurate coding; they must assess the comparative cost of obtaining it by tele phone versus the cost of sending an officerto the scene to obtain it directly, or the cost of some other alternative, such as referral. 97
mitting details to officers compounds distortion. This view has probably been the prevailing one in policing for some time. On account of the emphasis on rapid response time in the face of increasing workload, coupled with static or decreasing personnel resources, administrators have streamlined call processing wherever possible. And yet, some disagree with Rubinsteins analysis and downplay Mannings negative assessment of the value of incoming information. Providing all or most of the data available about an incident to the responding officer may offer advantages. In some instances, the com plainant may be unable to repeat information about the incident once an officer arrives, i.e., a victim may be injured too seriously to recount the matter or a third party may have called from a location other than that to which the police must respond. Additionally, officers may be better able to prepare themselves for handling a service request if they are provided relevant intelligence before reaching the scene. The American Bar Asso ciation (1972: 35) suggests that the vagueness characterizing most data gathered by call takers may cause an officer unwittinglyto approach the job without proper regard for his own safety and for the needs of his prospective client. Complaint codes alone may trigger a mind-set in responding officers that leads them to make statements or take actions inappropriate to the situation. Paradoxically, concern with shortened response time may lead to a reevaluation of the importance of obtaining more detailed information. As noted in chapter 5, departments have been searching for ways to devise alternatives to patrol-car dispatch, including report writing by telephone, referral to other agencies, mail-in programs, and delayed field response. All these alternatives require that operators obtain enough data to be certain that an alternative response is appropriate. This may require more probing, and hence a longer call-handling time during demand articulation, While probing, call takers may obtain information useful to responding officers. Whether these details will be forwarded to them is subject to call taker and dispatcher discretion.
Information Cost
Information is the key resource in demand processing. Although inval uable, it is costly to obtain and transmit. A key issue in determining its value is its effect on police performance in responding to demands. The costs of obtaining data from callers must be evaluated according to the expected benefit produced by resulting personnel actions. Operators must assess the costs and benefits of obtaining information in addition
Information and Demand Processing

The flow of information through the stages of demand processing and decisions on which items to include, exclude, or truncate are crucial to police response and performance. At each stage of demand processing, such factors as mode of communication, message duration, and the
98
99
The Changing Form of Citizen CaUs for Police Service

The content and meaning of citizen calls for service are influenced, and sometimes altered, by several factors at each stage of demand process ing. We have discussed some of them in general; it may be helpful to provide an illustration by following a call from initial receipt by an operator through to dispatch to a field officer: The changing form of the demand message is noted at each stage. We will examine a transcript of the call, the resulting internal relay transmission, and the transcript of the radio dispatch. Demand and response information is taken verbatim from FWPD tape recordings, though names and addresses have been altered to maintain confidentiality. Internal relay data come from records gener ated by the CAD system.
Demand Articulation The following call was received by the FWPD at 8:58 RM. on a Thurs day evening. It is a typical one, though in this case a third party, a witness, became involved in the call. Not an uncommon occurrence, the participa tion of the third party produced little effect on the way the call was handled: Caller: Operator: Caller:
Operator: Caller:
Operator:
My name is Jane Smith and my car got stolen about a minute ago. Just a minute ago? Yes. Im on Henderson Street at the Gulf Station right by the Highway. They are headed south on Henderson. Its a 78 Monte Carlo, red with a white vinyl top. The license number is AAA 111. Are you still making payments on the car? Yes, maam. Are you up to date?
Yes, maam.
OK, give me the address where youre calling from. Corner of Henderson and Lancaster. Whats the hundred block? 1200 block. I need your last name.
Smith.
extent of receiver participation in message formulation affect the content of the information being relayed. Perhaps more than any other service organization, the police provide an excellent setting in which to examine its flow and consequences. The stages of exchange are clearly deline ated so that identifiable outputs are produced that can be compared from one step to the next. The characteristics of and influences on information flow in demand processing also vary significantly among stages. Finally, a high proportion of the workload results directly from citizen demand and its initial interpretation. The three stages of information flow in demand processing were introduced in chapter 3; they are applied here to police services. In the first step, demand articulation, citizens telephone requests that are evaluated by call takers. After ascertaining eligibility, they gather and code information on demands. Because most of them are telephoned, operators can participate in demand articulation by requesting additional data and clarifications. Although eliminating certain nuances of meaning that might be conveyed face-to-face by gestures, body movements, or eye conctact, the telephone mode of communication fits well with concern for quick message transfer and rapid patrol response. In step two, internal relay, call takers transmit coded data about eligible demands to dispatchers. Internal relay is usually completed rapidly by transmitting abbreviated notes and coded facts via a preformatted instru ment, such as a dispatch card or a computer terminal screen. In this stage, they are quite specific, but in considerably less detail than during demand articulation. Messages are short and receivers (dispatchers> rarely participate in their formation, another accommodation to the need for rapid message transfer. Internal relays are produced in written form and, unlike information exchanged in demand articulation, can be readily stored for further reference. In step three, response articulation, dispatchers relay specific demand and response data to officers who can respond. Compared to demand articulation or internal relay, the process of information flow is quite different for this stage. Instead of its transmission by telephone, written dispatch card, or computer terminal display, response articulation occurs through radio broadcast. As with internal relay, response transmission is brief and to the point, much shorter than the original call. Dispatchers determine whether all or part of the information is relayed to officers, Although the latter may participate in message formulation, this seldom occurs. Messages are broadcast, and responding units are expected to acknowledge their receipt. If they do not hear them or require clarifica tion of details, they can request the dispatcher to repeat part of them or provide additional information.
Caller: Operator: Caller: Operator: Caller: Operator: Caller: Operator: Caller:
Operator:
The telephone number youre calling from? 332-1234. How many persons were involved?
100 Information Flow in Police Response
101
Caller: Figure 7-1 Fort Worth Police Department Complaint Card
Operator: Third Party: Operator: Third Party: Operator: Third Party:

**PRIORITY SERNO 001200 HENDERSON ST PHONE COMPL ADDR UNITS AVAIL REMARKS F216 BEAT 0000000 FO18 03/26/81
MRS. SMITH
2 51 APT 3321234 PRA A070
CODE
1**
000001
SIG
Operator: Third Party:
This man here can give you a description. (Hands phone to third party.) How many were there? One dude about 18 or 19. Was he black, white, or hispanic? Black. What was he wearing? Blue jeans, yellow baseball cap, and an orange short sleeve shirt. OK, tell her well send an officer. OK, bye.
2101
In this example, note how the operator first probed to determine the callers eligibility. If the latter had been behind on car payments, the vehicle might have been repossessed and no need would have existed to send an officer. Only after eligibility was determined was information sought pertinent to placing an officer at the scene. Many times, opera tors actually participate in message formulation by prompting callers. Such was the case in this instance, when the operator requested several types of information related to suspects, including number, race, and clothing description. The duration of demand articulation can vary widely, depending on the nature of the call, the physical or emotional state of the calle the current demand volume, or the attitude of the operator. In this case, the caller operator conversation lasted approximately two-and-one-half minutes (about average), influenced only slightly by the transfer of the phone from the victim to the witness, who provided additional information. If the caller is aware of supplementary data that could be of use to responding officers, demand articulation may take somewhat longer than would otherwise be the case. Normally, call takers attempt to gather only enough to place officers at the scene and provide them with an indication of what to expect. At the same time, they require information to enable them to assign a complaint code. In this case, the operator coded the call as a signal 51, investigation, one of the general classifications discussed in chapter 5.
SIG 60 THAT JUST OCCURRED / GULF STA// B/M 18 YELLOW CAP, BLU JEANS, ORANGE SHORT SLEEVE SHIRT LEFT S/B ON HENDERSON STOLE 78 MONTE CARLO RED/WH AAA 111/7
Internal Relay
After ascertaining relevant facts about the car theft and recording it on the computer terminal, the demand message was routed to the dis patcher responsible for the district in which the incident occurred. The complaint card for this call, as entered by the operator and received by the dispatcher, is shown in figure 7-1.
The information contained in this internal relay is specific, abbreviated, and encoded. The message is much shorter than that during demand articulation. This relay indicated to the dispatcher that the call involved an investigation (signal 51) that carried an intermediate response priority (code 2). The operator included the street location, the complainants name and phone number at the location, and a series of remarks that described the incident specifically. Included in the remarks was an indica tion that the investigation concerned a signal 60 (stolen car), along with certain location and participant information provided during demand articulation. In addition to information furnished by the call takefl the dispatch message has information automatically generated by the departments CAD system. These data include a code indicating whether or not officers should use lights and sirens when responding (code 1), a serial number, 00001 (used in all police reports related to the incident), the police reporting area (PRA A070, a geographical subunit of the police beat used by the department for planning purposes>, patrol units that are available for dispatch (F216), the beat location of the call (F018), the date (03/26/81), and the time the information was entered by the call taker (2101, or 9:01 P.M.).
102 Information Flow in Police Response 103
Response Articulation
During response articulation, dispatchers communicate demand and response data to field officers. In the case of our sample call, it took approximately two minutes from the time the call taker sent the internal relay until the information was dispatched; the call waited in the dispatch queue only briefly. The dispatch transmission was short and straightforward:
Police Dispatcher:
Frank 218, copy call. Frank 218 the sheet on a signal 51. 1200 Henderson. Twelve hundred
message. An exception is Manning (1980>, who demonstrates that many information items are available in calls. He argues that, depending on their interpretation by call takers, different items can be used to alter demand meaning, classification, and priority designation, ultimately af fecting police performance. By overlooking or ignoring certain informa tion, call takers may assign a different complaint code than they would had they considered it. Research undertaken by the Police Communications Study (PCS) traced calls from initial articulation through dispatch in order to analyze information flow and processing comprehensively. PCS researchers lis tened to tape recordings of incoming calls. For each one monitored, they noted the nature of the problem and the stated response. They also noted any facts that were exchanged about three general topics: the
complainant, location of the incident/problem, and specific details about
Henderson. Complainant will be Mrs. Smith. She states there was a signal 60 at the Gulf Station. A black male, 18, yellow cap, orange short-sleeved shirt, blue jeans, left southbound on Henderson, took a 78 Monte Carlo, red with a white roof, license number AAA 111 Be on Frank 018s
Patrol Officer:
beat. Show you out at 21:03. Frank 218, 10-4.
The entire dispatch transaction took forty-five seconds, including the time required for the officer to acknowledge the call. As with all FWPD dispatches, the transmission began with a brief indication to the officer to prepare to copy a call. This was followed by a short pause before providing the details of the complaint. The indication that Frank 218 was to have the sheet meant that this officer would be responsible for any reports stemming from the incident. The street number was repeated twice, as always; sometimes street name is also repeated. If the officer is to talk to a complainant, his or her name is given (if available), followed by the relevant details of the problem. Often when the units in a particular area are busy and an officer is being sent off his beat to handle a call, the dispatcher will indicate this to the officer by stating the number of the beat in which the call is located (Be on Frank 018s beat). Each trans mission concludes with the dispatcher indicating the official time of the dispatch, in this case 9:03 PM.. The officer then acknowledged receipt of the dispatch by signaling 10-4, message received. In most cases, clarification or additional details are not requested.
Information Exchange during Demand Articulation
Most analyses of demand have concentrated on dispatched calls. Consequently, they have examined demand patterns as reflected by departmental complaint codes rather than by initial service requests. Scant attention has been given to the initial content of the demand
location or the participants not covered by the assigned complaint code. Additionally, PCS observers coded whether exchanged information was volunteered by the caller or requested by the operator. In the illustrative sample call, no information was exchanged about the complainant other than her name, which she volunteered. Her home address and phone number were not mentioned (though the phone number at the location was requested) because they were immaterial to the problem at hand, purportedly a stolen car. Considerable intelligence was exchanged about the incident, location, and suspects, however. The address to which the police were to respond was given as 1200 Hender son, but the caller also indicated that she was at the Gulf station at the intersection of Henderson and Lancaster, near the highway. By mention ing a building, an intersection, and placing the site in reference to a major thoroughfare, she provided three items that could aid the responding officer in pinpointing the incident. The operator requested the precise location, and the caller volunteered the additional description. Information about the problem and its participants was provided in several different ways in the sample call. For example, the caller volun teered a description of the missing car, as well as the direction in which it left the scene. The third party was then requested by the operator to provide facts about the suspect(s), including a physical description and the number involved. The victim had previously indicated that the event had just occurred, and the operator had ascertained that the car had probably not been repossessed. Using PCS data, we can determine the types of information most likely exchanged during calls and whether they are requested by operators or volunteered by callers. These data provide a picture of initial demand articulation that can be applied throughout the three stages of demand
104
105
Table 7-1 Frequency and Source of Call Taker Information about Complainant Dispatched Calls
All Calls
Complainant Information
Total 75% 37
Volunteered by Caller 25%

