Automatic aid vs. mutual aid: Which local public safety agencies share real-time data?

Law dispatchers in Marion County work from two locations—one at the Marion County Public Safety Communications Center under the Sheriff’s Office and the other at the Ocala Police Department under Police Chief Michael Balken.

The agencies work under a mutual aid agreement stating that if one calls for help, the other will lend support. But the coordination is not automatic.

The two agencies use different computer-aided dispatch systems and do not share calls in real time, only on a case-by-case basis.

They also do not share their unit locations, which could help dispatchers decide quickly whether the Marion County Sheriff’s Office or Ocala Police Department has units closer to a call for help.

This stands in contrast to fire departments in Marion County, which work under an automatic aid agreement. Under that system, either county or city fire dispatchers can send the closest units to an emergency call regardless of jurisdiction or agency.

Marion County Fire Chief James Banta explained the difference between automatic aid and mutual aid.

“OFR and MCFR operate under an automatic aid agreement, enabling immediate support and real-time location sharing via our CAD systems,” Banta said. “This removes jurisdictional boundaries and provides for closest-unit response, ensuring the public doesn’t wait for help due to their location, a practice very common in the fire service. In Marion County, this need became tragically clear with the loss of 11-year-old Brandon Oxford, who died in a 2005 house fire in a county enclave near Ocala; it took 16 minutes for a firetruck to arrive due to jurisdictional delays, highlighting the life-saving value of such coordination.”

This arrangement reduces the time needed for back-and-forth coordination but requires both fire dispatchers to see all units from both departments at all times—something law dispatchers in Marion County do not have.

Ocala Police Chief Michael Balken would not take direct questions about why OPD and the Sheriff’s Office do not share automatic vehicle location, or AVL, data and he and the city’s fire chief Clint Welborn would only speak through the city spokesperson, who declined to answer any follow-up questions.

Sheriff Billy Woods also would not directly answer whether he would prefer such an arrangement.

Banta acknowledged that “the public may assume all agencies operate like OFR and MCFR with real-time data sharing.”

“From a fire service perspective, I believe all agencies would benefit from such coordination to enhance response times and situational awareness,” he added.

Communities across the state have adopted systems that allow dispatchers to see and send the closest unit to a call by sharing their agencies’ real-time GPS coordinates. This accessibility helps dispatchers quickly determine if another agency’s units are closer without having to make a phone call.

When asked how MCSO knows when an OPD unit is closer, a sheriff’s office spokesperson wrote:

“OPD will reach out for assistance when needed. Otherwise, our dispatchers will automatically send available units to high-priority incidents (such as the handgun on the school bus incident) that occur within other agencies’ jurisdictions since MCSO has jurisdiction throughout the entirety of Marion County.”

Because 911 calls from cellphones can be routed outside a jurisdiction—as often happens in Ocala—time could be saved if the sheriff could dispatch OPD units directly when they are closest to a call.

The gap is especially clear during high-risk situations. At the Paddock Mall shooting on Dec. 23, 2023, the first call went to the county call center despite the mall being located in the city. MCSO then had to notify OPD through their CAD-to-CAD interface.

The first call for help came at 3:39:46 p.m. to the county’s call center. Within 23 seconds, it was in the hands of the MCSO law dispatcher at 3:40:04 p.m.

According to MCSO CAD records, it took 1 minute, 33 seconds for MCSO to dispatch its first unit. From the time of dispatch, it took 17 minutes for the first MCSO deputy to reach the mall.

According to OPD’s CAD records, the first OPD unit arrived at 3:49:30 p.m.—more than nine minutes after the first call came into MCSO.

According to MCFR CAD records from the same call, the fire dispatcher assigned the first unit within 41 seconds. The first unit staged at the mall in just over four minutes.

The risk of delayed response due to emergency communications that are not seamless—and the lack of real-time information about where responding units are located—can cost lives.

Within the city of Ocala, the risk is especially acute, because OPD does not share its real-time unit locations with Ocala Fire Rescue either. This represents another significant difference between how public safety agencies coordinate within the city compared to the county.

Meanwhile, the Florida Highway Patrol, which responds to crashes on I-75 and in unincorporated Marion, is not connected to the local CAD system at all. If someone calls 911 about an accident, the dispatcher must notify FHP by phone. Low staffing levels mean troopers often arrive long after fire crews, who are left treating patients without the authority to control oncoming traffic.

The issue is not unique to Marion County. On Feb. 14, 2018, a lone gunman entered Building 12 of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, killing 17 people and injuring 17 others. The school was located near a municipal line, which meant calls were routed to multiple centers, and agencies struggled to coordinate.

Two years later, the National Police Foundation issued a report on the shooting that concluded:

“A series of technical, procedural, and human communications challenges occurred during the response to the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School (MSDHS) shooting incident on February 14, 2018. The challenges complicated the response as public safety personnel attempted to save the lives of victims. … Politics and localized control resulted in communications structures and protocols that were siloed and unable to function across jurisdictional boundaries, even in critical incidents.”

Since then, Broward County has worked to integrate its emergency systems. Dispatchers there can now see units from other agencies and work from the same CAD system, creating immediate awareness of what calls are active and who the closest responder is.

The Florida Legislature considered a bill last session that is reemerging again that would have required each county to consolidate emergency communications, and no municipality will be able to opt out.

For now, however, some local agencies continue to operate without real-time sharing of unit locations.

Mutual Aid vs. Automatic Aid

Mutual Aid

• Agencies help each other only when asked.
• Dispatchers must call or radio to request support.
• Unit locations are not shared in real time.
• Response can be delayed during coordination.

Automatic Aid

• Agencies share real-time GPS locations of units.
• Dispatchers can automatically send the closest unit, regardless of jurisdiction.
• No manual request is needed; cooperation is built into the system.
• Reduces response times and improves situational awareness.