ENTERPRISE — Temporary hires of 911 dispatchers were made Wednesday, Nov. 3, by the Wallowa County Board of Commissioners during its regular meeting.

The hires were made as part of the Telecommunicator Emergency Response Taskforce.

Commissioner Susan Roberts said they were hired to help eliminate the risk of the dispatch center being shorthanded again, as happened earlier this year.

“Some are from Umatilla County or other counties,” she said. “They come and they stay and they help out.”

She said a couple local dispatchers have retired in recent months and another is down with a serious illness.

“We’ve been shorthanded,” she said. “That’s what these people do. It’s just like the travelling nurses.”

Earlier this year, dispatcher Brooke Langerman and Supervisor Tammy Shaver were the only two of the center’s six dispatchers not down ill. Shaver nominated Langerman for special recognition for her efforts to help keep the center open, working 12-hour shifts for about two weeks. It was noted then by the commissioners that she could’ve decided it was too dangerous to come to work because of the COVID-19 pandemic and stayed home with her three children in quarantine. But she instead decided to help keep the 911 center open, the commissioners said at the time.

Langerman was honored with a special award by the commissioners Aug. 18 and again, as a “Hometown Hero” on Oct. 23, at a Portland Trail Blazers game.

Despite the heroics Langerman and Shaver exhibited, the commissioners don’t want to have to repeat such an emergency, so they hired the temporary dispatchers

They are Karen Primmer, Kirsten Eichenlaub, Rachael Haller, Madison Hoke, Kylee Peck and Kerry Roberts, according to the commissioners’ meeting agenda.

Roberts said those six hold down full-time jobs but rotate into the county as needed to fill vacancies.

Another temporary dispatcher, Jennifer Bostwick, agreed to stay on for 2½ months without rotating. She is under a personal contract, Roberts said.