As recently as two weeks ago, when faculty, staff and students working at the University faced an emergency situation, they had to repress the urge to call 911.
Instead, they had to call 346-6666, the extension that would connect them with the Department of Public Safety’s emergency line. If the emergency called for outside response, DPS would then report the emergency to Eugene Fire and Emergency Medical Services.
The reason University employees could not call 911, said University spokesman Phil Weiler, was because dispatchers could not identify where the call was coming from.
No matter where on campus the call was made, the dispatcher’s display, “would say they were receiving a call from Oregon Hall,” Weiler said.
A telecommunication team at the University recently fixed the situation by assigning addresses to each building on campus and rewiring the phones to reflect a call’s true origin on 911 responders’ screens. Meanwhile, DPS is in the midst of discussing a change in the policy that currently requires all University employees to dial the DPS extension for any emergency.

“Technically, we can have people call 911 directly,” Weiler said. “Now, we just have to figure out what policy makes the most sense.”
The discussion began in conjunction with talks about the emergency procedure plan the University has been developing since last summer.
Until DPS reaches a decision, the policy will remain the same.
Peg Rees, the associate director of physical education in the physical education and recreation department, said the policy had not just been enforced for technical reasons.
“There were quite a few student pranks in the past from the dorms that led (EMS) to have all calls come from DPS,” Rees said.
However, with the advent of cell phones, fewer people use the dorm land lines anymore.
Rees recently encouraged employees in her department to use their cell phones to call 911 if someone is bleeding, not breathing or unconscious to receive faster medical response.
“The style of having everybody go through (DPS) first is possibly an unnecessary layer and inefficient,” Rees said.
And in places like the Student Recreation Center, efficiency is important.
“Injuries and incidents are more likely to happen here,” Rees said.
Weiler said there are good and bad things about calling both numbers. While DPS “can be there, in some cases, in half the time” it takes EMS to respond, calling DPS in an extreme emergency would only delay response time from EMS.
“I do hope that our staff, in extreme emergency like that, will call both,” Rees said.
But according to Weiler, calling both numbers in an emergency isn’t a viable option. If an employee calls DPS first, DPS will pass the information onto EMS anyway. If that employee calls 911 first, “they will keep you on the line until they know for certain that the emergency medical folks have arrived.”
Regardless of University policy, students who don’t have a land line on campus said they were more likely to call 911 if there was an emergency.
“DPS? I don’t have their number,” said Louis Lu.
Christine Smith, a political science major, agreed – “911, because I know the number.”
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