Pam Hickey spent the last 27 years answering the calls of White County residents who found themselves in an emergency situation, and she said she has loved every minute of it.
“I’ve enjoyed every minute of the 27 and a half years of doing this job,” Hickey, who is retiring from her position as a White County E911 dispatcher, said. “I’ve had good days and bad days, but I’ve just loved it.”
Hickey said she often felt like she might have been cheating just a little. After having worked at a series of sewing factories for 25 years, Hickey said that taking the job as an E-911 dispatcher, in 1993, brought a lot of meaning and fulfillment to her life.
“When I started this job, I thought, ‘I feel like I’m on vacation,’ and I still felt like that a lot of days,” she said. “I felt like maybe I really wasn’t earning my money. I just loved this job so much.”
Over her years of as a dispatcher, Hickey has seen many changes to both policies and personnel as well as changes in the physical location of her job site.
“Every time a new change comes along, I think, ‘Lord, I can’t do this again,’ but then I do,” she laughed, saying that her love for the job always outweighed any inconveniences or hardships in learning a new system or adapting to changes, including learning all of the constant upgrades to technology that come along with making the systems used to help the public better.
“When I started this job, we were dispatching out of the old police department, and we had to grow to having at least eight certified dispatchers before we could move to the building on the Crossville Highway,” she reminisced. “In all my time here I have been through five or six sheriffs, three police chiefs, two Sparta fire chiefs, I don’t know how many [fire chiefs] out in the county, lots and lots of police officers and deputies, and I have trained a whole lot of dispatchers.”
“She trained every one of us,” Suzi Haston, White County E-911 director, said. “We will miss Ms. Pam so very much, but we are happy for her. We thank her for all of the things that she has taught us and, most of all, for her friendship and leadership.”
“I started out with Pam,” Tammy Gongaware said, agreeing with Haston. “She trained me. She was a huge influence. She taught me a lot. I wish I knew half of what she’s forgotten.”
Haston, Gongaware, and some of Hickey’s other co-workers hosted a drive-through style retirement celebration for her, on Oct. 23, in which police, rescue, fire, and EMS personnel, along with friends, family, and members of the community, stopped by to let Hickey know how much her work has meant to them and wish her happy days ahead.
As for what lies ahead for Hickey, she said lots of reading and maybe some daytrips will fill her time now, but that her heart will always be with the E-911 services and those who will be continuing her legacy.
“This is what I decided I wanted to do when I grew up – it just took me until I was 42 to find that out,” she laughed. “It was a commitment, but I have loved every minute of It.”
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