THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, September 22, 1995 TAG: 9509210198
SECTION: VIRGINIA BEACH BEACON PAGE: 07 EDITION: FINAL
COLUMN: Over Easy
SOURCE: Jo-Ann Clegg
LENGTH: Medium: 84 lines
Earlier this year my family tried to convince me that I needed a cellular phone for my car.
It was a hard sell. First of all, I hate to talk on the phone. Secondly, I consider the leather-lined front seat of a 1989 Mercury stuck at the corner of Kempsville and Princess Anne to be a great place to find a few minutes of peace and quiet.
To my way of thinking, the words peace, quiet and telephone do not belong in the same sentence.
But I did finally admit that maybe - just maybe - I needed one for safety's sake.
When I got to that point Bill whisked me off to a place where a sales representative handed me a piece of gray plastic sporting an antenna, extracted a rather large piece of change from my checkbook and sent me out into the world with the ability to reach my mother, order a pizza or call for help from the safety of my car.
I have succeeded in reaching my mother. I have succeeded in calling for pizza. I have yet to succeed in getting help.
My first attempt to reach a local police dispatcher came when I saw a bunch of kids ages 4 to 8 attempting to climb over a roadside barricade and make their way onto the expressway.
I reached for my phone, called 911 and gave a brief description of what was going on and where it was happening to a person I assumed was a Virginia Beach police dispatcher.
I was wrong.
It turned out that she was a State Police dispatcher. By the time she and I sorted everything out, the kids had apparently tired of their scare the bedevil-out-of-the-drivers game.
The next day Bill called the cellular phone company for an explanation.
``All of our phones are programmed to call the State Police,'' the customer service representative said. ``What you need to do if you want the local police is to dial O and ask to be connected to the Virginia Beach dispatcher.''
Which is exactly what I did late last Friday when the guy in front of me fell asleep (literally, I could see his closed eyes in his rear-view mirror) at three successive traffic lights, then weaved very slowly from lane to lane when he finally woke and attempted to drive a straight line.
I don't know whether he was intoxicated or ill, but I do know he was dangerous.
Unfortunately, the Virginia Beach police never got that information even though I had the make, model and tag number of his vehicle and was more than prepared to give it to them.
The closest I got, after I dialed 0 as instructed, was a telephone operator sitting inside a concrete blockhouse somewhere.
He quizzed me at length, decided that this was not an emergency and, before I could protest, patched me through to directory assistance so that they could give me the Virginia Beach non-emergency number.
At directory assistance my explanation to the operator was answered by a series of beeps and clicks, which, I suspect, represented the noises of the equipment needed to bill me for the call. They were followed by a long period of nothing.
By this time the driver in question had disappeared up a side street and, I fervently hoped, into the relative safety of his own driveway.
On Tuesday I talked with Paul Crane at Sprint Cellular. After doing his own check he was apologetic, but not reassuring. ``At present we have no way of detecting which city you're calling from so all 911 or *DUI (the other emergency option) calls do go to the State Police,'' he told me. ``They should be able to put you in touch with the local police.''
Tammy Van Dame, State Police public information officer, seconded Crane's recommendation.
``Tell our dispatcher you want the Virginia Beach Police,'' she said, ``and you'll be patched right through.'' Then she added a suggestion of her own.
``Better yet,'' she suggested, ``make a note of the number we use to transfer your call and keep it in a prominent place in your car just like you stick important numbers on your refrigerator at home.''
That number, 427-5000, is now taped to the back of my cellular phone.
I think I've got all that straight, but I do have one more call to make. I'm going to talk to somebody at the phone company about an operator who doesn't consider an impaired driver to be an emergency. by CNB