16 50% 21
Requested by Call Taker
Total
Volunteered by Caller
25%
27%
52%
14
25
16
32
16 11
1 2,118 30 7 11 19
0 23
27
types of calls. Home phone number, when exchanged, was always requested, and was in much greater demand for dispatched calls. Because many callers represent businesses, they have been listed separately in table 7-1 when contacting the police on behalf of their establishments. Complainant business name was exchanged more fre quently in dispatched calls, and was much more likely to be volunteered than requested. Unlike other callers, business complainants were much more likely to volunteer the names of their firms than to wait until they were requested by call takers. Business representatives likely deal with the police more often than most callers and volunteer the names as a matter of course. Business address was volunteered and requested equally as frequently, but business callers rarely volunteered their phone numbers, regardless of whether the call was dispatched or not.
12
Name Home address Home phone number Business name Business address Business phone
30 39 22 20
10
Number of Calls
5,752
In formation about the Location
processing to determine how much of the data initially available to police is provided to dispatched officers. In the remainder of this section, we will distinguish between two groups of calls: all those monitored by PCS observers (including both dispatched and nondispatched calls), and those that are dispatched (judged to be eligible for dispatch by call takers). The following tables present data about three factors common to many calls: complainant, location, and problem/participants, such as victims or suspects.
In formation about the Complainant
Table 7-1 shows information exchanged about the complainant for all monitored calls, then for the subset that were dispatched. The table indicates whether the information was offered by callers or requested by call takers. Name was the most frequently exchanged item about the complainant; it was present in about half of all monitored calls and in about three-fourths of calls deemed to be eligible for dispatch. Complain ant name was requested by operators about as often as it was volun teered by callers in the full set of monitored calls. In dispatched calls, however, the name was almost twice as likely to be requested, probably because it is required by the department to initiate dispatch. Complainant home address was more likely to be requested than volunteered for both
Table 7-2 lists information items dealing with the incident/problem location exchanged in caller-operator conversations. The street address was given in nearly all dispatched calls and in nearly three-fourths of all monitored calls. Many callers realize police need the location in order to respond and volunteer it often, regardless of whether or not the call is dispatched. In some calls, data other than street address were also exchanged. Table 7-2 lists several of those that help identify the location or situate it in reference to a building or landmark, which can assist officers to find it. Most of the time, additional location data were provided by callers rather than requested by operators. These are infrequently exchanged, how ever, except for information about a specific building or landmark at or near the scene, available in slightly more than half of all dispatched calls. Most of the time a named building was a specific business; responding officers were provided a street address plus the firm name. Other loca tion descriptors, available in nearly a fourth of dispatched calls, were a specified intersection near the site and an exterior location near a struc ture, such as a parking lot, yard, sidewalk, or alley. Descriptions of the building to which police were to respond (two-story yellow brick), an interior location (hallway, apartment at the top of the stairs on the right), location on a street (right lane, median strip, right shoulder), and place ment of a building in reference to another one or landmark (next to, two doors down from> were exchanged infrequently. Most of the time, these latter items are not relevant to calls.
106 Information Flow in Police Response 107
Table 7-2 Frequency and Source of Call Taker Information about Incident/Problem Location Table 7-3 Frequency and Source of Call Taker Information about Incident/Problem Details/Participants All Calls
Total Total Information Item Volunteered by Caller Requested by Call Taker Volunteered by Caller
All Calls Dispatched Calls

Volunteered by Caller Requested by Call Taker
Dispatched Calls
Information Item
Volunteered by Caller
Total
Total
Locaton street address 57% 41% 98% 10%

7%
46% 17% 18 5 21
28%
74%
Participants
14% 18 5 15 13% 11 2 5 27% 29 7 20
Additional Location Information

12 6 1 4 17 5 22 11 8 2 9 24 52 2.118 Injuries present Injunes not present or unknown 3 2 1 5 4 4 10 20 42 8 6
13
16
7 4
2 1
9 5
Suspect aescription Other suspect information Other participant description Other participant information
Problem Details In formation about Injuries

1 3
12
15
Nearby intersection Location on Street Building placement Exterior building feature Location inside building Exterior location near building Named building or landmark 4
29
35
Number of Calls
5752
lnformaron about Weapons

