911 SAVES Act of 2025

[Congressional Bills 119th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 540 Introduced in House (IH)]

<DOC>






119th CONGRESS
  1st Session
                                H. R. 540

   To require the Director of the Office of Management and Budget to 
    review and make certain revisions to the Standard Occupational 
             Classification System, and for other purposes.


_______________________________________________________________________


                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                            January 16, 2025

Mrs. Torres of California (for herself and Mr. Fitzpatrick) introduced 
 the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on Education 
                             and Workforce

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL


 
   To require the Director of the Office of Management and Budget to 
    review and make certain revisions to the Standard Occupational 
             Classification System, and for other purposes.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

    This Act may be cited as the ``Supporting Accurate Views of 
Emergency Services Act of 2025'' or the ``911 SAVES Act of 2025''.

SEC. 2. FINDINGS.

    Congress finds the following:
            (1) Public safety telecommunicators play a critical role in 
        emergency response.
            (2) The work that public safety telecommunicators perform 
        goes far beyond merely relaying information between the public 
        and first responders.
            (3) When responding to reports of missing, abducted, and 
        sexually exploited children, the information obtained and 
        actions taken by public safety telecommunicators form the 
        foundation for an effective response.
            (4) When a hostage taker or suicidal person calls 9-1-1, 
        the first contact is with the public safety telecommunicator 
        whose negotiation skills can prevent the situation from getting 
        worse.
            (5) During active shooter incidents, public safety 
        telecommunicators coach callers through first aid and give 
        advice to prevent further harm, all while collecting vital 
        information to provide situational awareness for responding 
        officers.
            (6) When police officers, firefighters, and emergency 
        medical technicians are being shot at, their calls for help go 
        to public safety telecommunicators.
            (7) Public safety telecommunicators are often communicating 
        with people in great distress, harm, fear, or injury, while 
        employing their experience and training to recognize a critical 
        piece of information.
            (8) In fact, there have been incidents in which public 
        safety telecommunicators, recognizing the sound of a racked 
        shotgun, have prevented serious harm or death of law 
        enforcement officers who would have otherwise walked into a 
        trap.
            (9) This work comes with an extreme emotional and physical 
        impact that is compounded by long hours and the around-the-
        clock nature of the job.
            (10) Indeed, research has suggested that public safety 
        telecommunicators are exposed to trauma that may lead to the 
        development of posttraumatic stress disorder.
            (11) Recognizing the risks associated with exposure to 
        traumatic events, some agencies provide critical incident 
        stress debriefing (CISD) teams to lessen the psychological 
        impact and accelerate recovery for public safety 
        telecommunicators and first responders, alike.
            (12) The Standard Occupational Classification system is 
        designed and maintained solely for statistical purposes, and is 
        used by Federal statistical agencies to classify workers and 
        jobs into occupational categories for the purpose of 
        collecting, calculating, analyzing, or disseminating data.
            (13) Occupations in the Standard Occupational 
        Classification are classified based on work performed and, in 
        some cases, on the skills, education, or training needed to 
        perform the work.
            (14) Classifying public safety telecommunicators as 
        Protective Service Occupations would correct an inaccurate 
        representation in the Standard Occupational Classification, 
        recognize these professionals for the lifesaving work they 
        perform, and better align the Standard Occupational 
        Classification with related classification systems.

SEC. 3. REVISION OF STANDARD OCCUPATIONAL CLASSIFICATION SYSTEM.

    (a) In General.--The Director of the Office of Management and 
Budget (in this Act referred to as the ``Director'') shall, as part of 
the first revision process of the Standard Occupational Classification 
system occurring after the date of enactment of this Act, consider 
establishing a separate code for public safety telecommunicators as a 
subset of protective service occupations.
    (b) Report to Congress.--If the Director decides not to establish 
the separate code for public safety telecommunicators described in 
subsection (a), the Director shall, not later than 60 days after the 
Director announces in the Federal Register the final decision of the 
revision process described in such subsection, submit to the Committee 
on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs of the Senate and the 
Committee on Education and the Workforce of the House of 
Representatives a report explaining why such separate code was not 
established.
                                 <all>