The Georgia Senate gave unanimous, final passage to a bill Thursday that would overhaul the state’s antiquated 911 system.
Under the proposal, call centers across the state would be encouraged to modernize 911 emergency systems. And if signed into law, Georgians would have more options to interact with operators at emergency call centers.
“We are woefully behind other areas of the country,” said state Sen. John Albers, R-Roswell. “This is a chance for us to catch up.”
The bill, sponsored by Rep. Will Wade, R-Dawsonville, originated in the House, where it also passed unanimously.
Callers are limited to communicating via telephone under Georgia’s current system. Next Generation 911 — a generic name for a type of standards-based technology — would change that by allowing people to also interact with operators through videos, photos and texts.
Albers said it’s a 21st-century update for a decades-old system.
Proponents say that food delivery and ride-sharing services have more accurate geographic data to pinpoint a customer’s location than Georgia’s current landline-based 911 system.
They also point to North Carolina’s upgraded system as an example of what the technology can achieve when call centers lose power or are overwhelmed by a surge of incoming calls.
During Hurricane Helene, several call centers in North Carolina experienced power outages. Calls to those centers were immediately rerouted to operators elsewhere in the state.
“Moving this to Next Generation, as most states have already done, will allow us to significantly upgrade the availability of 911 operations,” Albers said.
Under House Bill 423, the Georgia Emergency Communications Authority would be tasked with administering the deployment of the new system. GECA already works with 911 and emergency communications throughout the state, sets standards and collects data.
Additionally, to help initiate the rollout of the multimillion-dollar overhaul, Gov. Brian Kemp signed an amended 2025 budget, which includes about $5.7 million through the end of June.
The 911 overhaul effort that comes after an investigation by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution last year that surveyed millions of calls across metro Atlanta and the surrounding counties and found a shockingly high number of callers were left waiting for operators to answer.
And while some issues persist since last year’s investigation, the AJC recently found people in crisis are reaching 911 operators with fewer troubles.
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