5 5 2 7
Information about Participants of Specific Problem/Incident Details
Weapons present Weapons not present or unknown Description ot vehicles NumOer of Cats
10
21 5,752
11
14
25 2. 13
A third group of information items potentially available in calls deals with the participants or other details concerning an incident. One type is a description of suspects, including sex, race, and clothing. Another is the number of suspects involved or the direction in which they left the scene. Information about suspects was exchanged in about a fourth of the dispatched calls, but less frequently in the entire set of monitored calls (table 7-3>. Again, these data were not always relevant or applicable. They were more likely to be volunteered by the caller than requested by the operator. Facts about other participants, such as witnesses, victims, and bystanders, were usually reported less frequently than those about suspects; when available, they were usually volunteered. Table 7-3 also indicates the extent to which facts were conveyed about certain problem or crime details, including the presence of injuries or weapons and vehicle descriptions. Information about weapons and inju
ries falls into two categories. One indicates the pattern of exchange when these details are present in an incident, and the other shows the pattern when the information indicates that weapons or injuries are not present or that theIr presence is unknown to the caller. Injuries and weapons were present infrequently; injuries were reported n only 5 percent of dispatched calls, and weapons were mentioned in only 7 percent. The pattern in table 7-3 indicates that usually, when injuries or weapons were involved, callers volunteered the information. When inju ries or weapons were not present, or if this fact was unknown or
108
109
uncertain, it was revealed through operator probing. Operator coding, both for the nature of the problem and for response priorities, may be influenced by the existence of serious circumstances, such as those potentially created by weapons or injuries. Hence, probing is required in certain instances. For the other detail examined, description of involved vehicles, table 7-3 shows little difference in how information was ob tained. Again, however, probing was more likely in dispatched calls, reflecting the relevance of vehicle data for officers responding to certain calls (such as reports of stolen cars or fleeing suspects, for example).
Demand Articulation Reviewed
In any given call for police service, several information items may be available. Some may be volunteered by callers, and others are reported only after probing by operators. Police Communications Study data re veal wide variation in the extent of the exchange about the complainant, location, and participants/details. The items earlier considered were exchanged more often in dispatched calls than in others. Of the three groups of items, information about the complainant was reported most frequently; it was requested by operators more often than volunteered by callers. Except for certain incident/problem details, most of the other items were offered much more frequently than requested. Even for dispatched calls, however, most items were exchanged much less than 50 percent of the time, Other than street address, necessary for all dispatched calls, the only two items exchanged more than half of the time were complainant name and identification of buildings or landmarks at or near the scene. For many of the calls, these items were not exchanged because they were not relevant. Other times, it is likely that, though the information may have been relevant, it was not exchanged. Yet it seems plausible that, for some calls, exchanging information on items such as those listed in tables 7-1 through 7-3 might enable police to determine and initiate the most effective response.
Information Flow in Police Demand Processing
Two recent analyses have pointed out the importance of considering information loss when examining police response. Silberman (1978: 244) claims that departmental organization inhibits information flow and limits consideration to only a small fraction of that available. Although he refers primarily to crime fighting and to intelligence gathering by officers on the
street, his analysis applies to demand processing as well. Mannings work on organizational and environmental influences on policing applies more directly to data loss in demand processing. Manning (1980: 102) suggests that: In any information system there are critical points at which the level of information changes radically in one direction or the other. In a police communication system, there are a number of such key points. Our consideration of the loss of information is based on that initially available (i.e., exchanged) during a call. By following each dispatched call through internal relay and response articulation, the Police Communica tions Study determined which items initially available were conveyed during demand processing information stages. We are thus able to measure the extent of loss in calls as they progress from initial demand articulation to patrol-car dispatch. Any reduction in demand information content from its original as it is processed represents loss. Keep in mind, however, that this is not necessarily harmful for police or other demand processing agencies; some loss is purposeful and desired. For demands to be processed efficiently, data must be coded; otherwise, the organization would be swamped with detail and unable to function. We have already seen that coding involves planned reduction and loss. During demand articulation, extraneous details may be discussed. Call takers must consider the cost of gathering and transmitting information. They then attempt to weed out relevant from irrelevant material; the relevance is determined by the importance of the data for response. Police Communications Study data reveal the extent of loss during initial demand processing. Data show whether, and at which stage, information was lost about incidents, participants, and location descrip tions. This information is of potential importance in preparing officers for encounters and in placing them quickly at the scene. Table 7-4 shows the percent of loss about incident details and participants during demand processing. The number of cases on which percentages are based varies from item to item, because not every one was reported during each call. Tables 7-4 and 7-5 are both concerned only with those calls in which a given item was exchanged during demand articulation. Among the items dealing with incident details or participants, com plainant name was lost the least, in only 19 percent of calls. In 89 percent of the calls in which citizens furnished their names, either voluntarily or upon request, the operator recorded the data on the internal relay form. In 81 percent of the calls in which name was provided, dispatchers broadcast it to responding officers. It was thus lost in 11 percent of calls during internal relay and in 8 percent during response articulation.
110
111
Table 7-4 Loss of Information about Incident/Problem Details or Participants during Initial Police Demand Processing
Percent of Cats in Which Information Exchanged dunng Demand Articulation Was Also Exchanged during:
Information Item
N
Internal Relay
Total Percent Lost
Participants
Complainant name Complainant business name Complainant phone number Suspect description Other suspect information Other participant description Other participant information
89% 86 94 82 84 59 57
81% 68 0 77 78 51 48
19% 32 100 23 22 49 52
1,550 811 1,213 557 603 141 422
Problem Details
Information about injuries
Injuries present Injuries not present or unknown 18 98 164 3 97
29
82
12
Information about Weapons
79 70 28 77 23 515 72 81 30
Weapons present Weapons not present or unknown 164
62
Information on vehicles
82
*N represents total number of cases in which information about each item was initially available during demand articulation.
The name of business complainants was lost 14 percent of the time during internal relay and 18 percent during response articulation. Com plainant phone number was lost infrequently during internal relay (only 6 percent), but was never transmitted to responding officers. Phone num ber is of little value to them, but might be used by dispatchers to check back with a caller or cross-reference a location. Information about suspects, including personal descriptions and other facts such as age or number involved, was lost or truncated in less than a
fourth of the calls in which it was available. This type of data is frequently salient to responding officers, especially in crimes that are in progress or have just occurred. Descriptive and identifying information about other participants, including victims, witnesses, or bystanders, is more than twice as likely to drop out before dispatch as that about suspects. For all items about participants, most of the loss, when present, occurs in internal relay through call taker screening. Of the items included in the problem details section of table 7-4, only those about weapons being present and about vehicles approximate the low loss rate of complainant name and suspect information. The status of injuries was infrequently provided to responding officers; additionally, an indication that they were not involved or that the caller did not know the situation was passed along to officers only 3 percent of the time. A major reason for this apparent lack of interest in the injury pattern is explained by the fact that several FWPD complaint codes, including those for major traffic accidents, assaults, and cuttings, indicate that injuries are in cluded. Data in table 7-4 indicate, however, that for other codes in which injury status is not specified or implied, officers are given little indication of what to expect when they arrive at the scene regarding the possibility that they will need to deal with this situation. Officers were much more likely to be made aware of the presence of weapons; still, in 30 percent of the cases in which this was reported, they were not so apprised. Additionally, for nearly three-fourths of calls in which it was stated that no weapons were involved, officers were not told of this despite this facts potential utility for their preparation. These findings may reflect operator skepticism about the accuracy of callers; in some communities, citizens have discovered that the police will respond faster if the presence of a weapon is indicated. Considering that the large majority of weapons reported to the FWPD were either guns or knives, however, this skepticism, if unfounded, may have severe consequences. The final entry in the table, information about vehicles, was lost less than a fourth of the time. Often involved was a description of a stolen car or a car used by suspects in the commission of a crime. This is important knowledge for responding officers. At least in certain instances (license checks, vehicle registration files), it can also be verified by call takers for accuracy prior to relaying it to dispatchers. This may be one reason why it is more likely than information about either injuries or weapons to be dispatched to officers. When items in table 7-4 were lost, most of the truncation took place at the internal relay stage rather than during response articulation. The only items that dispatchers were more likely than call takers to truncate were the business names and phone numbers of complainants. This indicates
112
113
Table 7-5 Loss of Specific Information about Incident/Problem Location during Initial Police Demand Processing
Percent of Calls in Which Information Exchanged during Demand Articulation Was Also Exchanged during:
Information Item 40% 66 23 15 65 69 87 60% 34 77 85 35 31 13 463 235 163 58 136 12 1,093
Internal Relay N
Total Percent Lost
Nearby intersection Location on Street Building placement Exterior building features Location inside building Exterior location near building Named building or landmark
47% 72 26 24 77 76 94
largest source of loss for six of the seven categories was during internal relay; call takers did not include a large portion of location information on the dispatch form. For all categories except location inside a building (the apartment at the top of the stairs, by the fountain in the lobby), less than 10 percent of the loss occurred during response articulation. Most of the time, if additional descriptive information was routed to dispatchers, they in turn passed it on to responding officers. The purpose of this chapter has been to describe how information on calls moves through the police demand processing system. Information loss has been shown to be an integral part of demand processing; it is activated by coding processes and decisions of gatekeepers and re sponse coordinators. Analysis of data from Fort Worth indicates that most reduction takes place during internal relay as the result of operator actions and decisions. This reduction is both necessary and potentially dangerous. Loss prevents the department from information overload, yet, if not carefully undertaken, may cause ambiguity and poor performance.
*N represents total number of cases in which information about each item was available during demand articulation.
that call takers largely control the flow of information by determining which details are relevant through coding and inclusion of qualifying remarks. Dispatchers sometimes do not broadcast certain items they receive on the complaint card, but most of the time they follow the lead of the call taker. Similar results are evident from table 7-5, which considers the loss of information about location. In several instances, callers provided facts in addition to street address to specify the location more clearly or place it near a familiar referent. These additional data were lost much more frequently than were those about the incident or its participants. Call takers apparently consider them to be irrelevant in many cases. In only one of the categories in table 7-5, named building or landmark, was information presented during the initial demand articulation passed on to responding officers more than three-fourths of the time. Not only was a named building more likely to be mentioned by a caller than other location descriptors, it was also more likely to be included in the dis patch, often because it involved the name of the business to which officers were sent. Facts about exterior building features (color size, shape) or the place ment of a structure relative to another or to a landmark (three doors down from the hospital, near the golf course) were lost more frequently. The
8
Demand Processing and Police Performance In the next chapter, we turn to the broader implications of these findings for other public service agencies. 115
Demand Processing and Police Performance

