A crisis at Houston's 911 center?

Police union representatives met with city officials Monday and gave them an urgent message: Houston's 911 center is understtaffed and underprepared for a major disaster. Union reps say calls to the Houston Emergency Center have increased 18 percent since Katrina, which has sretched operators thin. From KHOU:

"The city of Houston we need help now we’re in a crime crisis,” Houston Police Patrolmen’s Union spokesman Johnny McFarland said. “We’re in a staffing crisis here. Hurricane season is upon us.”

"The issues they brought up we are aware of,” said Joe Laed with the Houston Emergency Center. “We have been working to find solutions to them for the past year.”

In addition to the understaffing, union reps say the HEC staff suffers from low morale and high turnover, and their complaints have been ignored. But a solution isn't clear at this point: Though the emergency center will ask for $500,000 to help pay for additional staff, union officials said they won't support the hiring of any new employees until problems at the center are fixed.