PHILLIP GOMEZ / PVT Paula Cooper, project manager for the new dictaphone-transcription service at the Sheriff's Office, holds a small dictaphone that sheriff's deputies talk into to make their reports. Advertisement

The Nye County Sheriff's Office is touting the advantages of new dictaphone-transcription technology the office recently acquired.

Sheriff's spokespersons said it's allowing deputies to spend more time patrolling the streets and making more service calls instead of sitting in the office to write reports.

The new system saves a lot on fuel, too, since deputies are not required to head back to the Basin Avenue office after responding to a call. In the past, that was the procedure, and often they would have to wait around until a computer was available to make the report.

"It's a proactive force for presence," Assistant Sheriff Rick Marshall said of the innovation, meaning that deputies can spend more time "showing the flag" and keeping the peace.

Response times to calls for service should improve as well, Marshall said, "due to being out there" more. The hand-held dictaphone, the size of a cell phone, will save about three hours per deputy, per day, Marshall said.

The dictaphone-transcription system was funded by the Nye County Board of Commissioners two months ago, and office staffers said it is already paying dividends. The office could see roughly $10,000 per month in savings from the automated technology.

While the start-up costs and monthly fees for the new service are yet unknown, and so the anticipated savings still unclear, the savings in labor and deputy downtime appear to be immense.

Verbal reports can be made with the dictaphone while driving, with the phones later inserted into a computer for downloading the information and then uploading it through a transcription service. The contracted service then delivers a written report to the Sheriff's Office via email within a few days.

Officers then can concentrate on what they are paid to do: enforce the law. And the reports are more accurate and of higher quality, since the information is fresher when reports are made using the device.

Now it takes a deputy only about an hour to do his or her reporting, whereas it had taken up to three times as long, according to Marshall.

Last month, the Nye County's Sheriff's Office in Pahrump generated 366 reports, with the average taking only six and a-half minutes to dictate, he said.

The average person speaks at a rate of about 120 words per minute, said Sheriff Tony DeMeo, but the average deputy, not being a skilled typist, can type only 12 words per minute.