A Process Model of Police Demand Processing
Given the foregoing descriptions of demand processing and information flow in police agencies, we now consider the impact of gatekeeping and response coordination on their performance. Isolating the full set of factors that affect performance is a difficult task, though perhaps less arduous than ascertaining the unique impact of particular factors. Police services are delivered in a complex environment characterized by a multiplicity of actors and a diversity of human needs. The broad classes of factors expected to influence service outcomes include the charac teristics and actions of officers, organizational arrangements of depart ments, management practices, the diversity and complexity of citizen characteristics and needs, the degree of social cohesion in the commu nity, citizen coproductive efforts in service delivery, and the physical environment of the jurisdiction (Ostrom, et al., 1978). One method to begin disentangling the factors affecting performance is to formulate process models, which identify relationships among organizational activities and outcomes. These models provide descrip tive information on agency operations and suggest areas for change and improvement:
The description of the processes and interactions of police telephone operators and dispatchers presented in earlier chapters represents the basic model that can be used to consider the impact of demand process ing on agency performance. As, we have seen, demand processing commences during gatekeeping when operators receive incoming calls, evaluate eligibility, gather and code demand data, route it to dispatchers, and possibly provide response information to callers. The actions and decisions at this gatekeeping stage subsequently affect dispatchers who, serving as response coordinators, determine and coordinate agency responses to service requests. The demand processing system and the information it provides can affect agency performance in multiple ways. First, through their screen ing efforts, operators influence it by determining who receives services and by providing information to callers. Second, the actions of operators and dispatchers together determine the information provided to officers, and this influences their actions during subsequent police-citizen en counters. Demand processing may impinge upon performance in a third manner, by its impact on the deployment of agency resources. In all these ways, the demand processing system can affect the quality of services rendered to citizens and the resources expended to supply them.
Models are essential for a performance measurement program that can inform policy and program decisions. To the extent that models convey an accurate understanding of what happens in policing, they provide predic tions about the likely consequences of altering police programs. (Whitake!, et al., 1982: 107)
Police Gatekeeping and Performance
This book represents an effort to delineate a process model related to
one set of police agency operations: demand processing. Figure 2-1, in
the second chapter, provides a general process model broadly applicable to public service agencies. The descriptions and arguments presented in chapters 5 through 7 together describe a process model relating police gatekeeping and response coordination to each other and to agency performance. In this chapter, we will elaborate a process model linking the component activities of demand processing to police performance.
Gatekeepers serve both as the interface between the agency and persons demanding services as well as the primary initiator of response to calls. Gatekeeper actions are important agenda-setting mechanisms. Rules and policies about service domain and eligibility set the broad agenda for the agency, and operators apply these criteria and decide whether or not demands will be met. Operators exercise discretion in eligibility determination as a result of the diversity and complexity of requests received. Through their discretionary decisions, operators de cide which of them will be serviced and which will be denied. Thus, in an agenda-setting role, gatekeepers influence the overall volume and type of demands that are handled.
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Operators also serve as agenda-setters when they select an appropri ate response alternative. Based on information gathered from service seekers, gatekeepers select and initiate response, which can range from immediate dispatch of units to refusing to offer assistance. The selection of responses and the subsequent routing of demand information to other organizational units (eg. dispatche report-writing station> influence both the workload of those units and the type of services provided to citizens. Operators thus affect the nature and extent of the workload of patrol officers, report writers, detectives, and supervisors. Selecting and activating responses to calls is a primary determinant of how requests are handled and how citizen needs are met, The growing inability of police to respond to all calls with a dispatched officer and the increasing reliance on alternative modes of service delivery, point to the importance of the gatekeeper, who activates organizational response. Operators may also influence performance, as measured by citizen evaluations of police, through information provision and treatment of callers. Although largely ignored by police administrators, operators rep resent the first citizen contact with the department in the context of a particular need. The manner in which gatekeepers handle callers, many of whom are upset or anxious, can significantly affect their im.age of the police and their propensity to contact them in the future. By providing relevant information, operators may influence citizen perceptions about police response and inform them.. of what to do until an officer arrives at the scene. This information provision may also enhance satisfaction with police response.
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A second way that police demand processing systems can influence organizational performance is through their effect on the actions of street-level officers. Figure 8-1 depicts some of the possible relation ships between actions of operators, dispatchers, and responding of ficers, and suggests cumulatively how demand processing can bear on performance. The combined actions of operators and dispatchers affect agency operations through impact on the speed of response, the extent and type of resources deployed, and the demand information provided to responding officers. Demand processing systems influence the speed of response to calls. As we have seen, gatekeepers assign priority and complaint codes that are used by dispatchers to determine the speed with which responding units ard dispatched. Data presented in chapter 6 show that both types of
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118 Demand Processing and Police Performance 119 As noted earlier, the actions of gatekeepers and response coordinators determine the volume of requests handled and the type and extent of resources deployed in response to them. These decisions affect the way that resources, including both manpower and equipment, are expended. The amount of resources used bears on overall efficiency of operation; should too many officers be assigned to a request, then scarce agency resources are being wasted. Conversely, if insufficient manpower or equipment is dispatched, then service-rendering action may be pro longed and characterized by inefficiency. The argument here is that, through their role in deployment decisions, police operators and dis patchers not only influence the effectiveness of officer actions in the field, but also resource allocations and organizational performance as measured by efficiency criteria.
codes influence the speed of dispatch, which determines overall re sponse time. The rapidness of response, in turn, affects the capabilities of officers in delivering services. Empirical research has shown that response time has a bearing on outcomes such as the probability of arresting suspects and locating witnesses, as well as citizen ratings of police (Percy, 1980; Kansas City Police Department, 1977; Pate, et al., 1976; Parks, 1976). Operator and dispatcher actions also influence the number and type of personnel assigned to handle calls for service. By designating complaint and incident codes and by noting other relevant demand information, operators provide dispatchers with a distilled picture of the reported problem. Based on this, dispatchers decide on whether or not to send backup units and specialized personnel. The presence of additional man power may significantly enhance officer safety in particularly violent or dangerous situations. Assignment of a number of officers may also allow for more effective handling of Certain situations. For example, the pres ence of two officers in domestic disputes permits them to separate and individually deal with disputants. The assignment of specialized personnel may also make a difference in the outcomes of citizen-police interactions. Members of a crisis inter vention team, for example, may be able to deal with a domestic dispute more effectively than officers who lack specialized training. Similarly, dispatcher assignment of personnel who have characteristics similar to callers (e.g., race, language) may lead to more effective resolution of citizen problems. Only through the appropriate demand messages for warded by operators can dispatchers know when specialized personnel are needed. The effectiveness of officer actions is also influenced by the type and extensiveness of information provided by the demand processing sys tem. Information on the problem or crime situation is necessarily abbre viated and distilled: it may also be distorted or lost. The extent and quality of intelligence received by responding officers about an incident can influence their subsequent handling of it. Advance information may bear on their mental preparation, the speed with which they locate the inci dent and/or participants, the way they approach the scene, whether weapons are drawn, and a variety of other factorsall of which can impact on subsequent officer-citizen interactions as well as officer safety. Demand Processing and Performance in Fort Worth
Impact of Demand Processing on Organizational Resources
One other means by which demand processing impinges upon organ izational performance is through impact on the efficiency of operations.
Empirical data gathered through the Police Communications Study (PCS) have been used in earlier chapters to illustrate the operation of gatekeeping and response coordination. We again consider these data while examining the linkage of demand processing to police perform ance. This data set is only partially suited to consideration of perform ance, however. To measure the impact of the demand information provided by gatekeepers and response coordinators on officer actions clearly, the latter would need to be studied in the field. This might be accomplished through some method of patrol observation. Because of resource, time, and practical constraints, the PCS was not able to under take this sort of study, which would have provided information on the final component of response to calls. For this reason, the impact of demand processing on performance as it works through actions of officers in the field cannot be empirically examined. However, various components of this study provide other data relevant to an examination of the impact of demand processing on performance. First, a survey of officers in the department allows us to consider their perceptions of demand processing operations and the quality of informa tion they receive. Thus, although we cannot examine the influence of information in particular calls for service, its impact on officer actions can be considered more generally. And secondly, through analysis of survey data, the opinions and evaluations of citizens who have called the police can be examined to gain a second perspective on the demand process ing-performance connection.
120 Demand Processing and Police Performance ity for the discrepancy on operators; some felt that callers reported the problem incorrectly or incompletely. Analysis of PCS data reveals that FWPD officers perceive detailed information to be particularly important when responding to serious or emergency calls. In these instances, more than 90 percent wanted knowledge about the presence of weapons, vehicles or suspects, the number of persons involved, and the...type of location. Much less interest was expressed in complainant name, when the incident occurred, whether or not injuries were involved, and the role or emotional state of callers. For less serious situations, the pattern was different. In these cases, officers requested information on complainant nam.e most often. On these calls, they know they will usually speak with a complainant; in serious calls, police action may be required before seeking him or her out. A consistently strong finding throughout the survey was that officers wanted as detailed a description of the crime or problem as possible before arriving on the scene. This finding may be partly attributable to. a natural desire for more information than less when encountering an unknown situation, but the consistency across questions was marked. Survey questionsalso gave officers the opportunity to evaluate their departments computer assisted dispatch (CAD) system. Their re sponses indicate mixed feelings about this innovation in processing calls. Although a plurality of officers indicated that the CAD operation improved response time and dispatching operations, pluralities also felt that the system exerted no impact on effectiveness in handling calls or on radio congestion. And 42 percent of the officers said that their safety was worsened by the system. Part of this negative assessment may result from concerns about efforts to speed response by reducing the amount of information provided to officers. We can infer from these data that officers .in Fort Worth consider demand processing to be important in their efforts to provide effective services. They recognize what many observers tend to overlook: infor mation provided by callers and dispatched to officers can appreciably influence how they approach and handle .an incident.
Demand Processing and Performance: The Officer Perspective
One component of the PCS was a survey of patrol officers in the Fort Worth Police Department (FWPD) plus their immediate supervisors. The purpose was to gain knowledge about their perceptions and evaluate their departments demand processing system. These data are also useful in assessing officer perspectives on the quality of information they receive from operators and dispatchers. As discussed in chapter 7, observers disagree about the amount of information that should be gathered by the demand processing system and forwarded to officers in the field. Some observers argue they should be provided only information essential for arrival at the scene; others contend that complaint code and address alone represent an unaccept able level of ambiguity about an incident. We will argue in the next chapter that providing officers with additional information about service requests may improve their performance. Insufficient knowledge may cause them to approach a problem without proper regard for their own safety and to be poorly prepared to assist citizens. Officers mental preparation as well as physical readiness can influence their handling of an incident; both may be significantly affected by the level of knowledge they receive through demand processing activities. Officer survey data from the PCS are instructive concerning this argument, In general, officers in Fort Worth wanted as much information about incidents as possible, and felt that they could be provided with more than they currently receive. Officers were asked in the survey if dispatched data provided sufficient detail about an incident to enable them to re spond effectively. Nearly three-fourths of those interviewed said it did not. Of officers who wanted additional information, about 80 percent desired further details about the problem, three-fourths wanted more about participants, and one-fourth requested additional facts about inci dent location. Forty percent wanted other information, including whether the location had a history of previous crime problems and some indica tion of whether or not weapons were present at the scene. Also, about two-thirds of the surveyed officers said that the knowledge they wanted was usually unavailable to dispatchers, and that call takers should be instructed to obtain it when possible. PCS researchers asked FWPD officers about the frequency with which the nature of the problem or crime as dispatched was different from what they encountered upon arrival at the scene. Ninety percent felt that a difference existed at least some of the time. Three-fourths felt this discrepancy sometimes occurred because operators did not obtain suffi cient information from the caller. Officers did not place all the responsibil Demand Processing and Performance: The Citizen Perspective
A second perspective on the impact of demand processing can be gained through analysis of responses to the PCS survey of individuals who had recently called the FWPD to request assistance. Although many recent studies have considered citizen evaluations of police services, most have concentrated on general ratings or evaluations of responding
122 Table 8-1 Reasons for Citizen Dissatisfaction with Police Operator Responses Reason 26 23 20 20 19 14
13 7
Demand Processing and Police Performance
123
Number
Percent
12.9 11.4
Operator seemed unconcerned Operator was rude, abrupt, or discourteous Operator did not promise unit would be sent Operator asked too many questions Insufficient information about police response Operator was slow in sending police unit Operator did not take caller or problem seriously Requested service not promised by operator Operator hung up or was cut off Other reasons 7 52
201
9.9 9.9 9,4 7.0 6,4 3,5 3.5 25.9 100.0
Total
