On July 14, the U.S. House of Representatives passed a major legislative package, the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) of 2023, with an amendment that would direct the Office of Management and Budget to classify public safety telecommunicators as “Protective Service Occupations” in the Standard Occupational Classification. Passage of this provision into law would have the same effect as passage of the 9-1-1 SAVES Act. In recent years, the House has passed an initial version of the NDAA with a reclassification provision, but due to the nature of the NDAA and its complex negotiation process, the final version has never included reclassification language. Nonetheless, this is a positive step, and APCO will be advocating for the reclassification language to be included in any version that moves forward. Stay tuned for further updates.
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On July 6, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) adopted new rules regarding a formerly voluntary agreement among the major wireless carriers to increase coordination and information sharing during emergencies. However, with the support of APCO and others, the new rules now require all wireless service providers to participate in their agreement including to execute roaming agreements with each other and extend activation to additional emergency situations. These rule changes are consistent with remarks from Commissioner Carr during APCO’s “Improving Emergency Communications Resiliency” webinar held earlier this year. The FCC is seeking comment on additional proposals to improve resiliency, during which APCO will continue to urge the FCC to require the wireless service providers to establish a secure, two-way contact database to improve communications with 9-1-1 centers and provide timely outage information in a graphical manner to ECC equipment.
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APCO seeks working group members to participate in the creation of a candidate standard titled Common Computer Aided Dispatch (CAD) Public Safety GIS Identifiers. This standard focuses on the Geofile aspect of database updating and identifies a minimum set of CAD oriented geographic import/export database file requirements necessary to allow multiple agencies to share public safety geographic data and databases updates, utilizing 9-1-1 infrastructure and data, among disparate CAD systems.
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On July 11, APCO filed comments with the FCC to express support for location-based routing, a method of routing 9-1-1 calls to ECCs based on the location of the device making the call instead of the location of the cell tower transmitting the call. As APCO wrote in 2019 and reiterated in its comments, the time saved by delivering 9-1-1 calls to the right ECC without needing to first transfer a call between ECCs could save thousands of lives each year. APCO emphasized that real-world implementations demonstrate location-based routing can be achieved without imposing costs on ECCs and regardless of whether ECCs are connected to legacy systems or have made some progress toward Next Generation 9-1-1.
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Local News 8 ABC
“The more calm I am, the more calm he will be,” explained Tobreshia Horn, who helped a driver escape from a flash flood.
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ClickOrlando.com
Chelsea Picciotti, Katie Brooks and Michael Delisle moved the drainage grate and rescued five ducklings trapped below street level.
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Loveland Magazine
Jessie Bocks, a telecommunicator in the Clermont County (Ohio) 911 Center, was recognized for calmly relaying CPR instructions so Wettengel could save his friend’s life.
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TBNewsWatch.com
Telecommunicator Megan Petzel worked with police to locate an uncommunicative girl in an unknown location who was subject to dangerous temperatures.
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WKRN.com
Maury County is promoting an online form for citizens that will allow its emergency communications center to be among the first in the country to deploy the lifesaving system.
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