'VOICE OF AUTHORITY' SIGNS OFF
BY BETTY ADAMS
Staff Writer Kennebec Journal & Morning Sentinel 09/02/2008

FARMINGDALE -- For almost 20 years, the distinctive tones of Bill Crowley answered "Maine State Police" when people called for a trooper during the 3-to-11 shift.

With his retirement Friday, the voice will be heard on the rare occasions when Crowley opts to fill in for a shift as an emergency communications specialist.

Crowley, 64, leaves the Bureau of Emergency Communications Services in Augusta, a group that has a new name, a new home, but not a new role.

"The most important thing you do is make sure everybody goes home at the end of the shift," he tells trainee dispatchers. "We're the front line between the people and the trooper. We're part of the team, and people get hurt when you let down the team."

He recalls working through some of the tough times, when a trooper didn't make it home or was injured.

State Police Detective Giles Landry was shot in Leeds in 1989 and Trooper James Griffith died on U.S. Route 1 in 1996. "I had just gone off duty when Jeff Parola died," Crowley said. Parola died in 1994 in a crash in Sidney on West River Road.

Crowley was on duty in 1995 when a trooper was attacked on Interstate 95, and when another trooper was hit head-on with a snowplow. Both troopers survived.

He has a pet peeve about being given a post office box number box instead of a street location.

One particularly taxing day, Crowley told a caller, "Look, ma'am, we're not going to mail you a trooper."

Crowley's jobs kept him close to the communications industry. He's sold cars and radio advertising, worked as a reporter for the North Shore Sentinel newspaper in San Diego, a radio announcer for WRDO in Augusta, and a television reporter in Presque Isle.

He joined the state Department of Public Safety, Maine State Police, as a dispatcher. Today, he works for the Bureau of Emergency Communications Services, still within the Department of Public Safety.

"He just kind of had that radio voice from the first day on the job," said Davene Luce, the supervisor who trained him. "It was the voice of authority whether he was explaining something on the phone to a caller or a responder in the field."

With 21 years in the state retirement system and four more from the military, Crowley decided the timing was good to retire.

A sports fan, he sees compares athletes to communications specialists.

"I see these aging athletes," he said. "They play and they play and they play; they get beyond their years and beyond their ability. I wanted to go while I could still do the job and didn't have to have someone pick up after me."

Crowley, a 1962 Cony High School graduate, was the oldest communications specialist.

"People have been there longer than I was, but I started late," he said. "One of my regrets is that I didn't discover it earlier. It's a young person's job. There's a lot of stress, and there's a lot to learn."

He served as the union's representative on the Maine Emergency Communications Systems Policy Board that set up the system to consolidate the Public Service Answering Points that answer E-911 calls statewide.

"The system, had it gone through the way it was originally conceived, it would have worked fine," Crowley said.

Crowley said higher costs resulted from legislation that gave municipalities a choice of which communications center could answer their emergency calls.

"It took money away from state center in Augusta. You can run the center for X dollars if you serve 100,000 or 1 million you can run it for the same amount of money," he said. "Spread over 100,000 people it's one figure, and over a million people, it's a different figure."

Luce said Crowley was particularly knowledgeable about central Maine geography, always was willing to fill in for a colleague, and easy to work with.

"You can have a rip-roaring disagreement with him, and five minutes later it is like it never happened," Luce said. "He held no grudges when someone disagreed with him."

Crowley and his wife, Diane, who retired from the state eight years ago, plan to use their new motor home to do some traveling next year, to a daughter and two granddaughters, all in Denver.

Crowley will stay in touch through his ham radio. "I got to know the governor through ham radio," he said. "I was one of three people who gave Gov. Baldacci his exam."

And Crowley plans to continue working on his 1962 Studebaker Lark Commander now that he's given up work full-time.

"It's been a good ride," he said. "I've pretty much enjoyed it, and I'm glad I did it, and if I had to do it all over again, I would."

Betty Adams -- 621-5631

badams@centralmaine.com

Bookmark and share this story: digg del.icio.us Reddit

Reader comments

Click here to view or add reader comments