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Mesa staff pitch new cloud‑hosted 911 dispatch platform citing vendor end‑of‑life and QA gains
Summary
City staff recommended replacing the incumbent 911 platform with a cloud‑hosted event‑tide product serviced through a cooperative; staff said the change supports regional dispatch, automated quality assurance, and analytics and carries an estimated multi‑year contract cost including about $84,000 per year in recurring fees.
Mesa staff told council the city's current emergency dispatch platform is approaching end‑of‑life and presented a cooperative purchase of a cloud‑hosted event‑tide product to serve 911/fire dispatch and regional operations.
Council Member Taylor asked why the city was not simply moving to a vendor's upgraded platform; a presenter answered that the city sought a product with better performance and broader adoption among regional partners. "The issues that we're having with Variant was one of the reasons we were looking for a better solution," the presenter said, and staff noted the selected product is used by other regional centers.
Staff described the new solution as software‑as‑a‑service, hosted in the cloud with support handled through an existing services partner (identified as the city's usual technology integrator). The presenter said the move lets the city put fire and police on the same platform and adds automated QA and analytics that can speed training and performance feedback for call takers and dispatchers. "It will automate some of our quality assurance, so we're able to actually quicker identify if we need to do any remedial training," staff said.
Costs and timeline: in council questioning staff said the one‑time contract amount discussed in the presentation was about $647,000 (contract package discussed in the study session) and that the ongoing annual service cost for the combined departments would be approximately $84,000 per year under the five‑year pricing provided. Staff said they hope to transition to the new system within a few months if council approves the purchase.
Council noted the purchase would come from public‑safety budgets and praised staff coordination across departments. Staff also emphasized the city would continue to own or have access to call and dispatch data under the cloud arrangement and that the product supports regional dispatch configuration only for 911/fire operations, not citywide administrative systems.
Next steps: staff will present the full contract and pricing details to council at an upcoming meeting for formal action.