officers. Few empirical studies have analyzed citizen evaluation of their verbal exchange with call takers. Because the PCS focused on demand processing activities, it gathered these data. During the three-month period of field research, more than 1,200 interviews were completed. Analysis of survey results indicates that most persons who called the FWPD during the field research period were satisfied with the way they were treated by operators. When asked if he or she was courteous, an overwhelming 97 percent replied affirmatively. Respondents were also asked if they were given the opportunity to describe their problem or incident as fully as they wanted. Again, 97 percent said that they were able to do so. Of those who felt they did not have sufficient chance to explain their situation, most said they wanted to describe the incident or suspects more fully. Overall, the citizens appeared to be highly satisfied with their initial interactions with call takers. Examination of survey data suggests that operators exerted a calming effect on the emotional states of some people. Both at the start and finish of the interview, respondents were asked to classify their emo tional state as calm, excited, frightened, upset, angry, or confused. Twelve percent of those who were initially upset, angry, excited, or frightened said they were calm by the end of the conversation. At east part of this effect may be attributed to operators, who often tried to soothe and reassure callers. This is further evidence of the potential influence gatekeepers exert on those seeking services. In addition to seeking data on evaluation of operator treatment, the PCS wanted to gauge the reactions of citizens to what operators told them would be done about the matter. To gather this information, re spondents were asked how satisfied they were with the response given by operators. Once again, the evaluations were highly positive. About 85 percent of those interviewed were satisfied with the response. Only 8 percent gave a negative rating. To understand why some citizens were dissatisfied with the response, a follow-up question was included in the survey that allowed them to provide multiple reasons; several did so, as listed in table 8-1. The data in this table suggest that several factors account for dissatis faction, though again it is important to note that most citizens were satisfied with response. The most frequent complaints were that the operator was rude, abrupt, discourteous, or seemingly unconcerned about the caller or the problem. Other people were displeased because the operator would not send a unit or because some other service was not rendered. Still other reasons for dissatisfaction centered on delays in sending units. Callers complained both that they were not dispatched quickly enough and that operators asked too many questions before taking action. Thus, although dissatisfaction with the responses of oper ators was relatively infrequent, it is clear that tieir actions can adversely affect citizen evaluations of the police. The survey also afforded citizens the opportunity to evaluate the FWPD telephone report-writing station (DECOR). This allows the caller to complete a crime or other report over the phone. In some but not all instances, callers are given a choice of this option or having an officer come to complete the report. Of all interviewed citizens, 73 (6 percent) said they had been trans ferred to the report-writing station. Most often, they were reporting thefts, missing persons, or vandalism. Some 60 (80 percent) of this group said they were satisfied to give their report over the phone. Another 12 respondents (16 percent) said they would have preferred that an officer had been dispatched for this purpose. Thus, although based on a small number of cases, this analysis provides some evidence that citizens may often be satisfied with response alternatives other than sending an officer to the scene. These data on the perceptions and evaluations of citizens indicate that the information and treatment they receive can substantially affect their evaluations of police. In this way, the actions of gatekeepers directly influence agency performance as well as the actions of officers during encounters with the public.
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Part III
Implications for Public SerVice Organizations
The purpose of this chapter was to explore linkages between demand processing activities and the performance of police agencies. Several theoretical linkages have been posed. These related gatekeeping and response coordination to performance through impact on callers, streetlevel personnel, and agency resource utilization, Empirical data from Fort Worth, though not suited to testing all the theoretical linkages, suggest that demand processing efforts are important to both officers and cit izens. Although further empirical work is needed for a full understanding of the performance-related consequences of police demand processing systems, it is clear that the actions and decisions of operators and dispatchers are central to agency operation and the overall efficiency of service delivery. In the following chapter, we will explore the implications of these findings for police and other public service agencies.
9
The Importance of Demand Processing in Service Organizations: Realities and Prospects
A variety of factors have stimulated interest in and study of service organization performance. Most analyses have focused on the efforts of the personnel who directly deliver services; to a lesser extent, manage ment practices and administration styles have also been examined. Throughout the literature, scant attention has been given to the initial processing of service demands. The purpose of our analysis has been to highlight this function and its role in the provision of public services. After introducing the demand processing concept in part I, the second part of this volume examined its application in urban police departments and documented its central role in service delivery. This chapter returns to an examination and evaluation of this function in the more general context of public services. Our purpose is to reconsider gatekeeping and response coordination in light of the specific descriptions and conclu sions derived from analysis of police services. The chapter considers the key role of demand processing and its relationship to organizational performance, the prevalence and consequences of employee discretion, the impact of demand processing on the distribution of services, the importance of information flow, recommendations for policy modifica tions, and questions that might be examined in future research.
Demand Processing and Performance The arguments concerning the impact of demand processing activities on police performance can be generalized to other public service agen cies. As with the police, the gatekeeping function is an integral compo nent of most of these agencies. Through the enforcement of eligibility rules, gatekeepers affect performance by determining who will receive services and who will not. The welfare intake worker, through application of rules and discretionary actions, decides who will be awarded benefits. Screening personnel in emergency rooms and clerks in housing offices make similar eligibility determinations. As the first organizational repre sentative to interact with citizens seeking services, gatekeepers serve as
128 known or misunderstood by persons requesting assistance, and this unfamiliarity may upset them or result in their abandoning their requests. After receiving explanation of policies and organizational response, they know what to expect and may feel more at ease. In some instances, knowledge about organizational procedures may lead to greater citizen cooperation with service delivery personnel. Although response coordinators do not usually interact with persons requesting service, they nonetheless can affect the quality and quantity of that which is delivered. Tasks such as sequencing responses and assigning personnel can directly bear on performance. Sequencing influ ences the speed with which services are rendered, which in turn can exert an effect on citizen well-being. Especially in situations where demands are characterized by high immediacy, the speed of response may have significant impact on individuals needing services. The assign ment of personnel affects the overall efficiency of delivery by determin ing the amount and type of resources brought to bear. The assignment of a Spanish-speaking caseworker, for example, might greatly assist an Hispanic family in communicating their problem or need. For all the above reasons, the component tasks of demand processing affect the quantity and quality of organizational services provided. Be cause gatekeeping and response coordination are interrelated and se quential, initial decisions by gatekeepers can influence those of response coordinators and subsequently those of street-level personnel. As an example, acquisition of incomplete information on welfare clients by intake workers may lead to inappropriate actions or decisions by caseworkers. It is important to recognize, therefore, that the actions of gatekeepers and response coordinators, both individually and cumulatively, have a bearing on the delivery of services and the resulting social outcomes.
Implications for Public Service Organizations
The Importance of Demand Processing
129
The Prevalence of Discretion Throughout our discussions of demand processing in police agencies, a repeated theme was the widespread discretion in decision making. Discretion connotes the idea that employeesin this context, gatekeepers and response coordinatorscan take actions that are not totally prescribed or controlled by rules and procedures. Employees have discretion when no organizational rules exist to guide their behavior, when rules provide them with options, or when compliance with rules is insufficiently monitored. In one sense, managing discretion is a funda mental task of all organizations. As Chester Barnard (1938), Herbert
an interface with the environment and limit the provision of services to persons judged to be eligible. Gatekeepers affect performance in a second way, by making prelimi nary decisions regarding what services or programs will be provided after learning about individual problems and needs. In our description of demand processing in police departments, we showed that a variety of service options can be provided to callers, including sending an officer to the scene, referral to another service organization, and transfer to report writers or other internal offices. Gatekeepers in other agencies usually have a similar set of response alternatives to apply to demands. Intake workers in welfare agencies, for example, can take advantage of a number of programs to assist persons having various social and financial needs. A third way gatekeepers can influence organizational efforts and per formance is through gathering and coding information. By doing so, they provide a key organizational input that guides the actions of others in the service delivery process. This demand information is used by response coordinators in determining specific elements of delivery. To the extent that it is accurately and concisely obtained and recorded, gatekeepers may enhance the subsequent provision of service. On the other hand, loss or distortion may generate negative consequences when unin formed or misinformed response coordinators and street-level person nel take inappropriate actions. Finally, gatekeepers affect performance and the well-being of indi viduals through their direct interaction with citizens. Often these people face some problem or need that is causing significant concern, hardship, or anguish at the time of demand articulation. Someone contacting a welfare office may lack funds to buy food, and someone entering an emergency room may have suffered major injuries. In these situations, the manner and actions of the gatekeeper may have a positive and immediate effect. Even in noncritical situations, gatekeepers can directly influence per sons seeking services. Gatekeeper manner and treatment may impose psychological costs on them, especially where they are treated brusquely or with a condescending manner. Particularly for those ser vices such as welfare assistance that may have some degree of social stigma attached, the manner of gatekeeper treatment can have signifi cant consequences for those in need. In the extreme, perceived negative treatment can lead persons to cancel their requests for service. Through the provision of information on agency practices and re sponse efforts, gatekeepers may ease citizen concerns and reduce premature termination of requests. Organizational practices may be un
130
131
Simon (1957>, and others have argued, the central task of organizations is to maintain employee participation and conformance to rules. Employ ees are enticed to participate and comply with policies through some set of sanctions and incentives. Discretion is pervasive in the delivery of public services. In his study of service producing organizations, Lipsky (1980: 13) argues that streetlevel bureaucrats exercise substantial discretion, which has major conse quences for the organization and the individuals it serves:
Unlike lower-level workers in most organizations, street-level bureau crats have considerable discretion in determining the nature, amount, and quality of benefits and sanctions provided by their agencies. Policemen decide who to arrest and whose behavior to overlook. Judges decide who shall receive a suspended sentence and who shall receive maximum punishment. Teachers decide who will be suspended and who will remain in school, and they make subtle determinations about who is teachable.
Like their street-level counterparts, workers who perform gatekeeping and response coordination functions possess significant discretion. Gatekeepers utilize it when determining eligibility for services, selecting organizational responses, coding demand information, and providing information to individuals seeking services. Response coordinators, too, exercise discretion in sequencing responses and assigning personnel to particular cases. One might question why discretion is pervasive in the demand pro cessing function, especially inasmuch as lower-level workers in nonser vice organizations usually enjoy little discretion in job tasks. Discretion in demand processing results from several factors, including the complex ity and diversity of human needs, indeterminate technology, the nature of service processing efforts, the inability or unwillingness of legislators or administrators to define comprehensive rules about delivery, and the need for individualized response to complex problems. The complexity of human beings is a prime source of discretion. The principle agency inputs are individuals, or to be more precise, their particular attributes. Human beings are unique creatures, possessing a large variety of characteristics and needs. Different agencies have been organized to respond to particular sets of needs; hospitals and clinics are concerned with medical problems, schools with education, police with crime and public safety, and welfare offices with financial need. Yet, even within these categories, needs can be diverse, Consider the wide range of medical situations that hospitals are concerned with or the diversity of problems that police are called upon to handle. When practically every
service consumer poses a different combination of characteristics, needs, and expectations, establishment of organizational rules and oper ating procedures to cover all situations is impossible. Indeterminate technology is another source of discretion. Whereas knowledge about the production of physical objects is widespread, service production technology remains indeterminate. This is largely the result of human complexity and the relative lack of knowledge about motivations and impediments in human behavior. For example, the un certainty about what motivates individuals to commit crime or prevents them from learning creates lack of confidence about how to assist them. Couple this with the diversity of human problems and needs, and it is not difficult to understand why technology about service delivery remains imprecise and why it is difficult to formulate clear rules for demand processing personnel to follow. The high volume, rapid nature of demand processing increases discre tion by limiting the amount of supervision that can be effectively under taken. In many organizations, gatekeepers and response coordinators handle a heavy load of demands, which inhibits monitoring and supervi sion. In addition, the crucial nature of many services requires that de mands be processed rapidly; this contributes to the difficulty of supervision. Discretion is also the by-product of the inability or unwillingness of legislators and public officials to specify rules and policies governing service delivery (Davis, 1969>. To be sure, organizations formulate some operating guidelines and policies. Eligibility criteria represent an impor tant example. The point is not that agencies have no operating rules or policies, but that they seldom have those that cover all the complexities and contingencies of human situations. Even when it is possible to stipulate practices and policies, lawmakers and administrators may find it politically disadvantageous to do so. In controversial areas of delivery, these authorities, who can be held accountable for establishing rules, may avoid formulating those rules that generate negative public reac tions. For example, they may refrain from devising politically unpopular eligibility rules that restrict service domain. Instead, they prefer to allow gatekeepers to exercise discretion when making eligibility decisions. A final factor that impedes efforts to reduce discretion grows out of previous ones: given the complexity of service delivery, some level of discretion is desirable so that activities can be matched to individualized cases and needs. In this sense, discretion represents organizational flexibility in providing the most useful services to those in need. Davis (1969: 25> makes this argument in relation to the provision of justice in society: Discretion is a tool, indispensible for individualization of justice.
132 before they are promulgated; systems of accountability must be estab

