bballdawg84
Member
2017 according to press conference yesterday. I hope 2019. Regardless the fight is now on as to encryption before the system comes online.
Norristown police first recipient of new Montgomery County emergency radios
MontCo upgrades
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2017 according to press conference yesterday. I hope 2019. Regardless the fight is now on as to encryption before the system comes online.
Norristown police first recipient of new Montgomery County emergency radios
Stormfax
Member
That's about the third date in the last 6 months that we've been given. Our PD and Fire has new vehicles in service for about 3-4 months without radios.......
If it was going to be that soon, the county wouldn't be dropping a **** ton of money to flash yet again , the current xts/XTL radios currently on the system and companies and departments who accept the flash to keep them in service , sign a waiver that states they will NOT sell their current radios for at least another three year.
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This email came a few weeks ago , but I do not fully expect the system to come 100% online by 2017. Unless they plan to have some sort of crazy mix mode phase 2 and phase 1 setup for a few years, some encrypted and some not, 1000 different radio templates, multiple zones of new and old ......
But it is interesting to see how much this encryption BS is going to cost the county ( IE taxpayers) because of the delay .....
"Radio System Update
The Department of Public Safety will begin releasing the new radios purchased under the one-time bulk purchasing agreement to police departments in August. Fire companies can expect delivery later in the fall.
The process of building templates and programming radios was delayed until the final decision regarding encryption of police channels was reached.
Under the contract with Motorola, the warranties on those radios will start to run as of August 31st.
Because of the delay, the County will pay for covered repairs during the lag-time between when the warranty begins and when any agency receives delivery of its radios. For example, a fire company receives delivery of its radios on Oct. 2, 2016 and has purchased the extended three-year warranty. If one of those radios breaks between Aug. 31st and Oct. 2nd, 2019 and the repairs would have been covered by the warranty, the County will pay to have that radio repaired.
In the next few weeks, fire companies will receive in the mail a list of the inventory of new and existing radios it has according to the County’s database. Each company will need to assign an ID (also known as an alias) to each new radio and each existing radio it wishes to keep in service and which existing radios will be coming off of the system.
It is important to note that fire companies should plan to take an old radio out of service for each new radio that is going into service. There will be exceptions to that. For example, if a fire company purchases an additional apparatus and needs additional radios for the added seats or a fire company is taking all of its old radios out of service and has purchased an equal number of new radios plus several additional radios.
The reason for that is two-fold.
1. The County has to purchase a license from Motorola for every radio that operates on the system, similar to how consumers purchase a license from Microsoft to use that company’s operating system on their home computer.
2. It costs approximately $800 per radio to flash and reprogram existing radios that are being retained for them to function on the new system through 2019. Montgomery County has decided to pay that cost.
While existing radios that are decommissioned will no longer work on the County radio system, they can be retained for use on Fireground and Local Channels.
For existing radios that are flashed and reprogrammed to work on the new system, agencies will be required to sign a commitment to not sell those radios prior to 2019 unless they reimburse Montgomery County for the $800 cost associated with upgrading the radio."
But it is interesting to see how much this encryption BS is going to cost the county ( IE taxpayers) because of the delay .....
"Radio System Update
The Department of Public Safety will begin releasing the new radios purchased under the one-time bulk purchasing agreement to police departments in August. Fire companies can expect delivery later in the fall.
The process of building templates and programming radios was delayed until the final decision regarding encryption of police channels was reached.
Under the contract with Motorola, the warranties on those radios will start to run as of August 31st.
Because of the delay, the County will pay for covered repairs during the lag-time between when the warranty begins and when any agency receives delivery of its radios. For example, a fire company receives delivery of its radios on Oct. 2, 2016 and has purchased the extended three-year warranty. If one of those radios breaks between Aug. 31st and Oct. 2nd, 2019 and the repairs would have been covered by the warranty, the County will pay to have that radio repaired.
In the next few weeks, fire companies will receive in the mail a list of the inventory of new and existing radios it has according to the County’s database. Each company will need to assign an ID (also known as an alias) to each new radio and each existing radio it wishes to keep in service and which existing radios will be coming off of the system.
It is important to note that fire companies should plan to take an old radio out of service for each new radio that is going into service. There will be exceptions to that. For example, if a fire company purchases an additional apparatus and needs additional radios for the added seats or a fire company is taking all of its old radios out of service and has purchased an equal number of new radios plus several additional radios.
The reason for that is two-fold.
