INside INdigital: From PSAP to INdustry Partner to NENA

Guest blog written by
Laken Detweiler - Social Media Specialist | INdigital

I learned pretty quickly that no one at INdigital ended up here by accident. Everyone has a story that someone knew someone who knew Mark Grady, President, or Eric Hartman, VP. Very rarely was it, “I saw a job posting and applied online.”

This story holds true for former INdigital Employee April Heinze. She is now the 911 and PSAP Operations Director with NENA. She started working in a PSAP at the age of 19 in Eaton County, Michigan. Shortly after Eaton County had deployed 911, Heinze began working in the PSAP as a telecommunicator. When she started, they were utilizing wireline, and through her 24 years in Eaton County, she saw the PSAP transition from wireline to Next Generation 911.

Next Generation 911 is new technology that allows the PSAP to receive richer, more detailed data from callers. It also improves interoperability and improves system resiliency.

During her 24 years at Eaton County, she worked her way up to director and did just about every job in the PSAP on her way there. April became heavily entrenched in NENA with a focus on standards. Once she started working with standards, she was given the opportunity to get pulled into a bunch of different realms, partly due to her ability to understand the technology and then operationalize it for those who are using it. 

April was heavily involved in the PSAP side of things, so leaving to work for an industry partner never crossed her mind, but then the Michigan NENA Conference rolled around, and Ricardo Martinez dropped a seed in her path. He asked if she ever thought about leaving the 911 side and joining the vendor side. Without hesitation, April said no thank you with a chuckle. She still had things she wanted to do as director of Eaton County. Fast forward a year to the following conference, and Ricardo brings it up again, this time introducing her to Vice President at INdigital, Eric, but she still wasn’t ready to leave the PSAP yet. She had things she wanted to do still and needed to get her ducks in a row. As the conversation with Eric wrapped up, he told her that they’d wait for her, and she walked away thinking, “Yeah, ok, sure you will.” Little did she know he meant it. 

The following year rolled around, and she was asked again if she was ready to leave the PSAP. This time she was, and she was shocked that they actually waited for her! During this time, she was looking at joining another company, but she really loved what those at INdigital were doing. She felt her goals and interests for PSAPs aligned better with INdigital than the other company she was interested in. She knew that INdigital took care of their people and cared about what was going on in the PSAP, so she took a leap of faith and joined all of us at INdigital.

During her three years, she learned the ins and outs of being part of the team and the culture in the office. At INdigital, April held the title of Industry Affairs Specialist, and before she left, she was promoted to Director of Industry Affairs. She remained heavily involved in the standards work and educated people about INdigital, what we did, and how we did it. Through her years in a PSAP and at INdigital, her ultimate goal was to be in the role she currently holds, 911 and PSAP Operations Director with NENA. So when the opportunity presented itself, she couldn’t pass it up. 

“My passion has always been making 911 better, the whole field, better,” said April. 

Today she works on many things that benefit 911, including reclassification for 911 public safety professionals, alongside a big push for the NG911 bill and getting funding for Next Generation 911. She believes that NG911 needs to be deployed across the country so that regardless of county or city size, all have access to NG911 and everything that comes with it.