APCO will make a major technology announcement during its Annual Conference & Expo at the end of the Opening General Session taking place at 8:30 a.m. MT on Monday, August 14. Stay tuned!

360° Situational Awareness: Using Imagery to Support Operations Inside & Out
Monday, July 31 | 1:00 - 2:00 p.m. ET

During this 60-minute webinar, attendees will:

Felicia Scali, PHR, Human Resources Associate
Felicia joined APCO on a contract basis in October 2012 and concluded that assignment in December 2012. Following a departmental restructuring in March 2013, Felicia was brought back as an official APCO employee serving as the human resources associate. Felicia went on to earn her designation in human resources as a Professional in Human Resources (PHR) in June 2017.

A native of Florida, Felicia and her husband, Rick, have enjoyed 14 years of sailing adventures together and have five children and three grandchildren.

The FCC’s Public Safety and Homeland Security Bureau announced today that there will be a nationwide test of the Emergency Alert System (EAS) on September 27, 2017 at 2:20 p.m. ET. According to the public notice, the test "will assess the reliability and effectiveness of the EAS, with a particular emphasis on testing FEMA’s Integrated Public Alert and Warning System (IPAWS), the integrated gateway through which common alerting protocol-based (CAP-based) EAS alerts are disseminated to EAS participants." All EAS participants are required to participate in this nationwide test. If conditions on the day of the test require the rescheduling of the test, a secondary test date is scheduled for October 4, 2017.

Additionally, the public notice announced that the EAS Test Reporting System (ETRS) is now open and accepting 2017 filings and that the EAS Operating Handbook is now available to EAS participants.

The public notice can be found here: http://transition.fcc.gov/Daily_Releases/Daily_Business/2017/db0724/DA-17-708A1.pdf

The IAFC Board of Directors has issued a call to action for fire service leaders to urge governors in their states to opt into FirstNet.

The IJIS Institute—a nonprofit organization that focuses on mission-critical information sharing for justice, public safety and homeland security—invites volunteers to join an Industry Working Group (IWG) to tackle changing federal and state law enforcement reporting requirements. The IWG will work on how to quickly and efficiently respond to changing reporting requirements.

Current The Advanced Warning and Response Network Alliance (AWARN), a next generation public safety coalition that includes public broadcasters, has formed an advisory committee with several new partners. Representatives from the the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, the National Weather Service and the Association of Public-Safety Communications Officials will meet with AWARN Alliance members Monday, July 31, in Arlington, Va., to help "create a road map" for the organization, said AWARN Executive Director John Lawson.

FierceWireless FirstNet said it's building an ecosystem for applications developed specifically to meet the needs of first responders. The organization said it is working with emergency personnel to garner feedback from first responders and use that information "to cultivate an open, integrated applications ecosystem" on its network to ensure public safety officials have access to targeted apps as quickly as possible. FirstNet said the initiative aims to ensure that public safety "drives new applications for the network" and provides capabilities over the entire life cycle of apps.

Janet T. Roller of Meriden, Connecticut, passed away on July 24, 2017. She served her community as a police and fire dispatcher for 15 years and was an APCO member of the Atlantic Chapter.

TNW Emergency averted. Following reports from concerned users experiencing abrupt reboots when dialing 9-1-1 from their all-new OnePlus 5 handsets, the Chinese phonemaker has managed to promptly patch the glaring bug.

23ABC A local Bakersfield, Calif., police dispatcher is honored this week as part of the department's "Why I Wear the Badge" segment. Without them handling the over 750,000 calls into the 9-1-1 center that were received last year, the department could not function. Dispatcher Alison Webb shares her story of being on the line with an elderly woman as her home was being burglarized.

FCW Future uncertainty on service pricing and competition concern FirstNet stakeholders, but one state that has signed onto the project told lawmakers that opting out, or waiting to commit, would be more costly and less effective.