I took a trip to to Butte County (Oroville). I have an outdoor VHF/UHF antenna on a family house there with a good view of the valley (unfortunately, no internet at the house to set up a remote scanner).
Some observations below from my public safety scanning, which I will work on submitting to the database.
For background, when I travel (and even at home), I like to program all the state and local government FB2 repeaters I find via the FCC view all licenses tool here on RadioReference. Easy to do with the RadioReference FCC feature, copy+paste, and some editing in Google Sheets. I then program them into my scanner via Sentinel in tone search mode, so that I can find any tones or NACs being used that are different than what's in the RRDB (some examples below with Oroville Police and Sutter County Sheriff).
Butte County
Butte Regional Interoperable Radio Communications System (BRICS):
Talkgroup 15 (which I had submitted when I found it originally) is no longer active. Sheriff Ch. 1 is now on talkgroup 1001. Most traffic is still over VHF, but a small amount of radios were talking on the trunking system. Traffic was simulcast on both (VHF->BRICS; BRICS->VHF).
Allied Dispatching?
I believe Paradise PD officers are being dispatched during the overnight hours by Butte County Sheriff dispatchers on the BCSO MAIN repeater (154.725 107.2 PL). The dispatcher will broadcast a call in Paradise, and a "Paradise Paul" unit will come up and take the call. During the daytime, the Paradise PD repeater (155.715 100.0 PL) is active, and I assume Paradise PD dispatchers are sending calls. Please let me know if I'm incorrect with this.
I thought I read somewhere that Gridley PD was to start getting dispatched by Oroville PD during the overnight hours at some point. Not sure if that ever started or is going to happen.
State Parks, Bloomer Repeater:
Someone is broadcasting music intermittently at night on the DPR BLOOMER repeater 857.9375 125 DPL. They will key up with different songs, usually after 9PM or 10PM, at different intervals. No one seems to notice or care except for one time someone, I believe the NORCOM dispatcher, came up and said "open mic on Bloomer."
City of Oroville:
Oroville Police Dept. appears to be running mixed mode on their 154.785 repeater. Their day-to-day operations are still on the 154.785, 411 DPL, but some officers (maybe detectives) are talking in P25 digital. It's the same frequency, 154.785, with a 765 NAC (which is different than what's in the database). The officer will talk on P25 digital, but the dispatcher always responds via analog. The field officers seem to be able to hear both the analog and digital traffic without changing knob positions (I could be wrong, but I believe that's an option in professional radios, the ability to program an analog and digital code on the same knob/channel selector position for receive).
I don't know the use, but there's a repeater licensed to the City of Oroville at 159.165 131.8 PL. I heard little to no traffic to confirm it's use. I have it in some of my old notes possibly as their public works channel.
Fun fact: When broadcasting on the Oroville PD repeater, the dispatcher seems to be using a direct link (i.e. fiber, microwave, or telco) to go out on the repeater. When talking on Oroville FD1, they talk on the input frequency to go out on the repeater (i.e., just like how the mobiles do). I'm not sure the reason for the different methods.
City of Chico:
Everything is the same as in the database, but I see some FCC licenses for some repeater pairs that aren't in the database. I heard no traffic while I was visiting (although Chico doesn't come in too strong due to Table Mountain blocking point-of-view). But worth monitoring to see if they're being used: Repeater 1, 153.845; Repeater 2, 154.830.
Sutter County
Sutter County Sheriff:
Sutter County Sheriff's Office is running mixed-mode on their 460.225 dispatch repeater. Their day-to-day operations are still on the 460.225 210.7 PL, but the officers and dispatcher now have the option to switch to a P25 digital encrypted version at 460.225, 83B NAC when needed. They refer to this as "go to Secure." They seem to use the encrypted version when running sensitive communications, records checks, and BOLOs with actual persons named. It seems to be more of a protocol thing depending on WHAT will be broadcast. For example, the officer will ask for a records check on analog, the dispatcher acknowledge in analog, the officer will give the information using analog, and the dispatcher will give the returns using digital encryption. In other cases, the officer will give the information using digital encryption, but if nothing returns, the dispatcher will respond "no returns" via analog. Same as earlier, all radios seem to hear all traffic whether it's analog or digital (encrypted) without having to change knob positions.
Yuba City Police:
Similar to Sutter County Sheriff, Yuba City Police Dept. is running mixed mode on their 460.350 dispatch repeater. Their day-to-day operations are still on 460.350 155 DPL, but they have a P25 digital encryption option on 460.350 293 NAC (already in the database, just not marked as encrypted). Also seems to be a protocol use type thing depending on WHAT is being broadcast, like when broadcasting sensitive communications, records checks and BOLOs with actual persons named. Same as above, all radios seem to hear all traffic whether it's analog or digital (encrypted) without having to change knob positions.
Yuba County
Marysville Police:
Marysville Police Dept. is still using their 460.400 192.8 PL dispatch repeater for day-to-day operations. HOWEVER, I found they have a second repeater at 453.5125 173.8 PL referred to as "Tac" by the dispatcher. They were using this for routine dispatching for a day this past week.
