San Bernardino County radio reprogramming

[kd6ecz]

I was reading an article in one of the local newspapers and noticed some radio related information in it. It appears as though the 15,000 radios that operate on the county's 800 MHz radio systems are going to be reprogrammed over the next 3 years due to the Nextel interference problem. I certainly hope it's just radio reprogramming going on and not any sort of system upgrade to digital or something along those lines.

Anyway... here is the article:

Big radio project raises concerns

PUBLIC SAFETY: A plan to let San Bernardino County's workers do the job would boost pay.

09:22 AM PST on Friday, February 11, 2005

By SHARON McNARY / The Press-Enterprise
A handful of San Bernardino County employees are in line to get contracts that will boost their hourly pay as high as $90 and double their pensions when they retire in three years.

An anonymous protest e-mail to top county officials accuses the county's computer department of "spiking" pensions by putting those workers into high-paying jobs in their final years of employment.

That's a powerful charge, because recent events have made county officials sensitive to criticism of alleged cronyism in hiring. It was enough to make County Administrative Officer Mark Uffer pull the issue from the agenda of this week's Board of Supervisors' meeting, county spokesman David Wert said.

County Information Officer Leyden Hahn defends his plan, which will go to the board for approval Tuesday, saying that it shouldn't cost the county or the employee-supported retirement plan any extra money.

The contracts would pay a group of 11 county employees from $61 to $90 per hour to change the frequencies of 15,000 radios used by public-safety agencies throughout the county. The goal is to reprogram public-safety radios that use the 800 MHz radio frequency band away from frequencies on the same band used by Nextel's walkie-talkie mobile phones.

Nextel phone signals have been interfering with public-safety radios nationwide. Accepting a recent FCC order, Nextel this week agreed to put $2.5 billion in trust to pay for the work, company spokeswoman Leigh Horner said.

Nextel will pay the tab for San Bernardino County's system change, covering an estimated $40 million in equipment and $10 million in labor to complete the work by a June 2008 deadline, Hahn said.

Riverside County will put out a request this month for outside firms to change the frequencies on some 3,000 public-safety radios as part of a larger project to close gaps in the radio system coverage, said Greg Stoddard, the county's chief technology officer. Stoddard did not have an estimated cost for the work; however, the frequency change would be paid by Nextel, he said.

Hahn said his proposal to give San Bernardino County experts who are nearing retirement higher salaries and bigger pensions will get the job done in a way that keeps expenses down, keeps them from taking other jobs, spends the money in San Bernardino County and provides greater accountability to him and other county officials.

The alternative would be to hire outside consultants who would charge Nextel at least triple the county price for labor, Hahn said. Outside companies might buy the equipment outside San Bernardino County and deprive the county of the sales-tax revenue. Hahn estimated the cost of the job, if done by outside contractors, would rise to about $88 million.

Hahn's choice to lead the radio frequency fix-up is Dave Seidel, 55, the county's chief of network services. Seidel oversaw the county's efforts in the mid-1980s to install a radio network that connected all local public-safety agencies.

That campaign grew out of the chaos of the 1980 Panorama Fire, which burned 286 homes in northern San Bernardino, and a shootout involving robbers of a Norco bank the same year. In both cases, agencies that needed to work together couldn't communicate because they used different radio systems, Seidel said.

Seidel's expected $7,880 monthly pension would rise to $14,000 per month if he works the $90-per-hour job for three years, he said.

The county will charge Nextel enough to cover the county retirement system's $3.2 million additional outlay for Seidel's and others' higher pensions, Hahn said.

CHANGING FREQUENCIES

The FCC has ordered Nextel to eliminate its phones' interference with public-safety frequencies nationwide:

The fix: San Bernardino County looks at having the job done by county employees. The workers who would oversee the job would see their pay and pensions increase. Riverside County plans to hire a contractor.

SB County work's cost: $50 million with in-house labor and equipment; $88 million if contracted out.

Riverside County work's cost: Undetermined.

Who pays: Nextel.

Reach Sharon McNary at (909) 806-3062 or smcnary@pe.com

http://www.pe.com/localnews/sanbernardino/stories/PE_News_Local_spike11.a1c6b.html

I just found the Board of Supervisors angenda Item too:
http://www.sbcounty.gov/sbco/cob/AG021505/ITM65/

 

[kd6ecz]

There was an interesting letter to the editor yesterday regarding the above article.

$90 an hour?

If the San Bernardino County Board of Supervisors approves county employees to be paid $60 to $90 an hour to reprogram emergency radios, state and federal agencies should start corruption investigations ("Big radio project raises concerns," Local, Feb. 11). Why should these employees be paid this money for doing their jobs?

When I worked for a police department in San Bernardino County I paid police cadets less than $10 an hour to reprogram radios. Most 12-year-olds have the computer knowledge that is required to do the job. The county should bill Nextel the cost of the employees' pay and benefits for the time spent on the project at their pay scale, not $60 to $90 an hour.

VINCE LEONE
Moreno Valley

http://www.pe.com/localnews/opinion/letters/stories/PE_OpEd_Opinion_op_0214_letters.a140c.html

 

[sunstarrz]

Hey, mister S.

So what's the latest? Do you think Dave's gonna retire? How about the others. (Really, with all that smoking in front of the building you guys do, I'd think you'd all be ready to retire.) :roll:

If he goes, how many of you is he gonna take with him? If you can get $90/hour as a contractor, I'd say it would sound like a good plan.

If only I knew what you guys did about radio stuff.

