The Colorado Springs 911 Communications Center is short nearly 30 employees and cannot meet recommended minimum staffing standards for call takers during its busiest times, officials said.

The Colorado Springs Police Department has for years grappled with ongoing staffing shortages among police officers and in its communications center, which currently has 27 vacancies, according to a presentation Police Chief Adrian Vasquez gave during a City Council work session on Monday.

Public Safety Communications Manager Renee Henshaw told the Gazette the department has 11 vacant police and fire dispatch positions, seven vacant 911 call taker positions and two vacancies among lead supervisors the department is currently working to fill. Officials did not specify in which positions the remaining seven vacancies were.

Henshaw attributed the attrition rates over the last three years to the COVID-19 pandemic that broke out in early 2020.

"COVID was very challenging. We lost a lot of people through COVID and trying to rebuild from that has been a lot," she said.

Vasquez said attrition in the communications center is a "problem" the Police Department has been working to fix for some time.

"How fast can we fix it is the question, because we've been working at that for awhile," he said.