The St. Pauls Emergency Services Committee has work for about two years to get St. Pauls established with the state as a primary answering point for all 911 calls, rather than have those calls routed to Lumberton and emergency responders dispatched from there.

St. Pauls has done everything asked to get that designation, including purchasing equipment costing $77,000, and the state seems willing to make that designation, but the County has so far refused to release the town from its central jurisdiction/command by signing off on that designation. Local emergency responders are hearing horror tales of ambulances dispatched to the wrong addresses, to long periods after a 911 call is made before those ambulances are even dispatched. The St. Pauls EMS Committee is now weighing its options as to how to get St. Pauls designated as a PSAP (Primary Service Answering Point)so that all 911 calls made from St. Pauls can be dispatched from St. Pauls.