State Interop Is Focus of Security Directors

A survey of state-level homeland security directors found that interoperable communications is their #2 priority, behind only coordinating state and local security efforts. The results are in contrast to a survey of city mayor’s, whose wish list for public safety communications funding was less than two-thirds of one percent of their total needs. The National Governors’ Association (NGA) made the survey with a grant from FEMA, and 43 officials responded. The top five priorities remained the same for this fifth survey, and only the ordering of the issues changed. Besides coordination and communications, the officials identified protecting critical infrastructure, developing state-level intelligence and strengthening citizen preparedness. Interoperable communications was the top issue for the last three years, falling to second for the 2008 survey. “This shift likely is related to the statewide communications plans and investment justifications required as part of the 2007 Public Safety Interoperable Communications (PSIC) grant program,” the NGA explained. The survey found that 78% of respondents believe their interoperable communications structure had improved from the previous year, while 22% said it was the same. No official said communications were worse.

The difference in priorities between the state officials and local mayors might be explained by the range of duties each performs–state official have a more limited set of projects to accomplish, generally unaffected by citizen input or politics. Local mayors have a very wide range of projects that need funding, and must balance a wide variety of special interests, politics and voters.

The state homeland security officials said that challenges remain, and ranked almost all the survey options equally:

• technology – 87%
• standard operating procedures – 83%
• governance – 81%
• regularity of usage – 81%
• training and exercises – 78%

Download (pdf) a copy of the 2008 survey here.