Welcome to the world of radio monitoring. To answer your questions yes you do need a license to transmit on ham/amateur frequencies but monitoring is available to anyone. There are digital ham radios but I do not know of any that will successfully track the two systems that you are wanting to monitor. MCSO is using their new P25 Phase 2 system which requires a phase 2 capable scanner. Queen Creek Fire uses the Mesa Topaz system P25 Phase 1 (Mesa Simulcast) and they do have their own talkgroup but not sure as to what all they use if for as I hear most of their traffic on the C-Deck channels. They had a MVA this morning working on C-Deck 2. I use a Uniden BCD325p2 handheld scanner that tracks both of these systems pretty well, however there are other options with Uniden, Whistler, and Unication models. Both the MCSO and Mesa Topaz systems are listed in the Database on this site, I would recommend a premium membership and programming whatever scanner you choose with software so you can import the systems directly into the software for best results.
