NYSAFC Communications Committee Sets Priorities

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By Chief Brian Wilbur, Ithaca Fire Department
PIO – NYSAFC Communications Committee

The Communications Committee is engaged in prioritizing a number of issues to work on that will affect not only the fire and emergency medical services, but also public safety in New York state. Now familiar topics like interoperability, ICS, narrowbanding, broadband, next generation 911 (NG911), and more, are all clamoring for our attention. In the meantime, most communications system users just want to be able to talk amongst themselves without needing a degree in electrical engineering to do so. Your Communications Committee has its work cut out for it. 

As an example, the promise of interoperability comes with challenges most of us did not fully anticipate. While many of our new consolidated or shared systems are allowing us to talk to each other and between disciplines on the local level (intra-county), the impact on our ability to talk to agencies from adjacent counties (inter-county) has not been all that positive. Oh for the days of 46.22 MHz!

Coordination among counties to facilitate inter-county communications is sporadic at best, and often results in work-arounds that do not truly solve the problem. As another example, some counties are building out, or have completed 800 MHz systems that do not play well with the 400 MHz UHF or VHF high band systems planned or operating in the next county over. In the meantime, other counties have been unable to move forward with any kind of new system, and remain on legacy VHF low band (30-50 MHz) systems. Solutions to these and other looming issues are expensive. In this era of tight budgets and tax caps, I have talked with friends who feel like they have taken residence between a rock and a hard place.

If we didn't know better, it looks like we are doing the "one step forward, two step back dance," which frustrates more than helps. Where is the over-arching planning that would coordinate these efforts, and answer questions about the transition from legacy systems to new technology? This and other answers are on the "to-do" list for the Communications Committee.