Current Issues in Public Safety Communications

The public safety communications community is always in the midst of tackling several issues, some past, some current and some future. Here's a quick run-down of those issues (in no particular order), and links to other pages on this Web site that discuss them more fully.

Implementing 911 Everywhere

Believe it or not, the 911 emergency number isn't available in every single county of the United States. Perhaps 150 counties don't have the number at all, and perhaps an equal number have only Basic 911 service, which doesn't transmit the location of the caller to the comm center. In most cases these counties don't have the funding to purchase the equipment to implement 911, or their local telephone service is ancient and won't support 911.

Comm Center Staffing

For about the past 10 years a large number of public safety comm centers across the country have suffered from an inability to recruit, train and retain qualified dispatchers. The shortage arose during the Web boom of the late 1990s, which created competition for the tech-minded, quick-witted applicants that comm centers needed because of an increasing reliance on computers and other technology. There have been many studies and proposed solutions, but there has been no relief. Many big-city comm centers operate at 60% staffing, requiring the employees to work mandatory overtime. In turn, this creates stress in the comm center, and increases the costs from overtime. Read more here.

Wireless 911 - Implementing & Location Reporting

Back in the early 1990s the increasing use of cellular phones required the public safety communications community to quickly work with the wireless industry to come up with a solution to the lack of location information when someone dialed 911. The FCC finally intervened to require carriers to transmit a caller's location during a 911 call, and mandated a two-phase approach. All but smaller carriers now provide locations using either GPS technology within the handset, or triangulation using the network. However, not every comm center in the U.S. has updated their equipment to receive the location data from carriers, either Phase I (the receiving tower location only) or Phase II (the caller's latitude and longitude). Read more here.

Next Generation 911 Networks

Since the first 911 systems in 1968, the nation's emergency telephone systems were implemented locally--either city-by-city or on a county basis. There are just a handful of 911 systems that are operated on a state level. This situation means that 911 systems are not interoperable, operate in different ways and are probably more expensive to operate and maintain. The wide-spread use of Internet-based communications protocols (IP) has given public safety the promise of vastly more capabilities, including the ability to inter-operate with other comm centers. This so-called Next Generation 911 (NG911) is in the very early planning stages, and it might take a decade to begin any type of significant deployment.

VoIP/911

About 15 years after solving the location problem created by wireless cellular communications, the increasing use of the Internet for voice calls (VoIP) has created a similar problem for public safety comm centers. Inherently, the Internet does not have a way of determing a user's location and transmitting that along with the data packets. As a result, by FCC rule the VoIP carriers must "hard code" registered users' locations into their system so it can be passed to PSAPs. Even so, there are still lots of problems and incident glitches. The Internet's best minds are working on how to upgrade the system to help solve this problem.

800 MHz Retuning

In 1990 several public safety agencies complained to the FCC about interference that affected the 800 MHz trunked radio systems. After an extensive investigation, their problems were traced to cellular transmitter sites, specifically those erected by Nextel. After considerable debate, Nextel co-founder Morgan O'Brien made a proposal: re-tune the entire 800 MHz band to eliminate interleaved frequency assignments--and in the process give Nextel some additional spectrum. The proposal was huge, expensive, controversial and seemingly a long-shot. But the FCC adopted most of what O'Brien proposed, and agencies are now still in the midst of a complicated, expensive, coordinated and sometimes contentious re-tuning effort.

Consolidations - Mergers

Virtually all comm centers were formed locally. But over time common sense and money have moved some local centers to combine, merge or consolidate, usually at a county level or at as part of a special district. Over the past 15 years the trend has accelerated as funding and interoperability (see below) have become major issues. Several states now limit the number of PSAPs within a county, usually as a way of standardizing and funding the state's 911 equipment funding. But many other agencies are mergering and consolidating to avoid the cost of funding equipment upgrades required by wireless cellular, VoIP/911 and other advanced--and required--technology.

Communications Interoperability

Before Sept. 11th, the "White channel" was a close as most fire departments came to interoperability. Afterwards, the "I" word became a commonly-used (and usually over-used) word to indicate that public safety agencies should be able to easily communications with each other on the radio. Now, hundreds of millions of dollars are being spent to upgrade communications systems so a city's agencies (police, fire, EMS, public works, etc.) can talk to one another, and cities/counties can communications with one another within a region. The efforts frequently focus on the technical issues as a solution, and don't include political, procedural and other aspects of interoperability. Usually, radio interoperability is a political problem, not a technological one.

In connection with interoperability, the Congress passed the Homeland Security Act of 2002, requiring the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to create a Office of Emergency Communications (OEC), and to develop a National Emergency Communications Plan (NECP). In July, 2008 the DHS published the plan, which outlines short and long-term goals, both technical and procedural, for maximizing communications among all levels and all localities of public safety agencies. The NECP sets milestones for achieving these goals, reaching out to 2013. Download (pdf) the NECP for more information.

Accessibility - Deaf and Blind

There is a fundamental need for 911 to be accessible to anyone who needs help, including those with sight or hearing disabilities. The FCC and U.S. Department of Justice have mandated this accessibility in various laws and regulations, and virtually every comm center make accomodations to handle these calls. But the challenges are always out there to handle new technologies, such as video relay services. The FCC is working steadily to compile rules on this. Comm centers upgrade their access capabilities when switch to new gear, but otherwise aren't actively pursuing this topic.

