Federal Interoperability Study

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RFsponge

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An article of interest from yesterday's Rocky Mountain News.

Metro area so-so on crisis communication
Fed survey evaluates emergency workers' ability to be in touch

By John Ensslin, Rocky Mountain News
January 3, 2007

The Denver area ranked in the middle of the pack in a new federal survey of how well emergency agencies are prepared to communicate with one another during a crisis.

The study by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security evaluated 75 U.S. metropolitan areas on a "tactical interoperability" scorecard.

The metro area, which includes emergency services in Denver and in Adams, Arapahoe, Boulder, Clear Creek, Douglas, Elbert, Gilpin and Jefferson counties, received a grade of about 75 percent for the standard operating procedures and use of interagency radio systems.

They got an "intermediate" grade of 50 percent on the issue of governance and how they interact with one another on matters such as decision-making, strategic plans and formal agreements.

That's a better grade than metro areas such as Baton Rouge, La.; Chicago; Cleveland; and American Samoa received.

Those areas had the worst grades in the survey.

But it's far less than what metro areas in Columbus, Ohio; Minneapolis-St. Paul; San Diego; Sioux Falls, S.D.; and Laramie County, Wyo., received.

George Epp, former Boulder County sheriff who now heads the state Division of Emergency Management, questioned the way the study looked at the governance issue.

"There's a considerable amount of arbitrariness to the grading system," Epp said Tuesday during a break from overseeing efforts to deliver emergency services to areas of southeast Colorado buried under last week's blizzard.

"It didn't take into account some factors that are unique to the region," he added, citing the area's long history of preference for local control.

However, the report gives an opening to state lawmakers who criticized the state Department of Local Affairs for ordering a $130 million radio system without adequately consulting with the cities the system aimed to link.

As recently as April 2006, at least half of the 800 agencies statewide were not linked up to a statewide radio system.

The situation has improved somewhat since then, Epp said.

"There's been a significant amount of progress made, not just in Denver but in Colorado, over the last five years," he said.

A new state law that requires agencies to file "interoperability" plans also will push them to improve, Epp said.

"That's going to be a strong incentive for people to work and plan together," he said.

Copyright 2007, Rocky Mountain News. All Rights Reserved.
 

Halfpint

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RFsponge said:
But it's far less than what metro areas in Columbus, Ohio; Minneapolis-St. Paul; San Diego; Sioux Falls, S.D.; and Laramie County, Wyo., received.
Interesting... Laramie County, Wyo!? {VB GRIN!}

George Epp, former Boulder County sheriff who now heads the state Division of Emergency Management, questioned the way the study looked at the governance issue.

"There's a considerable amount of arbitrariness to the grading system," Epp said Tuesday during a break from overseeing efforts to deliver emergency services to areas of southeast Colorado buried under last week's blizzard.

"It didn't take into account some factors that are unique to the region," he added, citing the area's long history of preference for local control.
Somehow I'm not surprised at Geo's `shorts in a knot' response. And... His remark about "factors unique to the region" and "preference for `local control'" are not the least bit unexpected given his stances on several other issues in the past. Oh, well... Like was said about TPRofB... "They don't `play' well with others."

Just an `Olde Fart's' 2¢ worth. {WAN GRIN!}
 

scanlist

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Interesting that Laramie County Wyoming (Cheyenne area) is ranked higher considering everyone in the county is on VHF except Cheyenne Fire which has this obsession with 800 MHz. Yet the metro area always get's criticized because of agencies not getting on the DTRS bandwagon that are EDACS or remain on VHF.

Seems that sales droids are pushing the old 800 MHz mandate BS again as shown in the Pueblo County press release earlier this week.

Phil.
 

rfburns

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Denver UA Report

Here's most of the Denver UA report with an interesting observation about migration to P-25.



The area’s estimated $100 million investment in Enhanced Digital Access Communications System equipment—some of it very recent—means this migration will take many years. In the interim, grant-funded subscriber equipment with a P25 mode for the M/A-COM systems is being purchased.

Does anyone know who the Communications Unit Leader was for the TICP Validation Exercise?