lished; forms of control must be instituted; and ample provisions must
133
All governments in history have been governments of laws and of men. Rules alone, untempered by discretion, cannot cope with the complexties of modern government and of modern justice. Discretion is our principal source of creativeness in government and in law Daviss arguments are well taken and are applicable to all public services. Discretion allows for creative solutions to human problems, many of which are complex and unique in at least some dimensions. Pupils experience individual learning problems, family disturbances can exhibit many manifestations, and medical problems can involve multiple complications. Discretion provides latitude to actors in the response processgatekeepers, response coordinators, and street-level bureau cratsto undertake more personalized and unique service delivery ac tions, ones aimed at individual problems not general circumstances. Although it provides room for creative solutions, discretion can yield negative consequences for organizations and the people they serve. Davis (1969: 25) argues that every truth extolling discretion may be matched by a truth about its dangers: Discretion is a tool only when properly used; like an axe, it can be a weapon for mayhem or murder. In a government of men and of laws, the portion that is a government of men, like a malignant cancer; often tends to stifle the portion that is a govern ment of laws. In addition to enhancing service delivery, discretion can be used by employees to foster personal goals and satisfy personal biases and values. This type of discretion is counter to organizational goals and may harm performance as well as the well-being of citizens. A gatekeeper in a housing authority who turns clients away who are personally displeasing is exercising discretion in a way contrary to agency purposes. Similarly, police gatekeepers who provide favorable treatment to friends or rela tives are not conforming to departmental goals and concerns, which usually include some notion of equal treatment. Concern about discretion in public services is not new. The emphasis has usually been on those that can exert the most impact on citizens, including police and other criminal justice agencies. Many analysts argue that discretion should be restricted, especially because this enhances equity in service provision. Among others, Goldstein (1977: 100) has made this argument: be made to enable persons affected by discretionary decisions to review the basis on which they were made.
If discretion is to be exercised in an equitable manner, it must be struc tured; discretionary areas must be defined; policies must be developed and articulated; the official responsible for setting policies must be desig nated; opportunities must be afforded for citizens to react to policies
Those who seek to reduce discretion see limitations as a means of improving performance and the equitable delivery of services. Limita tions on discretionary action derive from official rules, regulations, and policies that prescribe what should be done by employees in the process of delivering services. Rules and regulations are born of several sources, including legislative action, court decisions, constitutional rights and guarantees, and administrative decisions. These rules and regulations alone, however, seem unlikely to check the use of discretion ary decision making. To be effective, they must be accompanied by some system of enforcement that provides sanctions and incentives to encour age employees to follow them. In recent years, attention has been focused on the discretion of streetlevel personnel and their performance. For example, the actions of police officers have come under close scrutiny during the last two decades, largely in response to the urban riots of the 1960s and accompanying charges of police brutality. As a result, efforts have been made to limit discretion. The courts have rendered judicial decisions that more clearly specify the domain of legitimate police actions, including proper condi tions and procedures for searches as well as the requirement that ar rested suspects be informed of their rights. Efforts have also been made to limit officer discretion through formulation of more administrative rules and closer oversight by supervisors and, in some cases, by citizen review boards. Similar concerns about discretion have been expressed concerning medical treatment, welfare services, and education. Although this attention to discretion has produced significant conse quences, it has not often been extended to internal functions such as demand processing. Local officials and the public have been concerned about police officers, for example, but they. have not recognized the discretion exercised by call takers and dispatchers as well as the poten tial consequences that may result from this discretion. As with other components of service delivery, the challenge is to recognize discretion and to devise means of constraining it while at the same time maintain ing sufficient flexibility. In the Considerations for Public Policy section, we return to the question of discretion in demand processing and consider ways in which it might be structured and confined so as to improve service delivery.
134
implications for Public Service Organizations
135
Demand Processing and the Distribution of Services
A major topic of inquiry among urban scholars has centered on the distribution of services to community residents. Analysts have exam ined a wide variety of urban services in an effort to discover and explain patterns of distribution to individuals, groups, and neighborhoods. Sev eral researchers have examined the underclass hypothesis as one explanation of distribution. This hypothesis holds that the poor and minorities, who lack political, social, and economic clout, will receive fewer and lower-quality services than other residents. Empirical findings cumulatively suggest, however that poor and minorities do not system atically receive worse services. Assessing this literature, Jones (1981: 688) argues, the wealthy do not seem to be able to gain service benefits consistently, and there is no evidence to indicate that electoral coalitions account for variations in public services. Another explanation of distribution patterns is that bureaucratic rules and procedures are responsible for the allocation of urban services. According to this hypothesis, it is not socioeconomic factors alpne that determine distribution, but instead it is some type of interaction of these factors with bureaucratic rules:
Factors like age, population density, architectural characteristics, and physical layout of the neighborhoods may all affect the distribution of public services, but these factors effects are mediated through the way in which municipal bureaucrats interpret their significance in the process of allocating resources. A neighborhoods greater need for services will result in more services only if bureaucrats include the factors creating that need in their distributional formulas. (Rich, 1979: 143)
Jones and colleagues (1980: 81) carry the argument further by con tending that service allocations are the unintended results of bureau cratic rules which are oriented to organizational tasks but not to service distribution.
Service delivery rules are the procedures established by an agency to codify the repetitive decisions it must make in dealing with the recurring situations requiring service effort. They regulate the tasks that the organ ization must perform. Service distribution is primarily an unintended by product of attempts by a service agency to perform the tasks assigned to it. It is an unintended consequence of the task-directed behavior by the organization, whose tasks almost never explicitly consider who is getting what level of service from the delivery process.
Recent research has begun to explore the bureaucratic explanation, and, though no firm conclusions can yet be made, studies have found delivery rules to influence the allocation of several services (Levy, Meltzner, and Wildavsky, 1974; Antunes and Plumlee, 1977; Mladenka, 1977, 1978; Jones, 1977). Our discussions of demand processing have highlighted both organ izational tasks and rules that affect the allocation of services. Distribution is affected by the tasks of both gatekeepers and response coordinators, though this has seldom been recognized in studies of distribution. Al though we concur with Jones and colleagues that service delivery rules and procedures can affect distribution, the question of whether alloca tions are mostly unintended results of task-oriented rules deserves closer scrutiny. To be sure, the rules and procedures of demand process ing are task-oriented, designed for rapidly screening service requests and selecting an appropriate response. And demand processing proce dures and rules are not usually designed with reference to the overall allocation of services to particular geographic areas of the community. Yet this does not mean that distributions are simply unintended conse quences of demand processing. The allocation of divisible services, which is a primary purpose of demand processing mechanisms, is undertaken by scrutinizing the di mensions of individual service requests. Decisions concerning alloca tions are made on the basis of demand characteristics such as the nature of the need or problem, location, and seriousness. The resulting alloca tions, therefore, do not seem to be unintended consequences, but instead result from application of bureaucratic rules and procedures to individual cases. This raises the question of the appropriate unit of analysis for studies of urban service distributions. Most studies have examined delivery to geographical areas, usually termed neighborhoods. These works have usually concerned the allocation of basically indivisible services, such as street repai parks, and recreation facilities. Because these are more or less available to all residents once provided, it makes sense to examine their allocation in terms of geographical distribution. At the same time, it may not be reasonable to examine the distribution of more divisible services across geographical areas. Divisible services are provided directly to individuals with limited spillovers to others. Police response to calls, fire department reactions to reported fires, and the processing of requests for welfare assistance are examples. Where allocation decisions are made on the basis of individual needs and problems and not on the basis of area needs or characteristics, it makes more sense to analyze allocation decisions to individual cases rather than
136
137
to geographical areas. The foregoing discussion of demand processing suggests that bureaucratic rules and practices are important to the ultimate allocation of public services and that demand processing tasks and rules should be included in analyses of public service delivery. As a final caveat, we note that, though demand processing tasks and rules can affect allocations and performance, they are not the only factor. As argued in the previous section, the personnel performing the demand processing function act with substantial discretion and are not com pletely bound by bureaucratic rules and policies. Discretion in the per formance of demand processing tasks remains an integral part of the function, and, as such, is another potential influence on the distribution of services.
Information Flow in Public Services
social stigma or where service seekers are emotionally distraught. It is also difficult to formulate useful guidelines for the acquisition of informa tion because of the diversity of human situations and reactions. Observa tion of police operators suggests that it can be obtained even under the most arduous circumstances by careful questioning and soothing man ner. The same is likely true for other human services and points to interpersonal communication skills as useful resources for those who perform the gatekeeping function. In addition to communication skills, the procedures and mechanisms of demand processing influence information flow. Mode of communica tion affects the way that information is articulated and often the duration of demand messages. The most effective communication mode for a given service organization is a function of the types of demands it channels. We have seen how police, who handle many serious and emergency situations, are organized to receive telephone messages. This mode is usually effective because it simultaneously allows for articulation of demands from diverse locations and rapid response. Wel fare agencies, on the other hand, usually conduct demand articulation face-to-face in an office situation. Inasmuch as admission to programs requires the exchange of large quantities of information and often review of documents, the face-to-face mode is effective. Service organizations must recognize that the modes of communication devised for the receipt of demand messages influence the extent and quality of information received by the organization, which in turn has implications for organiza tional performance.
Considerations for Public Policy

