The state of New Mexico and the Los Angeles Regional Interoperable Communications System (LA-RICS) have received 90-day extensions to close out their public safety BTOP (Broadband Technology Opportunities Program) grants, the National Telecommunications and Information Administration said today. But NTIA said that New Mexico and LA-RICS and the other two public safety BTOP projects met today’s deadline for spending grant funds.
The four public safety BTOP projects are among five early builder projects that have partnered with the First Responder Network Authority (FirstNet) to provide early lessons ahead of the construction of a nationwide public safety broadband network. The fifth partner, the state of Texas of behalf of Harris County, which includes Houston, did not receive BTOP funds.
“Under NTIA’s existing authority, we have the ability to give projects that need it additional time to complete their projects and close out their awards,” an NTIA spokeswoman said. “Four projects will have until December 31, 2015 to use the grant money for expenditures that have already been obligated. Those projects are: LA-RICS, New Mexico, EAGLE-Net, and GovNet.”
EAGLE-Net is a non-public safety BTOP project in Colorado, while GovNet is a non-public safety BTOP project in Arizona.
“We have been working hard toward the 1 October deadline, and are very nearly complete,” New Mexico Chief Information Officer Darryl Ackley told TRDaily today. “We have … 6 LTE [sites] that are deployed or being finalized, as well as 1 COW [cell on wheels] that we have been using for demonstration projects.”
“Though the majority of the heavy lifting is done, this extension will allow us to close out the grant at a relaxed tempo relative to the sprint we have been making to date,” he added.
The project that that has experienced the most difficulties is the one overseen by LA-RICS.
LA-RICS construction was suspended in April after the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors and the Los Angeles City Council voted to halt LA-RICS construction of cell sites on government-owned land in their jurisdictions, including at fire and police stations (TRDaily, April 3). LA-RICS subsequently filed an amended plan for constructing the network and the suspension was lifted (TRDaily, May 1).
LA-RICS ran into fire union, politician, and community opposition to the siting of cell sites over health and aesthetic concerns. LA-RICS originally had planned to deploy 232 cell sites, but later reduced the number to 78 – 63 fixed sites and 15 COWs. One COW was removed from the network due to a technical issue with the California Highway Patrol, an LA-RICS spokesman said today.
“We have the coverage that we were hoping. We don’t necessarily have the building penetration or the capacity, but it’s a great starter system,” LA-RICS Executive Director Pat Mallon said in a statement. “In the event of emergency, the public safety responders will have connectivity. They will not be on a commercial system or dependent on a commercial system, which has proven to be unreliable during public emergencies for public safety use.”
During an IWCE Virtual Show 2016 webinar today, Fred Scalera, public safety broadband manager for the New Jersey Office of Homeland Security and Preparedness, said, “All of our sites are deployed, but we have not finished optimization.” The system includes 37 deployable units plus a Chevy Tahoe and a van.
He said that the optimization process was delayed by a few weeks due to the use of the network last weekend during Pope Francis’ visit to Philadelphia, when the system was deployed to support the Pennsylvania State Police.
“We got to do a lot of different things,” he said of the Philadelphia deployment. “No real emergencies happened, so we didn’t have to stress anything.”
About 1,200 uniformed members of the state police were deployed to Philadelphia to assist the U.S. Secret Service and the Philadelphia Police Department, according to Capt. William Williams, director of the agency’s Radio and Information Services Division. The agency used the New Jersey system to stream high-definition video from airborne craft to devices on the ground, he said. Commercial systems remained operational, he added. Capt. Williams expressed hope that greater use of the network could be employed next summer for the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia.
Walt Leslie, assistant director-technology for the Adams County, Colo., Communications Center (ADCOM 911), the fourth public safety BTOP project, said today that the 19-site network has been completed. He also said that NTIA conditionally approved a request by ADCOM 911 to expand the network to two neighboring communities by using legacy equipment, but that “FirstNet denied our request.”
“FirstNet looks forward to continue working with the projects to collect key learnings to help inform the development of a nationwide public safety broadband network,” FirstNet spokesman Ryan Oremland said today.
Also during today’s IWCE webinar, Vicki Lee, association manager for FirstNet and the liaison to FirstNet’s Public Safety Advisory Committee (PSAC), stressed that FirstNet expects a good response by today’s deadline from states on requested data collection.
“We anticipate that the mailbox will be blowing up today,” she said. She added that FirstNet also expects that “the data will continue to roll in as they get additional information.” Ms. Lee also noted that two more initial state consultations were held this week and that the final three are planned for later this year. Also, more than 130 representatives from 52 states and territories are registered for a second meeting of FirstNet state points of contact (SPOCs) next week, she said. The meeting is closed to the news media.
Maj. Diane Stackhouse, director of the Pennsylvania State Police’s Bureau of Communications and Information Services, said her agency will meet today’s deadline for submitting data. But she said additional data will be given to the governor to help assist in a decision about whether to opt-out of having FirstNet build the state’s radio access network (RAN). Maj. Stackhouse said that there were 73 agency responses representing 42 of the state’s 67 counties and 312 user responses representing 61 of the 67 counties. She also stressed the importance of a state plan showing how the network will be affordable for first responders. She also emphasized that it must include the cost to construct the network. Without such cost data, the 90-day clock for the governor to decide on the RAN deployment should not start, she said. Pennsylvania also needs control over priority and preemption, she said, adding that FirstNet should develop quality of service technical standards soon and should also establish a quality assurance program. – Paul Kirby, paul.kirby@wolterskluwer.com
Courtesy TRDaily