Council hearing highlights OUC pay raises, transparency concerns and new hotel fee proposal

The Committee on Judiciary and Public Safety held a public oversight hearing on June 9 to review Mayor Bowser’s proposed FY2026 budget for the Office of Unified Communications (OUC), focusing on staffing, technology upgrades and transparency around reported 911 errors.

The hearing matters because OUC operates the District’s 911, nonemergency and 311 call-taking systems; the committee and public witnesses said funding, staffing and accurate public reporting affect emergency response times and public trust.

Public witnesses told the committee they continue to see serious service problems and incomplete public reporting. Dave Statter, owner of Statter 911 Communications, said a reported incident at the National Air and Space Museum resulted in a 25-minute arrival time for ambulance crews and that the event and other mistaken-address incidents he has reported do not appear on OUC’s public performance dashboard. “That’s because OUC doesn’t want us to know,” Statter said. Trippity (Troopdi) Patel, chair of Advisory Neighborhood Commission 2A, told the committee his building experienced an elevator fire in February and said the response took 30 minutes from call to on-scene arrival.

OUC Director Heather McGaffin and staff defended operations and described the FY26 requests as aimed at stabilizing staffing and technology. Director McGaffin said the mayor’s FY26 operating request for OUC is…