The Phoenix Police Department is rolling out a new AI-powered call triage system for the department’s non-emergency (Crime Stop) phone number. This cutting-edge technology will improve service, reduce wait times and help ensure that emergency calls receive priority attention.
Starting August 13, 2025, when community members call the non-emergency line, they will now be greeted by a conversational AI system capable of speaking 36 languages.
The languages included are: Arabic, Italian, Russian, Armenian, Japanese, Serbo–Croatian, Bengali, Korean, Sinhala, Cantonese, Laotian, Somali, Croatian, Malay-(Latin), Spanish, English, Mandarin, Tamil, French, Pashto, Telugu, German, Persian, Thai, Greek, Polish, Turkish, Gujarati, Portuguese, Ukrainian, Hebrew, Punjabi, Urdu, Hindi, Romanian, and Vietnamese
The system will then ask a few simple questions to determine the purpose of the call and will automatically direct the caller to the right resource.
Depending on the situation, the system may transfer callers to various City and community resources such as Phoenix PD’s Online Reporting portal, Silent Witness, public records requests, PHX C.A.R.E.S. and myPHX311, Arizona Humane Society and Arizona Department of Transportation. Callers could also be transferred directly to information on identity theft, food assistance, fireworks, landlord-tenant rights, court information, jail inmate lookup or the barking dog hotline.
“The goal of the system is to get the citizens the help that they need faster and more efficiently, too,” said Phoenix PD Communications Administrator Allie Edwards. “It's also going to free up the call takers to take that emergency and the non-emergency calls that they need to triage and then send to an officer in the field.”
For example, if a caller reports a vehicle break-in, the AI will determine if the report can be completed online. In those cases, the caller will receive a text message link to the online portal. If an officer is needed, the call will be routed directly to a Communications Operator for dispatch entry.
By automating routine non-emergency calls, the department can provide faster service to residents while enabling police operators to focus on urgent situations.