I'm sorry I couldn't get the formatting to come out exactly right.

The Denver Urban Area (UA) includes the core city and county of Denver as well as agencies from Adams, Arapahoe, Boulder, Clear Creek, Douglas, Elbert, Gilpin, and Jefferson counties. This UA is also known as the North Central Region.

Governance:


Intermediate Implementation
The Denver UA (established in July 2003) has created a communications subcommittee to make key decisions and recommendations on interoperability. The committee appears to be extremely active (bimonthly meetings) and most agencies in the UA participated in the Tactical Interoperable Communications Plan (TICP) process. Despite their regular activity, no formal charter binds the group with defined missions, responsibilities, and authorities. No additional steps have been taken to ensure that the work of the governing body is being actively adopted within the individual agencies and that agreements are put in place for agencies noted in the TICP. Leaders in the Denver UA appear to be making budget decisions based on the communications interoperability needs of the UA as a whole, but it is unclear whether their current approach to prioritize and sustain funding is sufficient to support their long-term interoperability goals (e.g., extending solutions to other jurisdictions). The Denver UA has completed the TICP; however, a strategic plan accepted by all stakeholders is not currently in place. The Denver UA developing a strategic plan would ensure that the area’s communications interoperability efforts are coordinated with the State’s initiatives.

Recommendations:
Create a formal regional governance board to manage regional multidiscipline and agency communications and coordinate with state interoperability efforts and plans relating to interoperability

Continue to recruit and sign-on additional participants (e.g., additional emergency medical services, and public support agencies such as transportation and utilities, schools, and nearby Department of Defense facilities) to the agreements

Develop and publish a regional strategic plan (e.g., vision, objectives, funding, procurement strategy) and obtain acceptance from all participants


Ensure coordination of the strategic plan, once developed, with the state’s plan



Enhance the regional interoperability funding strategy and methods to include additional long-term (e.g., 3 to 5 years) funding sources in line with interoperability goals



Ensure buy-in for standardizing distribution of information to participating agencies

Increase the level of leadership participation in state and local jurisdictions that are outside of the city and county of Denver and adjoining county agencies, specifically the leadership of the Consolidated Communications Network of Colorado (CCNC)

Standard Operating Procedures (SOP):

Established Implementation
The Denver UA has effectively used the TICP process to expand on existing interoperability procedures.

The SOPs are regional in scope and are actively disseminated to agencies participating in communications planning in the area, providing a solid basis for implementation across the area. The Denver TICP Urban/Metropolitan Area

Tactical Interoperable Communications Scorecards represented a collaborative effort with all agencies in the area and became the model upon which numerous other areas based their plans. Five training videos were also developed to help institutionalize regional procedures. This degree of training on SOPs indicates a strong commitment to ensuring SOPs adoption and should be considered a best practice. The UA has begun implementing National Incident Management
System (NIMS)/Incident Command System (ICS) command and control policies and procedures, the TICP validation exercise demonstrated significant issues (e.g., use of proper ICS terminology, confusion about who was in charge of the incident or where that person was) with these procedures and therefore more training is recommended.

Recommendations:








Distribute regional SOPs beyond the core city and county of Denver through training and exercise, and day-to-day usage


Ensure that interoperability materials (i.e., SOPs, training information) are being distributed from regional communications meetings to all of the jurisdictions’ first responders

Initiate basic and advanced training and exercises on SOPs (include communications unit implementation consistent with the TICP) to ensure that all participating first responder agencies attain and maintain NIMS/ICS compliance


Usage:








Established Implementation


The Denver UA regularly uses its two major shared systems, and the fixed gateway system is actively promoted and used weekly. Although some issues were encountered during the TICP validation exercise at the first responder level (e.g., radios for some agencies were not updated with appropriate channels, a radio
cache request to dispatch was not fulfilled), the After Action Report indicated a “broad and largely effective use of interagency communications capabilities identified in the TICP.” For example, gateway technicians demonstrated proficiency in setting up and using the gateways, and users on each of the shared systems were able to effectively communicate within the coverage area of their systems.