1. The County has to purchase a license from Motorola for every radio that operates on the system, similar to how consumers purchase a license from Microsoft to use that company’s operating system on their home computer.
2. It costs approximately $800 per radio to flash and reprogram existing radios that are being retained for them to function on the new system through 2019. Montgomery County has decided to pay that cost.
While existing radios that are decommissioned will no longer work on the County radio system, they can be retained for use on Fireground and Local Channels.
For existing radios that are flashed and reprogrammed to work on the new system, agencies will be required to sign a commitment to not sell those radios prior to 2019 unless they reimburse Montgomery County for the $800 cost associated with upgrading the radio."
Stormfax
Member
"$800 per radio to flash and reprogram existing radios..."
Wow! Do you get a free EpiPen® with each one?
Wow! Do you get a free EpiPen® with each one?
bballdawg84
Member
Do we know if the commissioners actually voted on this or was this a creation of the police chiefs and Montgomery County just acquiesced.
They expected no stink to be made by the broadcast stations?
bballdawg84
Member
And a scanner transmission it was, on the hit and run arrest...
Of course, this all runs counter to the MontCo narrative that scanner hobbyists are criminals, misfits and societal deviants... lol
Schwenksville man charged with striking Philly police sergeant while driving drunk
Stormfax
Member
The next time there's a natural disaster, local law enforcement might wish there were media and emergency management personnel monitoring scanner activity. But, then again, I'm old-fashioned and part of a generation that respected law and order and authority. Good luck out there!
I mentioned something like this a few weeks back. It will happen again and when someone dies because of encryption, the media will force a policy change that the commissioners are afraid to do.
royldean
Member
This was not a act of legislation by the Commissioners. This was a unilateral decision made by DPS, based on a request by the county's association of police chiefs. I contacted all police chiefs in the PD-2 group (my region) and about 3/4's of them responded that they were in favor of the encryption (duh).
I will plead again, with everybody, please plan on attending the 9/15 meeting. If you cannot attend, please feel free to PM me with your name, town that you live in (Montco only, please), and a brief message of anything you would like the commissioners to know. The story linked above is classic, as it even shows that the perp was a Montco resident.
I encourage everybody to pitch in and help prepare a statement that I will happily present.... We need more names attached to this.
--Roy
[edit] Just remembered I've got training on 9/15. I WILL attend the Oct 6th meeting, however. Still encourage somebody (everybody) to attend the sept meeting.
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Stormfax
Member
As is the case in some municipalities across the nation, certain "favored" media outlets may be permitted to purchase an unencrypted radio receiver from the local law enforcement agency for use in their newsrooms.
Meanwhile, serfs need to understand that public scrutiny and accountability is not permitted in a fiefdom.
bballdawg84
Member
Bucks County had ,I believe, three commissions look into encryption. I do not know the make up the commission but I would optimistically assume that at least one press outlet was represented.
What gall, that the DPS and Chiefs could, basically keep this under the radar, then switchover and leave folks and the press (in a top 5 media market no less) scratching their heads as to what happened to the transmissions. From perusing Facebook it appears people in the DPS community are indignant that any blow back has started to occurred.
What gall, that the DPS and Chiefs could, basically keep this under the radar, then switchover and leave folks and the press (in a top 5 media market no less) scratching their heads as to what happened to the transmissions. From perusing Facebook it appears people in the DPS community are indignant that any blow back has started to occurred.
Stormfax
Member
Federal lack of transparency has trickled, no...oozed, down to the state and local level.
Email sent today stating that they are ceasing any further deployment of portable radios due to a problem with some of them will "arbitrarily shut off with no alert or notification of such; this is of great concern and is a grievous officer safety issue "
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Just heard about this myself. Wonderful - let's drag this out even further. I have gear that I've been delaying purchasing parts for in anticipation of receiving the new radios. With this news, I have to think we'll be lucky to see anything before next summer.
I haven't seen any complaints of issues like this over in Batlabs, so I have to wonder if it is related to the county's particular programming images.
We have new PD cars and new fire apparatus without mobile radios.
I've searched and only found one post on .p25 about this.
I have had an apx 6k deployed for about a year with no issues.
They didn't specify if these particular radios were 4k's or 6k's.
After all that chest thumping and bragging they did with those press releases, the media should get ahold of this and ask WTF over.
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I also think you are going to see municipalities ceasing their payments until they have a product in hand. I know I will be pushing for mine to do so. We had a tax increase to pay for this , and already paid short of 20K and have nothing to show for it. I'm beginning to think this was just a R&D investment at this point......
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