TTFN!

 

[colheli]

This whole thing sounds kind of fishy:

Nextel is vacating the 800Mhz band, so why is San Bernardino changing it's frequencies? With Nextel out of the 800Mhz band, the current frequencies that S.B. uses should be free and clear of interference. And, even if they have to switch for some reason, $90 an hour for reprogramming radios!?!?!? I think I will tell my boss that I am grossly underpaid.

 

[kd6ecz]

There was a blurb in the Press Enterprise on 3/2/05 (page B5) that states the Board of Supervisors, "agreed to begin a selection process to choose a team of vendors to reprogram police and fire radio frequencies."

It also mentions that they won't be using the 11 existing employees that were mentioned in the previous article to handle the reprogramming and that they will be using an outside agency to handle the reprogramming.

I'd post the article but I can't find any mention of it online. You can read more about it on the BOS Web site on the agenda for the March 1st meeting though: http://www.sbcounty.gov/sbco/cob/

 

[2wayfreq]

I agree with coheli, there is an article on the FCC web site about this very thing. Nextel wil go to 1.9GHz and Public Safety will have 700/800 all to thier lonsome. Some kind of knee-jerk reaction to complaints. They should upgrade to smartnet digital while they are at it.

 

[kd6ecz]

They should upgrade to smartnet digital while they are at it.

I don't know if a digital system would work very well here. As it is, the analog system is rather noisy on the handheld radios in ceratin areas. I know several cops that complain about their HTs being worthless in a lot of places too. I would think there would be a great expense to upgrading to digital because of the need to add more radio sites to the system along with buying new radios. I could be wrong though.

So Nextel is completely vacating 800 MHz then? I'm kind of curious why the reprogramming is necessary then.

 

[INDY72]

Guys per the rebanding agreement-

PS will leave all freqs above 860 MHz, assisted by NextHell, for which NextHell will get paid to assist, and get a whole other chunk of spectrum.

This means all the 866-869 MHz stuff will go to other use, and the new PS bandwidth will be 851-860, and the new 700 MHz band. Those Agencies/Entities that are not in the 866-869 MHz don't have to really do much of anything, unless they choose this to be the time to upgrade thier systems say from VSELP to the newer ASTRO format, or to go from analog to digital. (Which a lot of them are doing, Motorola will be very busy in the next few years.) Oh this also means that the old 800 MHz Mutual Aid freqs are gone, and will have to be replaced.

 

[2wayfreq]

I see the deal now. Makes sense, they must of had the new freqs already allocated for SBSO.

 

[n4voxgill]

First, all 866-869 frequencies move down 15 MHz accross the nation. This was ordered by the FCC to resolve the interference problems. this is called rebanding. there is a lot of information about it on the FCC website. Other frequencies in 800 are also effected that public safety uses.

Second, Nextel is not leaving 800. They are moving to the 866 range and also get the 2 gig frequencies.

The cost of reprograming all of the radios is being paid by Nextel. It sounds to me like the San Bernadino guys are going to do it after hours on overtime paid for by nextel, not the county. The FCC is appointing a transition administrator to handle the approval of payments. The TA will decide if the hourly rate for overtime is appropriate.

Smart agencies are the ones that get in early and make their deals before the mandate time for their region.

The five national frequencies just move down 15 MHz.

Motorola has a website that shows which model radios can just be reprogramed, which will need new software before reprograming and the few that can't be reprogramed. The last ones will be replaced at nextel expense.

I would expect some agencies to look at how much they will receive as a result of rebanding and kick in the difference to end up with digital systems.

 

[Sharky]

There will be frequency changes when the Nextel rebanding occurs in SB County. That's all.
Systems 1-10 in SB County won't be going digital for many years.
SB County is seeking the rebanding aggressively because of their size, and the time it will take to facilitate once they begin.
Sharky

 

[n4voxgill]

Calilfornia, except for the southern part that uses splinter frequencies are in phase 1 of rebanding that will start this summer and must be completed pretty quickly.

 

[n4voxgill]

San Bernadino county is lucky to have one of it's key people, Dave Buchanan, who serves on several national communication committees and is in the top 2% of radio professionals. He has an indepth knowledge of how the rebanding works as he contributed significantly to the concensus plan that the FCC adopted to implement rebanding. His knowledge is invaluable to an agency.

 

[kd6ecz]

I found some information about the current status of the 800 MHz rebanding project here in San Bernardino County in the ISD 2007-2008 business plan and thought you guys might want to read it.

Here are the sections about the radio system:

Objective C: Deliver innovative 800 MHz Radio communications solutions including design, configuration, implementation, and ongoing maintenance by moving 800 MHz Radio systems hardware and software to a vendor supported platform.

1C. Percentage of 800 MHz site controllers moved to a digital capable and vendor supported platform. Controllers are the hardware component located at various sites throughout the County that enable radio connections between dispatchers and emergency personnel.

2006 - 2007: 25%
2007 - 2008: 50%

Percentage of total projected RED radios online (1200 red channel radios).

2006 - 2007: 100%
2007 - 2008: N/A

ISD will continue to work on the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) mandated 800 MHz Rebanding project next year. The contract with the West End Communications Authority 800 MHz Public Safety Radio System (WECA) has been drafted and will be brought to the Board to implement improvements to the communications system serving the cities in the West Valley portion of the county. In addition, the RED Channel System for 800 MHz valley-wide radio interoperability between various law enforcement agencies will be 100% complete by the end of 2006-07.