Nearly $1 Billion To States And Cities To Fix Communications Problems

[scannerboy02]

The government announced Wednesday it will distribute nearly $1 billion to states and cities to fix communications problems that still plague police and fire departments six years after the Sept. 11 terror attacks.

The biggest state recipients are California with $94 million, Texas with $65 million, and New York with $61 million.

In certain states, chunks will be specifically set aside for major cities: New York City will get $34.8 million and the Los Angeles/Long Beach area was awarded $22.3 million. Other cities getting specific amounts were: San Francisco Bay area, $14.5 million; Chicago, $16.2 million; Houston, $14.6 million; Jersey City-Newark, $17.5 million; and Washington, $11.9 million.

A total of $968 million for interoperable communications grants was announced Wednesday by the heads of the departments of Homeland Security and Commerce, after a review earlier this year found that of 75 major U.S. cities, only six received a top grade in emergency communications.

The money, said Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez, will answer "the urgent need for firefighters, police, and other first responders to be able to communicate effectively with one another."

Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said the money should get the entire country up to a basic standard of effective emergency communication by 2009 - but only if the local authorities coordinate with each other and avoid turf fights.

"That's not something the federal government can make people do," said Chertoff. "We can put the tools on the table, but the training and the willpower to use the tools has to rest with state and local officials."

Congress provided the money in a 2005 bill, seeking to address lingering radio problems exposed when hijacked airliners struck the World Trade Center in New York in 2001.

In that chaotic, fast-moving crisis, many firefighters could not hear important radio messages - including orders to evacuate before the second World Trade Center tower collapsed. Police officers' radios generally worked better, but they had little effective communication with firefighters.

Such flaws were evident again in 2005 when Hurricane Katrina knocked out many local rescue workers' communications systems.

Since then, Chertoff and others have insisted that agencies need to end any so-called "battle of the badge" rivalries that historically exist between some departments, and, where needed, adopt new technology to handle a natural or man-made disaster.

[karldotcom]

Mayor Villarsalinas and the County are already grumbling they are being left out....not that they have finished their plan....they pushed it another 9 months.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la...1,127798.story

[ScannerDude244]

Originally Posted by karldotcom

Mayor Villarsalinas and the County are already grumbling they are being left out....not that they have finished their plan....they pushed it another 9 months.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la...1,127798.story

Man that sucks they need the money bad down there!

The Monterey County Joint Gang Task Force is slated to receive $1 million in federal funds, U.S. Rep. Sam Farr, D-Carmel, announced Thursday.

http://www.californianonline.com/app...=2007707130302

How long does it take to get this money? Sam Farr also got money for the fire dep's to replace all their communication equipment last year,but I haven't heard any departments get any new stuff.

[karldotcom]

I dont know how many more new mobile command posts the City /County need...they seem to have done pretty well for themselves the past five years.

The problem with LA is that everyone is competing and no one is cooperating.

[mikepdx]

Nearly $1 Billion To States And Cities To Fix Communications Problems?

It would be better spent BRIBING local officials
to stop thinking about themselves and their careers
and actually COOPERATE with one another for the public good!

[gusbuster1217]

Originally Posted by mikepdx

Nearly $1 Billion To States And Cities To Fix Communications Problems?

It would be better spent BRIBING local officials
to stop thinking about themselves and their careers
and actually COOPERATE with one another for the public good!

That will never happen in our lifetime

[karldotcom]

Some details appear in SF Gate. (Note: This is why the LA Times is worthless....they dont include links for people to get to the details of their stories)

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-San Francisco, said the award would allow the Bay Area to move forward with "improvements in the interoperability of our first responder communications equipment, protection of critical infrastructure including bridges and mass transit, a terrorism early warning system, and other essential security projects."

But Bay Area officials were disappointed with a separate $14.5 million grant that the federal government awarded Wednesday for emergency communications systems.

Laura Phillips, who directs San Francisco's Department of Emergency Management, said she had expected the region to garner perhaps $100 million of a $968 million national pool to try to resolve problems that far-flung police and rescue agencies in the Bay Area have talking to each other.

http://www.dhs.gov/xlibrary/assets/g...local_fy07.pdf DHS grant document

[karldotcom]

The problem is there is a leadership vacuum in all of LA County, and since they just overturned term limits this week, it wont be getting better anytime soon. Someone should point out to the Mayor that his little amnesty protests drained the city treasury with tons of overtime costs for the LAPD, LAFD, and DOT. These grants are for infrastructure upgrades, not payroll.

Plus, I have no doubt that the city and county filled out the appopriate requests wrong, the same way they filled out all the Highway appropriations funding incorrectly and complained when they didnt receive any of the Dept of Transportation funding.

When that gunman shot up LAX July 4, 2002, everyone denied it was terrorism related....until a year later the FBI said, oh yeah, it was terror related....and by the way, buried even deeper in the report, a RAND study predicted the most likely target was the El Al Counter in the Bradley Terminal....and it was never acted on (except by El Al)


>>>>Villaraigosa said he told Chertoff, who is scheduled to come to Los Angeles on Friday, that the inconsistent stream of funding puts the city at increased risk.

Since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks in New York, the Washington, D.C., area and Pennsylvania, the LAPD's counterterrorism division has arrested 250 people in what it classifies as terrorism-related disruptions ranging from marriage fraud to gun running.

There are currently 50 open terrorism-related investigations, compared with only seven last year.

But the division remains short of money and Bratton has called on the City Council to fund 44 new analysts and officers.

"They are reporting the highest level of threat in six years," he said. "To cut back, it doesn't make sense."

[zz0468]

I'm left shaking my head in wonder... how will $1 billion help fix the politics that are the root of nearly all interoperable communications issues? The problems aren't technical so much as they are politics and organization. Another billion to be spent on toys that won't solve the real problems. Oh well...

[trooperdude]

You need a billion $$$ to link CAD systems, put JPS WAIS' in hilltop radio vaults, and have a microwave self-healing ring ?

Everybody keeps their own current political radio system silos, but can talk to each other if TSHTF.

Not everybody needs a region-wide multi-county 700mhz smart trunk $ystem and
$500K RV's with antennas.

[karldotcom]

"


"Well our rig can get qualifiying from Dover Speedway!"

[trooperdude]

Good lord.

Looks like a ham convention at Dayton without the duct tape.