LISTEN | A leaked 911 call made by Interim City Manager Terry Childers shows him using his authority to try to get police to lock down a hotel until his missing luggage and briefcase were found. The city manager has since changed how the department that handled that phone call is managed, citing his personal experience and anecdotal evidence of a need for change.

"I want more than one police officer out here," Childers tells the dispatcher in the recording. "I want this place shut down and searched immediately."

The Amarillo Emergency Communications Center, which handles local police, fire and EMS calls, now will have Amarillo Police Department and Amarillo Fire Department personnel on its management staff. Childers said the change comes in an effort to improve what he called "a highly insulated organization over there thinking, 'We won't be held accountable.'"

"Apparently it's a problem we've had for a long time," Childers said Thursday. "There was a leadership change just prior to me arriving."

The problem became personal for Childers two weeks ago when he discovered his luggage and briefcase missing at the Residence Inn by Marriott, where he stays.

Childers left his bags by the door to his room upon his arrival back from a trip. He returned to the lobby to get his room key "recharged" because it expires every few days.

"It was stupid on my part," he said.

He called 911, but he said he suffered through an inadequate response from the call taker.

The Amarillo Globe-News obtained a copy of the leaked recording of the 911 call. An official recording of the call requested from the city was not released to the newspaper Thursday.

During the call, the dispatcher asked him where he was and what the address was. He then identified himself as the "city manager of Amarillo" and said "I need a police officer here now."

Childers said Thursday that he was frustrated by the questions because he used a landline instead of a cellphone so the call location would show up on the operator's computer screen.

"No, hold on a second, hon. Hold on a second," he told the dispatcher. "I don't think you know who you are dealing with now. Let me talk to a supervisor immediately."

Childers said he then waited for more than 15 minutes for a supervisor to call him back.

Childers said dispatchers later leaked an audio file of the call and "put a slant on it that, 'He's going to fire us.'"

"They're retaliating on me," Childers said. "They think they can pressure me into going home or hanging my head in shame or not fixing the problem. I'm not built that way. This is about fixing a long-standing problem."

The problem, Childers said, is he had heard from two police officers, a deputy fire chief and later from an elderly couple about their negative experiences with the call center.

He said he had also heard about resident complaints from three Amarillo City Council members, issues he passed on to Interim Assistant City Manager Paula Hopkins who oversees public safety issues.

Childers said the management shift wasn't brought about because he had an aggravating experience.

"It's about a 911 system being broken for a long time," he said. "When people don't understand the criticality of a situation, they'll behave bureaucratically. The urgency has been missing."

He said he has placed the call center under the control of the fire and police departments, who answer to Hopkins, and has since moved on. He said he is not aware of any disciplinary action resulting from the call, and said he knew no firings came about because of it.

"The head of 911 put in his retirement papers," Childers said. "It was his decision."

Amarillo Police Chief Robert Taylor said his department has heard complaints from the public about dispatchers and the department has had complaints of its own, justifying changing the system back to the way things were done years ago.

The new management includes a police lieutenant and three police sergeants, as well as a fire captain and three fire lieutenants.

"This will be a shared public safety management initiative where we will have a collaborative and comprehensive effort to improve operations," Taylor said.

Councilman Randy Burkett campaigned in 2015 in part on problems he heard from employees of the call center, from being overworked to having to use software that made them jump through too many hoops.

"They said you'd go to a page and have to do a whole laundry list of questions before you could do anything," Burkett said. "Police and Fire have complained since I've been in office about getting misinformation or not all the information they need. They would walk into a situation not knowing if a gun was involved."

He likes the new approach and doesn't think it has been a knee-jerk reaction.

Mayor Paul Harpole said he is also satisfied with the changes.

"I didn't know there was a concern, but I did hear what Mr. Childers had to say. The choice being made is fine," he said. "The City Council has the philosophy and wants the city manager to follow it. I support what the management is doing, whether it's the city manager, police chief or fire chief. I'd tell them it looks good."

Councilman Brian Eades said there's more to talk about. Eades, who heads the Emergency Care Advisory Board, which monitors ambulance response, said response times have been good. He said he's found employees have acted in a professional manner and are providing service efficiently.

"We've heard several calls from the public over the years about responses and appropriateness of responses, and all of the (responses) I reviewed have been appropriate," Eades said. "When the manager said he thought we should change the way calls are handled, that's his prerogative."

Councilman Mark Nair said the changes are overdue. "We've needed to make changes for a long time. People talk about response times and lack of proper response," he said.

As for Childers' experience being the final push?

"When the boss of a thing doesn't get good customer service, how do we expect regular people to get good customer service?" Nair said.

And Childers' bag and briefcase he left on the third floor, where he said there were "marauding children" at the time?

"They were found on the first floor where kids obviously thinking they were being funny put them," Childers said.

Listen to the 911 call