Given previous descriptions and arguments concerning demand pro cessing, a variety of recommendations for the design and modification of public policies related to delivery of public services are offered. Each of these policy considerations suggests ways in which services might be improved through attention to and changes in demand processing systems. 1, Public officials and organizational administrators should give more attention to the role of gatekeepers and response coordinators in the process of delivering services. Urban scholars and local officials have focused significant attention on the activities and performance of service agencies. They have not,
Another lesson derived from analysis of demand processing relates to the importance of information structuring and flow. Demand processing in police agencies was examined both from this perspective as well as the component tasks of the initial response process. Both perspectives indicate that information is a primary input in the delivery of police services. This suggests that organizational factors and mechanisms which guide the flow represent significant elements of the delivery apparatus of service agencies. The initial acquisition of demand information may involve two potential problems. First, in processing individual service requests, gatekeepers may face the situation of having too much information. Persons request ing services often provide a large amount of data concerning their problem or need, more than is necessary to activate organizational response. Gatekeepers must distill information, gathering and coding only that necessary to determine eligibility and initiate service provision. Without this reduction, organizations would be overloaded with data, which would hamper rapid and effective responses to individual needs. At the same time, it is important that information be distilled and struc tured so that significant elerents are not lost. If coding and transmis sions about the demand situation are not accurate, then appropriate service-rendering activities may not be initiated. The second problem concerns situations where persons seeking ser vice do not initially provide adequate information about their needs. Here, gatekeeper efforts must center on eliciting more background so that appropriate response activities may be initiated. Acquisition of facts is not always an easy task, especially in service contexts that involve
138 ceive hundreds of demands on a daily basis, often provide only limited training to gatekeeping personnel. Usually, new workers are trained in how to operate equipment and instructed about basic agency rules and policies, Training is short and often lacks instruction in communication skills and appropriate treatment of persons seeking services. Given that this treatment directly affects citizens and their cooperation with the organization, it would seem highly desirable for administrators to review their training programs with special reference to ways that communica tion skills and treatment of the public might be enhanced. 4. Both gatekeepers and response coordinators should be more care fully monitored and supervised. Demand processing activities in service organizations are usually un supervised. The few supervisors assigned to gatekeeping and response coordination normally concentrate on routine administrative tasks. Be cause demand processing is frequently viewed as an internal support function only indirectly related to performance they have not attempted to monitor closely the work of gatekeepers and response coordinators The tasks of street level personnel such as caseworkers teachers and police officers, receive far closer scrutiny and oversight. Given that demand processing can exert a direct impact on organizational effective ness, demand processors should be more closely supervised. Efforts ought to be made to monitor gatekeeper interactions with persons seeking services to determine whether organizational guidelines are being followed whether relevant demand information is being obtained and whether citizens are being properly treated Supervision of response coordinators needs to focus on their decisions regarding the assignment of personnel and sequencing of responses, again to ascertain if they are congruent with organizational policies and effective deployment of resources. 5. Administrators should examine demand processing to ascertain the extent of worker discretion. Efforts ought to be made to restrict discretionary action except where it will unnecessarily reduce re sponse flexibility. Previously we speculated on the reasons for the extensiveness of discretion in demand processing and argued that it can yield both costs and benefits. It is useful when it provides the opportunity for flexible response to individual situations, but is harmful when it generates ac tions and consequences contrary to organizational goals and purposes.
139
however, sufficiently studied demand processing efforts. The traditional conception of these is that they represent an internal support function, of only limited significance to the overall process of delivering services. The analysis presented in this volume indicates the shortsightedness of this conception. Gatekeepers and response coordinators play a central role in delivery, one that can significantly influence performance.
2. Personnel assigned to gatekeeping and response coordination functions should be carefully selected. Hiring and promotion ought to be made with reference to skills that enhance the performance of demand processing tasks.
Gatekeepers and response coordinators in many organizations pos sess low status and are often poorly paid as a result of the relative lack of importance attached to their functions. Individuals are assigned for a variety of reasons, but seldom with reference to skills that might be relevant to demand processing. A case in point is the nOt uncommon practice of assigning disabled officers or those under internal investiga tion to call taker and dispatcher functions. Other agencies assign new personnel to demand processing actions so that they can learn about the organization from the ground up. The problem with these practices is that they place persons with insufficient skills or experience in key posts in the response process, which may harm organizational performance. Attention to the skills and experience of demand processing personnel is advisable on the grounds that it will enhance the performance of gatekeepers, which in turn should improve overall service delivery. A variety of capabilities might be considered desirable for individuals assigned to demand processing. A key one is interpersonal communica tion skill, which can enhance effective collection of demand information. The ability to handle emotionally taxing and high-volume situations is another attribute that might enhance gatekeeper performance. In terms of experience, detailed knowledge of organizational policies and proce dures, both formal and informal, is useful for gatekeepers and response coordinators in demand processing tasks such as selecting and coordi nating responses as well as assigning personnel.
3. Gatekeepers should receive formal training prior to starting work.
No major company that conducts business by telephone would con sider assigning personnel to its telephone communications center with out training them in equipment use, company policies, communication skills, and proper treatment of callers. Yet service agencies, which re
140 purposive reduction and how message content is sometimes reduced as information flows through the stages of demand processing. The conse quences of flow, distortion, and loss have been examined mostly in light of their effects in hierarchical organizations. Administrators of service agencies also need to consider the effects of flow on demand processing systems and agency performance.
141
Except where flexibility is important, it is appropriate to structure and limit discretion carefully to ensure that worker actions are in line with organizational goals. Structuring can be accomplished through more detailed guidelines concerning appropriate service delivery actions. The complexity of delivery makes it practically impossible to devise clear operating rules for every demand situation, However, general ones that apply to classes of events might help to delineate actions appropriate to particular situations. For example, to the extent that rules governing eligibility can be clearly specified, gatekeeper discretion might become more structured. Where rules for demand processing efforts are de vised, discretion can be reduced through more supervision and over sight. To the extent that gatekeepers and response coordinators know that their actions are being monitored and that they will be held account able for them, they will more likely conform more closely to organiza tional rules and guidelines. Structuring discretion while simultaneously maintaining flexibility is no easy task. It is not readily apparent where the latter is needed and where it can lead to abuses that contradict organizational purposes. The challenge is to reach a balance between maximum flexibility and struc tured discretion so as to prevent significant abuses. To be sure, this is a difficult charge, but is one that should be considered from the perspec tive of improving service delivery. Questions for Future Research
6. Administrators ought to recognize the importance of information flow to service delivery: Organizational processes should be reex amined to determine ways in which the flow related to demands might be enhanced.
Analysis in this volume has highlighted the role of information flow in responding to service requests. Examination of processes related to flow should point to areas where improvements might be made. In cluded in this analysis ought to be both the procedures and resources utilized in processing demand information. The review of forms used to record it may indicate ways in which more useful data could be obtained or ways in which form redesign might improve agency response. For agencies that use automated processing systems, attention should be given to policies related to the entry and storage of information and its internal routing. Examination of processing rules and mechanisms should isolate ways that it might be more efficiently gathered and inter nally transmitted. Any consideration of information transmission should include analysis of the role of distortion or loss. We have seen how coding involves
The relative neglect of demand processing systems in service agen cies means that much remains to be learned about the impact of gatekeeping and response coordination on organizational performance. Empirical data gathered through a study of calls for service received by one municipal police agency have been used to describe demand pro cessing activities and their relationship to overall operations. Further empirical analysis is needed to specify clearly the impact of gatekeeping and response coordination on service organization efforts. Especially useful would be cross-service analyses that comparatively assess the consequences of demand processing systems. A variety of questions might serve as the focus of future research on demand processing. One interesting question concerns how gate keepers screen service requests, often reducing demand volume. Eligi bility rules are one means of screening and, if appropriately applied, represent organizationally sanctioned means of delimiting demands. Yet as we have seen, discretion operates in the application of eligibility rules, which implies that screening may or may not conform to organizational goals. We have also noted that a more subtle type of screening may result from the intended or unintended imposition of costs on those seeking services; at the extreme, these costs may lead to termination of requests. Both the application of eligibility rules and the time, financial, and psychological costs associated with gatekeeping affect the indi viduals who ultimately receive services, and for this reason merit closer scrutiny. A related research question concerns assessing the extensiveness of discretion and its impact on performance. Measurement of discretion is a difficult task, requiring consideration of organizational rules and policies, employee behaviors, and supervision. Where discretion is identified, the next question is to determine its impact on the efficiency of service delivery. The challenge to researchers is to ascertain how particular types of discretionary action are related to performance, that is, whether the flexibility derived from discretion yields effective solutions to mdi-
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vidualized problems and/or detracts from organizational goals and pol icies. This type of research would be of significant value to administrators seeking a more careful structuring of discretionary actions on the part of demand processors. Examination of information processing suggests several possible re search questions for future study. One topic might be the impact of coding systems on information flow. In analyzing police services, it was shown how complex crimes and problems are reduced to descriptive codes. An interesting research issue would be to study coding schemes across agencies while paying particular attention to how they affect information flow and organizational response to requests. A related research effort would be to compare the forms used to record demand information across departments to determine how efforts to structure this information affect its flow through the response process. Examination of the impact of information at each step of the response process on actions of personnel is another possible topic for future research. For example, one could study how data gathered by gate keepers affects the activities of response coordinators. This question was considered in chapter 6, where empirical analysis indicated that facts supplied by call takers influenced dispatcher decisions regarding the sequencing of dispatches and the assignment of backup units. Another interesting investigation would be how the information provided by response coordinators bears on the activities of street-level person nel, such as caseworkers, teachers, and police officers. Although this list of future research questions is not exhaustive, it is suggestive of the many issues that need to be adequately considered. Empirical studies might compare demand processing efforts across different services or in different organizations producing the same ser vice. Only through studies such as these can we hope to learn more about demand processing systems and their relationship to agency performance. In turn, this information can be used by administrators to modify organizational rules and procedures to improve service delivery and the well-being of persons consuming public services.
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,.,,_
I..,,.4;,.,_,,.,
,,.,
-_.
r_.
Index
Index 151
Downs, Anthony, 35, 46 Dunsire, A., 35 Dutton, Donald G., 54
American Bar Association, 96 Antunes, George E., 54, 55, 75, 135 Ashby, W. Ross, 35
Cumming, Elaine, 54 Cumming, lan, 54 Cybernetics, 35 Cyert, Richard M., 35, 41
Easton, David, 15 Edell Laura 54 Elopement 1920 England, Robert E., 7 English, Richard, 7, 19 Eligibility review, 1620; in police agen cies 6468 Eligibility rules 1618 in police agen cies, 6468. See also Eligibility review Farmer, Michael T., 54, 56, 73, 80, 81 Fort Worth Police Department (FWPD), 5662, 6668, 6974, 7780, 84 91. 99113, 11924
Baker, Paula C., 8 Barnard, Chester I., 35, 129 Beer, Stafford, 35 Bercal, Thomas E., 54, 75 Bidwell, Charles E., 19 Bittner, Egon, 53 Blau, Peter M., 35, 36 Bordua, David J., 53 Boundary-spanning, 4, 16 Brandeau, Margaret L., 81, 82 Brudney, Jeffrey L, 7 Burton, Alan, 69
Information conduit: role of gatekeeper, 7678 Information costs, 96 Information distortion, 4647. See also Information loss Information exchange: during demand articulation, 10208 Information flow: introduced, 6, 12; stages in demand processing, 34; characteristics of. 3740; influences on, 4047; in police services, 94113; in public services, 13637, 14041 Information loss: defined, 108; in police demand processing, 10913; as policy consideration, 14041 Information overload, 4445 Information provision: to consumers, 2426; in police agencies, 7980 Information theory, 35 Intake workers: See Gatekeeping Intensity: of service demands, 910, 4243 Internal relay: defined, 34; in police agencies, 98, 100, 101, 10813. See also Information flow Jones, Bryan D., 3, 9, 33, 134, 135 Kahn, Robert L., 36, 41, 44 Kansas City Police Department, 25, 118 Katz, Daniel, 8, 19, 36, 41, 44 Katz, Elihu, 9, 36 Kirk, Stuart A., 8, 18, 19, 20 Larson, Richard C., 92, 93 Levins, Bruce R., 54 Levy, Frank, 3, 135 Lewin, Kurt, 15 Lilly, J. Robert, 54, 55, 75 Lipsky, Michael, 3, 4, 9, 18, 19, 31, 130
Garn, Harvey A., 8 Gatekeeping: defined, 4; function de scribed, 45; uses of the concept, 1516; component tasks described, 1626; in police agencies, 6382; personnel, 8082; impact on police performance, 11519; impact on police officers, 11618; impact on organiza tional resources, 11819 Geographic boundaries: as eligibility rules, 17; in police agencies, 6568 Glanzer, M., 36 Glaser, R,, 36 Goldstein, Herman, 53, 132 Goodsell, Charles 1, 3 Greenly, James R., 8, 9, 16, 18, 19, 20 Guetzko Harold, 35, 36, 41 Hasenfeld, Yeheskel, 7, 18, 19 Hiring practices: of demand processing personnel, 138 Immediacy: of service demands, 910, 4243 Inbar, Michael, 35 Incident codes: in police agencies, 69 73 Information: approaches to the study of, 3536; divergent views on its impor tance, 9596
Cahn, Michael F., 54, 56, 75 Calls for police service: distribution in FWPD, 5660; sample in FWPD, 99 102 Campbell, Donald 7., 36, 41 Carter, Roy E., Jr., 15 Cherry, Cohn, 35 Citizen survey in Fort Worth, 12123 Coding: of service demands, 2122; process of, 4042; in police agencies, 6975, 97 Colton, Kent W., 81, 82 Communication: mode of. 3738 Communications center: in police agen cies, 6465 Communication skills: 2021, 69 Complaint codes: in police agencies, 6973; used in FWPD, 7073 Computer-assisted dispatching (CAD), 6162, 65, 80, 82, 84, 9293, 98 102, 121 Consumer demands. See Service demands Coproduction, 7 Creaming, 18
Danet, Brenda, 9, 19, 36 Davis, Kenneth C., 131, 132 DECOR, 123 Demand. See Service demands Demand articulation: defined, 34; in po lice agencies, 98100, 10208. See also Information flow Demand characteristics: described, 9 11; as influences on information flow, 4 244 Demand for police services: variety of, 5356; in FWPD, 5660 Demand information: transmission of by gatekeepers, 23; review of by re sponse coordinators, 2627; transmission to street-level personnel, 28; in police agencies, 84, 85, 88, 89 Demand processing: defined, 4; over view of function, 2830; impact on police agencies, 11424; impact on FWPD performance, 11923; impact on performance of public agencies, 12729; impact on the distribution of public services, 13436. See also Gatekeeping, Response coordination Deutscher, Irwin, 15, 18, 19 Direct service provision: role of gatekeeper, 7678 Discretion: in demand processing, 12, 18, 3031, 88, 12934; constraint of, 13940 Dispatch center: in police agencies, 83 Dispatcher personnel: in police agencies, 9293 Dispatch transmission: sample in FWPD, 102 Domain: organizational, 8, 17, 65, 67, 68
McCleary, Richard, 22 MacKay, Donald M., 35 McLaren, Roy C, 83 Manning, Peter K., 53, 54, 95, 103, 109 March, James G., 35, 36, 41, 45 Meltzner, Arnold J., 3, 135 Mennerick, Lewis A., 22 Message authority, 3940, 83 Message construction: gatekeeper par-
152
Tuilock, Gordon, 35, 46 Vreeland, Rebecca 5., 19 Weaver, W., 35 Webster, John A., 54 Whitaker, Gordon P, 8, 13, 114 Wildavsky, Aaron, 3, 135 Williamson, Oliver E., 46 Wilson, James 0., 53, 54 Wilson, 0. W., 83 Supervision: of demand processing per sonnel, 8182, 9293, 139 Swarup, Asha, 62 Technology: defined, 7; of service pro duction, 78; implications of, 1113 Thompson, James D., 15, 36 Tien, James M., 54, 56, 75, 81, 82 Training: of demand processing person nel, 8081, 92, 13839
Index
Index
153
ticipation in, 4546, 68, 69, 10208, 13637 Message duration, 3839, 100 Meyer, John C., 54 Miller, J. G., 45 Misner, Gordon E., 53 Mladenka, Kenneth R., 135 Mode of communication, 3738; in po lice agencies, 6465, 83 Montias, John M., 42
Nagi, Saad Z., 16, 19
Organizational performance: impact of gatekeeping and response coordination on, 3132, 11424 Organizational response: deciding the specifics of, 2728; in police agencies, 8588 Organization theory, 35 Ostrom, Elinor, 114 Oyen, Else, 9
vices, 2029; of persons seeking police services, 68, 7577 Reiss, Albert J., Jr., 53, 54 Response alternative: selection of in public agencies, 2223; in police agencies, 7579 Response articulation: defined, 34; in police agencies, 98, 102, 10813, See also Information flow Response coordination: defined, 4; over view of function, 5; component tasks described, 2628; in police agencies, 8393 Rhodes, Sonya L., 40 Rich, Richard C., 134 Roberts, Jane, 54, 56, 73, 80, 81, 92, 93 Rogers, Everett M., 37 Rubinstein, Jonathan, 95 Rumbaut, Ruben G., 53
Parks, Roger B., 8, 118 Parsons, Talcott, 8 Pate, Tony, 25, 118 People-changers, 4, 7 People-processors, 4, 7 Pepinsky, Harold E., 74, 91 Percy, Stephen L., 8, 25, 61, 69, 118 Pesso, Tana, 19, 21, 24, 25 Plumlee, John P., 135 Police Communications Study: overview description of, 6062 Police Magazine, 63 Police officer survey: in FWPD, 12021 Police role: changing conceptions ot 5253 Priority codes: use in gatekeeping, 22; in police agencies, 73, 74, 8587 Process model: of demand processing in public agencies, 1314; in police de mand processing, 11519 Prottas, Jeffrey M., 9, 11, 16, 20 Public policy: considerations for, 13741
Oueue discipline, 27; in police agencies, 8587
Referral: of persons seeking public ser
Savas, E. S., 3 Scott, Eric J., 25, 54, 55, 62, 69, 75 Scott, Robert A., 15 Scott, W. Richard, 35, 36 Seriousness of demands: as eligibility rules, 1718; as applied in police agen cies, 6668 Service demands: defined, 8; sources of, 9; characteristics of, 911; implica tions of, 1112; interpretation and coding of, 2023, 6875; variety of in police services, 5356; in FWPD, 56 60 Service domain: as eligibility rules, 16 17; in police agencies, 6668 Shannon, C. E., 35 Sharp, Elaine B., 8 Signal codes: as used by the FWPD, 7073. See also Complaint codes Silberman, Charles E., 52, 53, 94, 108 Simon, Herbert A., 35, 36, 45, 130 Sjoberg, G., 19 Social psychology, 36 Specificity: of service demands, 10, 43 Stark, Frances B., 18 Steinbruner, John D., 35 Sudnow, D., 22 Sumrall, Raymond 0., 54, 56, 73, 80, 81, 92, 93

