There are situations where the line between emergency and non-emergency are vague, such as the OP's situation. It also depends on each person's personalities - what is an emergency to me may not be to someone else.

In such vague situations, if 911 is going to get me help in 10 minutes and the non-emergency in 3 hours, I think I'm probably going to call 911.

The OP involved a phone cal from an unknown person...,.not someone standing at the front door yelling stuff at them The correct response was followed. Info taken and a follow up made. I believe the operator would have asked the OP if they believed they were in immediate danger. If a real and immediate threat now exists then the Cops arrive code 3. There obviously was no such thing in this specific situation.

Used the non-emergency line once when I was at work.. Work at a call centre, customer didn't get what they wanted, so they threatened to drive by and shoot up our building (they knew the location)... So called up, gave non emerg the person's phone number and let them know our calls are recorded etc... Basically got a call from an officer 45min later telling me they were busy handling other shit...

^ really ? that's weird, I've worked at a few call centers part time when I was in high school, and I remember specifically every one of them had a policy that if there was any kind of threat against them they literally would shut down the whole center and evacuate as a precaution. That's why every agent is instructed clearly to NEVER tell the person on the phone the location of their center.


and lol @ seberry, ya call them tell'em there's a ricer outside revving his engine who doesn't have his front plate on and has tinted windows, they would have been on his ass within minutes!

Actually, that's why I called (except he did have front plates). Guy would always turn out his riced out Civic for like an hour and actually not go anywhere and turn it off after. It would always be right when my daughter was taking her afternoon nap so we called non-emergency. By the time they showed up, he already turned off the car and went in. However, he's stopped doing that 1 hour of revving his car cause I think I wasn't the only neighbour who complained.

The other thing I find really funny is that it'd take him like 2 or 3 minutes to parallel park in a huge parking spot and I just hear him revving it but moving very little. Sounds like someone who's not really good at driving a manual in low speeds. He'd go forward and back a few times while parking. Guess he didn't want to scratch his rims. It was annoying cause it's loud.

I actually used to have a Civic that was just as loud as his, but I would always be considerate around my neighbourhood and get in and out as fast as I can without any excessive idling or revving. Never had any complaints.