Upgrade of HPD radios may wait 5 years

[loumaag]

I mean do you think Harris County and Montgomery County will go to the Pro Voice system one day?

First, the Montgomery County system is already ProVoice capable.

STARNet is way too ingrained to change to the a MA-COM system at this stage.

As for the article, this same subject comes up whenever a reporter has nothing else to say. It has been hashed and rehashed several times in the last 5 years. It is interesting that Ms Ruiz first claims there is not direct connection then talks about gateways/patches and then says they are not instantaneous. Well I guess yes, both units desiring to talk have to change channels but I think they would have to do that in any case. HPD to SpecalOps (Ch 7) and a STARNet user to TG 6544 (didn't that used to be patched to CityWide Ch 5?).

It is not laziness, ineptitude, or expense. I am not an engineer, but I am a pretty good observer; notice that the largest metro areas here in the US do not use trunking systems for their regular Law Enf activity (4 of the top 4 and #5 is none too happy with their recent switch (Phoenix)). There probably is a pretty good reason for that and I think that Ms Ruiz and others of her ilk need to get out and do some real research for a story instead of column fill nonsense on slow news days.

 

[bpckty1]

"notice that the largest metro areas here in the US do not use trunking systems for their regular Law Enf activity (4 of the top 4 and #5 is none too happy with their recent switch (Phoenix)). There probably is a pretty good reason for that and I think that Ms Ruiz and others of her ilk need to get out and do some real research for a story instead of column fill nonsense on slow news days."

I tend to agree that dedicated single channel/repeater systems instead of talkgroups work better, especially in firefighting. Nothing like having a busy signal or being unable to connect with the repeater when calling for help. I have yet to hear of a "failsoft" on single channel systems, but have heard that repeaters or consoles do sometimes quit working ("Dispatch is using handheld radios and call slips are manual until further notice."), or there are software issues. Then again, there is the new, improved, HEC (Houston Emergency Center). ;^>

 

[mfn002]

As far as the issue at hand goes, HPD should keep it's conventional UHF system, but upgrade their equipment. Just because it's old doesn't mean it doesn't work. One limitation of the Sabers was that (from what I have heard) they could only take one squelch tone (which is why HPD has the same PL on all their channels). As a result, they couldn't communicate with other, UHF channels used by other agencies (such as HFD) because of the different PL tones. This, on top of the small number of channels available in the Sabers, makes them a great hinderance to interoperability (presently, to communicate with HFD, you need a second radio). Simply replacing these radios with newer ones (such as XTSs) would greatly improve the situation. The most important thing, in my opinion, is that HPD officers be able to communicate with HFD.

 

[bpckty1]

HPD does use 2 PLs. 123.0 on most radios, and 127.3 on IAH, because of an interference reason years ago. Many years ago, I did see a batwing handheld that had multiple PLs, but you had to manually dial the tone just like changing channels. Today, with the synthesized radios available, HPD could have different PLs for each frequency. So, programming HFD frequencies into the radios would be no problem. There may be problems, however with HFD having HPD frequencies because of certain legal issues regarding criminal history issues. (A rat hole and trail that doesn't need to be followed. And, don't get involved discussing HIPPA if HPD had HFD frequencies.) But, a dedicated common frequency, such as Citywide, should work.

 

[hiegtx]

HPD does use 2 PLs. 123.0 on most radios, and 127.3 on IAH, because of an interference reason years ago. Many years ago, I did see a batwing handheld that had multiple PLs, but you had to manually dial the tone just like changing channels. Today, with the synthesized radios available, HPD could have different PLs for each frequency. So, programming HFD frequencies into the radios would be no problem. There may be problems, however with HFD having HPD frequencies because of certain legal issues regarding criminal history issues. (A rat hole and trail that doesn't need to be followed. And, don't get involved discussing HIPPA if HPD had HFD frequencies.) But, a dedicated common frequency, such as Citywide, should work.

When Dallas Fire Rescue moved from their old Vhf-high channels up to Uhf, joining Dallas PD on that band, the fire units got the access to talk to the PD on the traffic division channel. for coordination at accidents, particularly freeways. However, the only PD unit you ever hear on the fire channels is Air One, the PD helo. Either the squad cars don't have reciprocal access, or else never use it. I suspect they don't have access, since they always ask their dispatcher to contact the FD when needed instead of making a channel switch themselves.

 

[rattlerbb01]

There may be problems, however with HFD having HPD frequencies because of certain legal issues regarding criminal history issues. (A rat hole and trail that doesn't need to be followed. And, don't get involved discussing HIPPA if HPD had HFD frequencies.) But, a dedicated common frequency, such as Citywide, should work.

I really don't see why that would be a problem down there. Just about every local agency I know has SO, PD, Fire and EMS channels around them programmed in. We regularly listen to the law enforcement. If there is no legal issue to the thousands of us listening in on HPD and HFD transmissions daily, then there certainly should be no hold back to the actual emergency personnel having access to each other's channels. And this is why an educated guess would support this: In a catasrophic event, some towers may fail. As many have noted, HPD's repeaters are not all centralized, but placed in locations to improve coverage to the area using them. HFD from all I have heard has a simulcast system, but I don't believe that all sites would fail. Lets say 8 of the 25 or so HPD/HFD repeaters fail citywide. Any repeater that remains functional in this catastrophe is now an extremely valuable tool for both agencies to work off of, regardless of prior use.

 

[bpckty1]

It's not so much the listening, but access to information that restricts how information, and probabaly interoperability could be accessed.

There was an interesting situation a few years ago with an area city that was allowing the FD and PD to use the same dispatcher. Not that big a problem, except the requirements for a law enforcement dispatcher are a bit more restrictive (criminal history inquiries, entry/warrant information/vehicle registrations/driver license checks, etc.) than those for a fire/ems dispatcher, and vice-versa. This oversight was quickly corrected. But, some cities, such as Houston, use different dispatchers who have different training requirements and may not be allowed to have access to any, partial, or full TLETS/NLETS information. This was mentioned during an in-service class, and it was stressed very strongly, that anyone using TLETS/NLETS must have been trained and gone through refresher training on a regular basis, or, the agency could suffer one or more sanctions, the worst being having their access removed. It's amazing how fast these training and certification issues are resolved.

As for the use of each other's frequencies, that would be a good idea, except the ever-present "My Turf" syndrome will need to be addressed by strong leadership at all levels of the local government.

 

[rattlerbb01]

When I worked for my local county jail several years ago, we were side by side in the control room with dispatchers. It is still like this today, and jailers will answer overflow calls, whether 911 or regular. If I recall, you have one year to get TLETS certified from the date of hire, but you can use the terminal until then as long as you follow regs. Of course, jailers didn't use the terminals, but they can and probably will have to get certified in the near future because they will be running their own CCH reports when our dispatch center moves (if it moves) to Navasota from Anderson.
Bigger cities just don't have these kind of issues though, and I respect HFDs requirement for dispatchers to be firefighters for years before operating a console. It really raises the quality of service because of a mutual understanding between the dispatcher and the fireground workers.