Happy scanning!
Some observations below from my public safety scanning, which I will work on submitting to the database.
For background, when I travel (and even at home), I like to program all the state and local government FB2 repeaters I find via the FCC view all licenses tool here on RadioReference. Easy to do with the RadioReference FCC feature, copy+paste, and some editing in Google Sheets. I then program them into my scanner via Sentinel in tone search mode, so that I can find any tones or NACs being used that are different than what's in the RRDB (some examples below with Oroville Police and Sutter County Sheriff).
Butte County
Butte Regional Interoperable Radio Communications System (BRICS):
Talkgroup 15 (which I had submitted when I found it originally) is no longer active. Sheriff Ch. 1 is now on talkgroup 1001. Most traffic is still over VHF, but a small amount of radios were talking on the trunking system. Traffic was simulcast on both (VHF->BRICS; BRICS->VHF).
Allied Dispatching?
I believe Paradise PD officers are being dispatched during the overnight hours by Butte County Sheriff dispatchers on the BCSO MAIN repeater (154.725 107.2 PL). The dispatcher will broadcast a call in Paradise, and a "Paradise Paul" unit will come up and take the call. During the daytime, the Paradise PD repeater (155.715 100.0 PL) is active, and I assume Paradise PD dispatchers are sending calls. Please let me know if I'm incorrect with this.
I thought I read somewhere that Gridley PD was to start getting dispatched by Oroville PD during the overnight hours at some point. Not sure if that ever started or is going to happen.
State Parks, Bloomer Repeater:
Someone is broadcasting music intermittently at night on the DPR BLOOMER repeater 857.9375 125 DPL. They will key up with different songs, usually after 9PM or 10PM, at different intervals. No one seems to notice or care except for one time someone, I believe the NORCOM dispatcher, came up and said "open mic on Bloomer."
City of Oroville:
Oroville Police Dept. appears to be running mixed mode on their 154.785 repeater. Their day-to-day operations are still on the 154.785, 411 DPL, but some officers (maybe detectives) are talking in P25 digital. It's the same frequency, 154.785, with a 765 NAC (which is different than what's in the database). The officer will talk on P25 digital, but the dispatcher always responds via analog. The field officers seem to be able to hear both the analog and digital traffic without changing knob positions (I could be wrong, but I believe that's an option in professional radios, the ability to program an analog and digital code on the same knob/channel selector position for receive).
I don't know the use, but there's a repeater licensed to the City of Oroville at 159.165 131.8 PL. I heard little to no traffic to confirm it's use. I have it in some of my old notes possibly as their public works channel.
Fun fact: When broadcasting on the Oroville PD repeater, the dispatcher seems to be using a direct link (i.e. fiber, microwave, or telco) to go out on the repeater. When talking on Oroville FD1, they talk on the input frequency to go out on the repeater (i.e., just like how the mobiles do). I'm not sure the reason for the different methods.
City of Chico:
Everything is the same as in the database, but I see some FCC licenses for some repeater pairs that aren't in the database. I heard no traffic while I was visiting (although Chico doesn't come in too strong due to Table Mountain blocking point-of-view). But worth monitoring to see if they're being used: Repeater 1, 153.845; Repeater 2, 154.830.
Sutter County
Sutter County Sheriff:
Sutter County Sheriff's Office is running mixed-mode on their 460.225 dispatch repeater. Their day-to-day operations are still on the 460.225 210.7 PL, but the officers and dispatcher now have the option to switch to a P25 digital encrypted version at 460.225, 83B NAC when needed. They refer to this as "go to Secure." They seem to use the encrypted version when running sensitive communications, records checks, and BOLOs with actual persons named. It seems to be more of a protocol thing depending on WHAT will be broadcast. For example, the officer will ask for a records check on analog, the dispatcher acknowledge in analog, the officer will give the information using analog, and the dispatcher will give the returns using digital encryption. In other cases, the officer will give the information using digital encryption, but if nothing returns, the dispatcher will respond "no returns" via analog. Same as earlier, all radios seem to hear all traffic whether it's analog or digital (encrypted) without having to change knob positions.
Yuba City Police:
Similar to Sutter County Sheriff, Yuba City Police Dept. is running mixed mode on their 460.350 dispatch repeater. Their day-to-day operations are still on 460.350 155 DPL, but they have a P25 digital encryption option on 460.350 293 NAC (already in the database, just not marked as encrypted). Also seems to be a protocol use type thing depending on WHAT is being broadcast, like when broadcasting sensitive communications, records checks and BOLOs with actual persons named. Same as above, all radios seem to hear all traffic whether it's analog or digital (encrypted) without having to change knob positions.
Yuba County
Marysville Police:
Marysville Police Dept. is still using their 460.400 192.8 PL dispatch repeater for day-to-day operations. HOWEVER, I found they have a second repeater at 453.5125 173.8 PL referred to as "Tac" by the dispatcher. They were using this for routine dispatching for a day this past week.
Happy scanning!
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