When people need a police officer, firefighter or animal control officer, a calm voice often is what callers need to hear.

Telecommunicators, otherwise known as dispatchers, connect callers to public safety when they need it most. They are the first responders for the first responders.

“Because even if they need help, they’re calling us too,” said longtime KanComm telecommunicator Marc Cote of Bourbonnais. “I get up on the radio, and I’m like, I need extra units, I need an ambulance, I need this, that, the other. So we’re the ones that are there first. We’re the ones responding to the incident first.”

These everyday heroes work in anonymity, tucked away in a 911 call center and sitting before four or five display monitors. They often work in dim room lighting so they can better see the monitors.

Cote became a telecommunicator 21 years ago.

He had moved to Kankakee County and was job hunting for a time, when he said his dad saw that KanComm was looking for applicants for telecommunicators.

“I was like, well, I can give that a shot,” Cote said.

What he found out firsthand was that the job has no typical day.

A telecommunicator handles calls ranging from dispatching an officer to a resident with a complaint, to serious events such as a shooting, structure fire or multiple-vehicle crash.

“You have to have a strong constitution about you to get through some things. There have been times where I’ve been the right person on the phone call,” Cote said. “I’ve had family members that have called in and I knew certain aspects of that scenario automatically that I don’t have to ask questions for; I can just go about and type information in or just relay it over the radios without having to ask the caller for that kind of thing.”

He said that the job does have some light moments – such as the time a man called to report he heard a ghost in his house.

“It turned out to be a raccoon,” Cote said.

A few years ago, Cote said he took a call that reported firefighters battling a blaze at a chicken farm in the northeastern portion of Kankakee County needed fuel for fire engines. It turned out that the firefighters had been at the scene overnight.

A commander on scene asked Cote to call a local fuel dealer, but he discovered that he could get no answers from the location.

That’s when instinct kicked in.

“My dad and I eat at local diners. You can find farmers there early in the morning,“ Cote said. “I called the USA restaurant in Grant Park. The waitress answers. I’m like, ‘Hey, this is Marc at the 911 center. Does anybody there happen to know the guy that’s in charge of the [local] plant? We need gas out at the fire scene for the engines.’

“She’s like, hold on. She tells me, ‘Four people just pulled out their phone, and two are making a phone call right now for you.’ Within 45 minutes, they had fuel out there already. That was a very cool day.”

Cote said that another cool part of the job is something he does when he is off the clock: “I’m a member of the 501st Legion, which is the worldwide Star Wars costuming group that does charity work.”

He is a fan of the Star Wars saga.

“We show up at Relay for Life and do hospital visits for kids in the hospitals and parades. I try to get out as much as I can for those,” Cote said. “It makes a difference in a little kid’s life.

“It’s funny how excited people get. Even adults. They’re like, ‘That’s a Stormtrooper! Can I get a picture?’ Like, yeah, come on in.”

All in a day’s work of an everyday hero.