Westchester County's New Fire/EMS Radio System Delayed

[x635 4,066]

Battle for airwaves delays emergency radio upgrade

By KEITH EDDINGS 

THE JOURNAL NEWS 

(Original publication: May 20, 2004)

WHITE PLAINS — A $15 million upgrade of the radio systems that serve emergency responders in Westchester won't work on the airwaves the county was assigned because of interference from other emergency channels in New York City and New Jersey, delaying the upgrade in parts of Westchester for up to six months, county officials say. 

The new system is intended to eliminate the kind of chaos on the air that results when police, fire and other emergency responders using different channels are unable to communicate with each other at major events, as occurred during the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attack at the World Trade Center. 

In Westchester, the new emergency communication system will use about a dozen channels to link local fire departments, medical response teams, hospitals and the county's bus fleet during major emergencies. The system was scheduled to begin working by the middle of next year, but the effort stalled when consultants from Motorola found "all kinds of interference" on the frequencies that the Federal Communications Commission assigned to the system, said Norman Jacknis, the county's information technology czar. 

"Whether it's New York City stepping on the frequencies, or (the frequencies) shouldn't have been assigned (to Westchester) to begin with, is an interesting question," Jacknis said. "As a practical matter, it means that in some areas of the county, those frequencies aren't usable." 

The county appealed to the FCC earlier this year, which said no other frequencies were available and suggested that the county ask New York City to surrender or share some of the nearly 600 frequencies that the city has been assigned, including many it doesn't use, Jacknis said. Those talks, which have included at least one conversation between County Executive Andrew Spano and Mayor Michael Bloomberg, still are going on, Jacknis said. In the meantime, Jacknis recently met with FCC officials in Washington, D.C., to get the agency to sign off on any agreement struck with the city. 

Jacknis said he is hopeful the city will cooperate, given the number of resources it has in Westchester that the county helps to protect. 

"We have their water supply here. Indian Point. We have a variety of things that closely tie New York City and Westchester," Jacknis said. "It's in their interest that our public safety resources can operate effectively and, considering the number of frequencies they have, this is a small amount to ensure that we're taking care of their stuff as well as our own." The county needs 12 channels to make the system operate, Jacknis said. 

John Werbell, a spokesman for the city's Department of Information Technology, could not be reached. 

The new system will give all of the responders in Westchester access to the same airwaves, which would be apportioned and administered by the county. The county bus fleet also would be included in the system so it could help carry out an evacuation, and major hospitals also will be given radios. The system will complement local radio systems, not replace them. 

Bringing the bus fleet into the system secured about $8 million in federal aid, cutting the county's cost to $7.8 million. The county cost will be paid for largely by the 30-cent surcharge that county legislators placed on monthly cell phone bills in January 2003, which is expected to generate $1.4 million annually. 

Westchester hopes to get part of the system up by late next year, but Jacknis said full implementation will be delayed for three to six months while the county searches for the new frequencies. 

Westchester Emergency Services Commissioner Tony Sutton said the system will be worth the wait. 

"It's disappointing, but we're trying to keep our eye on the ball," Sutton said. "We want a system that works, and we want clean frequencies. If it takes a little longer to do that, that's what we want to do." 

Putnam County already has a single frequency that allows emergency responders across the county to communicate with each other, said Robert McMahon, the county's commissioner of emergency responders. McMahon said the simpler system, which uses repeaters on hilltop towers to pick up and rebroadcast the signal to commanders across the county, is adequate for Putnam because it has many fewer police, fire and emergency medical responders than Westchester. 

In a related development, Westchester County Executive Andrew Spano and Assemblyman Richard Brodsky, both Democrats, issued a joint statement yesterday urging the GOP-run state Senate and Republican Gov. George Pataki to support a bill that would require nuclear energy companies — including Entergy Nuclear Northeast, which owns Indian Point — to pay the cost of developing plans for evacuating communities around nuclear plants in the event of an accident or attack. The bill, which was drafted by Brodsky and Sen. Thomas Morahan, R-New City, has passed the Assembly each of the past two years but has not advanced in the Senate. 

Entergy now pays $550,000 annually to help the state and the counties around Indian Point develop the evacuation plans, including $412,500 that goes to Westchester. Mark Hanson, a spokesman for Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno, R-Rensselaer County, said the Senate supports a measure that would allow localities to increase the fee to $950,000. 

Westchester spends about $4.6 million annually to maintain its evacuation plan, Spano said. 

[TRUCK6018 50]

Hmmm, it was told at a meeting last night that the radio's are due to be installed in apparatus at year's end.

[x635 4,066]

Argh, the more and more I hear about this new system, the more I am dissapointed by it.

The system will complement local radio systems, not replace them. 

Define "complement"? How will it do that?

So, somebody may have heard more/differently than me, but the jist I am getting from all of this, is that this will be a supplemental type system and in no way alleviate the problems and situations encountered using the current system, which includes 46.26 and several very different systems used by different agencies.

Ugh. A quote from today's Newsday about a different situations applies here. Useless radios bought by useless beaurocrats.

A UHF repeater system...with seperate dispatch, operations, and fireground frequencies as has been discussed previously on this board would have not only been much simpler in operations all around, but much cheaper as well. And compatible with a lot of the current systems that are out there now, which would only need a simple upgrade. I'm glad the citizens of Westchester have money to burn for some fancy uneccasary system.

Hey, County legislators AND IT department, over here, we're the ones who use the current system and will use the future system!!!

Since there is little information about what this sytem is or how it will work made availabe to us, the end users of the product, I guess we will just have to wait and see.

[mikeinet 37]

There's going to be a whole story about this on News Channel 4 tonight @ 11 -- seems to be the 'lead story' - they have video footage of 60ctl's dispatch center too.

[Guest alsfirefighter]

Does this really surprise anyone?

Is there anyone who really thinks this particular system is 1. the right choice 2. gonna work without any problems.

LOL. sitting here waiting on channel 4, and its next after these commercials.

[RWC130 594]

"Complement Local Radio Systems"

That is one hell of an expensive complement. LOL