Recommendations:


Continue training and exercise of interagency communications to improve the ability of users to interoperate seamlessly with responders from other jurisdictions
•
Continue training on the fixed gateway system to improve familiarity with the capability
•
Consider adding communications interoperability as a component of all future exercises

Below is a summary of the area’s existing technology used to provide communications interoperability:

Technology Overview​

The City of Denver and a number of agencies, primarily along the Interstate 70 corridor, use proprietary M/A-COM 800 megahertz (MHz) radio systems that are interlinked through a StarGate™ system that allows seamless roaming of approved talk groups across these systems. The State of Colorado operates the CCNC, a Project 25 (P25)-based 800 MHz system that serves state agencies and a number of local agencies, primarily east of the Rocky Mountains. CCNC is slowly being expanded throughout the state. A M/A-COM NetworkFirst™ gateway provides limited connectivity between these regional systems. The area’s estimated $100 million investment in Enhanced Digital Access Communications System equipment—some of it very recent—means this migration will take many years. In the interim, grant-funded subscriber equipment with a P25 mode for the M/A-COM systems is being purchased.
 
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MMIC

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scanlist said:
Yet the metro area always get's criticized because of agencies not getting on the DTRS bandwagon that are EDACS or remain on VHF.

Phil, the reason that Laramie did well is because they excel at each of the evaluated areas, not simply because everyone is on VHF. MOST of the score is based on their poilcies, procedures, and education processes, while the systems in place has the smallest effect on the overall score. In fact, the scorecard does not give a lower score simply for having many different systems in place. If they haven't figured out how to make those systems be effective for interoperability - no matter whether they are all the same or all different, they will get a lower score.

If everyone in the Denver UASI area was on a common system, I would be willing to bet that the policies, procedures, and education processes would have been beefed up with the UASI grant funding and our score would have been higher.

Simply being on VHF doesn't make the world go more smoothly, and I don't know why everyone here thinks that way. It DOES NOT matter what band or brand, if EVERYONE is on the same system, interoperability will improve.
 

abqscan

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Hey MMIC, you might know the answer to this. Besides politics, why is that Denver, Aurora, Lakewood, and Westy/Arvada do not have a MAC Group set in their radios for each others systems. ie. Denver could switch to Aurora system but only to use the the MAC channels and thats it. I know they would all have to redo their LID's on every system to make it work properly. This seems a little cheaper vs. StarGate. =)
 

rfburns

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MMIC said:
while the systems in place has the smallest effect on the overall score.
The various UA's have all kinds of systems and mixes of systems and for the most part they have little to do with the scores. In one UA the fire department is on VHF A.M. Some UA's with high scores have the Mayor personally serving on the TICP. American Samoa didn't do well in Early Implementation partially because:


"Additionally, because the exercise was conducted in a mix of English and Samoan, and some documentation is in Samoan, outside responders may encounter a language barrier during a mutual aid response."


 

MMIC

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Well, StarGate has the advantage of acting like a Motorola SmartZone controller to allow communications on talk groups to go in between IMCs so that users on different systems can communicate with one another. EDACS users are using the Network First talk groups to interoperate with one another right now. StarGate would have been sufficient for the BLUE/RED/GOLD/GREY talk groups between EDACS users, but bringing in the DTRS and VHF users is why they went with Network First (plus they had $$). StarGate is still used for some roaming of certain talk groups between the systems, but the use of it is limited since Network First was implemented.
 

Scan-Denver

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MMIC said:
Well, StarGate has the advantage of acting like a Motorola SmartZone controller to allow communications on talk groups to go in between IMCs so that users on different systems can communicate with one another. EDACS users are using the Network First talk groups to interoperate with one another right now. StarGate would have been sufficient for the BLUE/RED/GOLD/GREY talk groups between EDACS users, but bringing in the DTRS and VHF users is why they went with Network First (plus they had $$). StarGate is still used for some roaming of certain talk groups between the systems, but the use of it is limited since Network First was implemented.
Scratch my post, didn't fully understand what I read the first time.
 
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