Ergonomics - Working Conditions

Perhaps you're old enough to remember comm centers built inside former World War II bomb shelters--no, really! For many comm centers, not much has changed. But working conditions have become an issue for a job position that is "chained" to a console for hours at a time, usually typing on a computer keyboard and dependent on a video display screen for information. The issues now are proper ergonomics, work breaks, lighting, air conditioning, proper seating and other health-related issues. But who has money to buy the proper gear?

Telematics

The public safety community is but one small part of the emergency management issue, and there are scores of federal and state-level agencies, and special interest groups who claim a part of it. And they are all working on their own projects to provide improvements to safety and health. The U.S. Department of Transportation is one of the most high-profile, hoping to make the highways safer through improved communications, including transmitting veicle telematics data directly to PSAPs. Of course, their efforts must be coordinated with the public safety community, and somehow integrated into all the other systems being contemplated by other agencies.

Spectrum Management

The FCC has been under pressure for 20 years to provide more spectrum for public safety, although not necessarily at the direct request of law enforcement, fire or EMS agencies. The earliest action was to allocate 24 MHz of spectrum in the 700 MHz back in 1997--it's still not in use because it's in the midst of UHF-TV frequencies being used until the conversion to digital TV in Feb. 2009. The most recent action involves the FCC's' attempt in Feb. 2008 to auction spectrum to a private company, which would build and operate a nationwide public safety wireless network, administered by a trust representing public safety agencies. But the spectrum didn't sell because no bidder met the minimum bid amount. In Sept. 2008 the FCC proposed auction rule changes that might encourage more bidders for another auction of the same frequencies some time in 2009, but by Oct. 2009 pessimism is still high that such an auction-private-trust arrangement will actually work, and several companies and groups have called for alternate, non-auction proposals to allocate the spectrum.

MLTS/PBX Locations

At the moment, most multi-line telephone systems, including PBXs, transmit only the telephone switch's location and telephone number when an extension dials 911. This creates the possibility that an extension telephone will not be accurately identified when someone uses it to dial 911. The exact location of the phone (building, floor, room, etc.) will not be displayed to the dispatcher, and the address (ALI) displayed to the dispatcher may be completely different from the location of the caller (different floor, building or even city). There have been several high-profile incidents involving PBX 911 calls, including a heart attack victim who didn't know his location, and a high-rise fire where victims could not be specifically located by the dispatchers. There is add-on technology that would transmit the extension's precise location, but it's expensive and takes on-going maintenance to maintain accuracy. Sixteen states have passed legislation to mandate installation of these solutions, with some exceptions. Download (pdf) the Illinois law here and a presentation at NENA's "9-1-1 Goes to Washington" 2009 conference.

Emergency Alerting

This topic is owned by several groups, because it potentially covers every device capable of receiving voice, text or data--and that's a lot of devices. In general, the nation's Emergency Alerting System (EAS) is being advanced to handle input from a wide variety of local, state and federal agencies, and output to voice messages, text (e-mail, SMS), highway signs, TV and AM/FM stations, pagers and many more devices. To improve the existing system, the EAS will be re-made using more modern methods of input and output, and also begin using a Common Alerting Protocol (CAP), which standardizes the necessary data elements of the alerts. Right now, the EAS-CAP Industry Group is working to create a final standard that specifies the data elements of an alert. Once that standard is adopted, companies and groups can begin design and manufacture the end-point devices that will generate, deliver and receive the alerts, which will eventually find their way into the commercial and consumer marketplace for deployment. Check the EAS-CAP group's work here (including the latest proposed standard here [pdf]) and FCC information on EAS here.

Narrowbanding

In work started in 1992 and known as "refarming" the spectrum below 512 MHz, the FCC has mandated that public safety agencies must adopt radio technology that uses more narrow channels. The first major public safety deadline is approaching in 2011. Currently, a channel assigned from the FCC is 25 kHz wide, originally intended to meet voice quality and signal strength needs. However, technology improvements now allow the same quality of voice and signal in a narrower sllice of the radio spectrum. To take advantage of this improved technology, and to increase the number of available channels, the FCC mandated certain "narrowbanding" of the public safety spectrum over a long period of time (10 years or more). The first move would be to 12.5 kHz channels (one-half the current bandwidth), and then to 6.25 kHz channels. In both cases, the transition would involve various transition steps for radio manufacturers, and for public safety agencies. For radio manufacturers, the FCC stopped certifying radio equipment unless it was capable of 12.5 kHz bandwidth in Feb. 1997. Next, the FCC stopped certifying radio equipment unless it was capable of 6.25 kHz bandwidth in Jan. 2005 (although this deadline was later delayed). For public safety agencies, on Jan. 1, 2011 the FCC will no longer accept new system applications or system modifications unless they operate on 12.5 kHz channels or narrower. On Jan. 1, 2013 all public safety licensees must be operating on 12.5 kHz channels. Download (pdf) an explanation from IMSA, or a tech brief from NPSTC.