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Demand Processing

Public Service Agencies

Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data

Percy, Stephen L. Demand processing and performance in public service agencies.

viii Contents 40 Contents

Part N. Demand Processing in Police Agencies

Tables and Figures

91 104 106 107 110 112 123

Tables and Figures

Figures 10 29 34 101 117

0I The Key Role of Demand Processing in Service Delivery

Demand Processing in Public Service Delivery

The Key Role of Demand Processing

Processing Demands for Service

Central Research Questions

Demand Processing in Public Service Delivery

The Key Role of Demand Processing

Demand Processing in Public Service Delivery

The Key Role of Demand Processing

lo The Key Role of Demand Processing

Demand Processing in Public Service Delivery

Figure 1-1 Typology of Problems/Needs Based on Intensity and Immediacy

Insufficient skills in geography

Fire in an abandoned shack; school breakin signaled by an alarm

Demand Processing in Public Service Delivery

The Key Role of Demand Processing

Demand Processing in Public Service Delivery

Demand Processing in Public Service Delivery

The Anatomy of Demand Processing

Eligibility Requirements and Selection of Consumers

Demand Processing in Public Service Delivery

Demand Processing in Public Service Delivery

The Anatomy of Demand Processing

Interpretation and Coding of Demands

Demand Processing in Public Service Delivery

The Anatomy of Demand Processing

Selection of Response Alternative

Demand Processing in Public Service Delivery

Provision of In formation to Consumers

Demand Processing in Pubhc Service Delivery

The Response Coordination Function

Receipt and Review of Demand In formation

28 Figure 2-1 Stages in Demand Processing in Public Service Organizations

Demand Processing in Public Service Delivery

Comm un/cation of Demand In formation to Street-L eve! Bureaucrats

G,nher and Code Dnmand ntorrnanOfl

d referrai lPR0V1DE9EFL NFORMATON appropnate

Sc-Hat Approprate Orgaroatwna Respaurse

d specahZed sevce rseaed

SPECAUZED NTn_R\AL UNIT ,-Th I

revrew seroce rot \-ar,afltea

Monitoring and Coordinating Staff Activities

rmmedrate sererce requrred

Overview of the Demand Processing Function

atter_ deiay STREETLEVEL BUREAUCRAJ

{FyE_j Activrty Drsposrtron

Demand Processing in Public Service Delivery

The Anatomy of Demand Processing

A Recurrent Theme: Discretion in Demand Processing

Demand Processing in Public Service Delivery

Demand Processing in Pubhc Service Delivery

Figure 3-1 Information Flow in Demand Processing

Ctizen Req uest(ng 1 Service Street-LeR Breaccrat