Public safety groups, department struggle to find leader in public protection policy

The development of a coherent public protection disaster relief (PPDR) policy is proving to be a much more daunting task than previously anticipated as both the federal government and public safety groups call on each other to take the lead. At a conference on public safety radiocommunications in Ottawa last week, Industry Canada officials said they wanted greater input from law enforcement and public safety agencies on their particular systems requirements, while those same groups have looked to the government for direction on what those requirements should be. The National Public Safety Radiocommunications Conference, organized by the Radio Advisory Board of Canada (RABC), brought the various stakeholders together to discuss the challenges of interoperability and standardization in public safety networks. The conference was also designed to get the ball rolling on developing a policy framework. PricewaterhouseCoopers will soon make public a report on potential solutions and recommendations that could lead to the development of such a policy. Much of the first day of the conference centred around Agenda Item 1.3 slated for discussion at next year’s World Radiocommunications Conference (WRC-03), and the need to put some concrete ideas on the table. However, delegates didn’t seem to get very far and instead pointed fingers as to why development of such a policy, which has been in the works for two years, has taken so long. An Industry Canada official said it’s not up to the department to come up with a plan. "We’re not in the requirement business," Veena Rawat, deputy director general of spectrum engineering, told conference delegates. "We’re in the business of satisfying those requirements." She maintained that there needs to be greater involvement from public safety groups in policy development. "There is not sufficient participation or representation from the public safety folks. You need to tell us what the requirements are because if we don’t know domestically what your requirements are for this Agenda Item, which is focused on future (requirements), how can we turn your requirements into megahertz? And then say these megahertz are needed in this spectrum space in this timeframe and not only that let’s harmonize them globally. It is not an easy task." The carrier community reiterated this sentiment. Vino Vinodrai, director of industry relations at Bell Mobility, commented that it has been very difficult to engage public safety organizations in discussions, and even moving key meetings to Toronto didn’t help solve the problem. "Even then in some cases, (public safety groups) did not send the people of the higher level, which were required, to hear this process that was going on," he told delegates. "I think that has caused a lot of grief in some respect and we had to drag things out." Public safety organizations, on the other hand, told the conference that it’s very difficult to explain to chiefs of police what megahertz are and what these frequencies can do, and in some cases they aren’t sure if their current evaluation efforts are being conducted properly. Eldon Amoroso, senior director of the information and technology branch of the London Police Service, wants direction on how evaluation efforts by public safety groups are doing as a whole. "Are we, as public safety organizations, doing proper planning? How are we at doing our planning? I just don’t know," he said. Some, however, suggested that time is limited to continue discussing the issue and that action should be taken now. While the Agenda Item won’t be dealt with until WRC-03, the text accompanying the item needs to be submitted shortly, so there isn’t a lot of time to debate the issues at hand and come to a consensus, said Paul Frew, director of corporate and government relations at Motorola Canada. "We need participation and input as quickly as possible because that process will go ahead with us or without us. Others are putting information in, inputs in and decisions are being made," he noted. Interoperability and standardization primary goals Domestically, the crux of the issue comes down to simple communications between law enforcement agencies and other public safety groups. Peter Martin, CIO for the RCMP, explained the current situation succinctly. "People are surprised to hear that police can’t communicate with fire or ambulance from their vehicles," he told the conference. The situation is only aggravated when neighboring police forces can’t communicate with each other, Martin added. He recalled a situation where an unmarked police car was mistaken for one used in a criminal act during a high-speed chase. This wouldn’t have been an issue if the two neighboring police forces’ networks were interoperable, he explained. In times of disaster, this inability to communicate over a single radio is made even more difficult by the addition of more agencies such as the armed forces. Everyone at the conference seemed to agree that the need for standardization and interoperability of networks, not only in times of disaster, must be a primary objective. But ensuring network interoperability is easier said than done. "If there is going to be standardization, who is going to mandate this to ensure interoperability?" one government delegate asked. Some suggested that the only way to guarantee network interoperability is to mandate it through government legislation, a solution supported by some law enforcement groups, including the RCMP. "The onus is on us to come up with a proposal (to take to government)," Martin said. He cautioned, however, that there needs to be a clear and definitive plan before heading down the legislative route. Others have suggested that the RABC and Industry Canada simply identify a band for future public safety applications, and then migrate current users to other frequencies. This type of arbitrary allotment would certainly be met with opposition from current users. Domestic problems as large as international ones One of the primary obstacles to interoperability is the lack of a commonly used spectrum to provide public safety communications. There are currently three different frequency ranges used by the various law enforcement and public safety agencies in Canada: VHF (138-174 MHz), UHF (406-430 MHz and 450-470 MHz) and portions of the 800 MHz band. Only the 821-824 MHz frequency range has been reserved for public safety applications. Bob McCaughern, director general spectrum engineering at Industry Canada, pointed out that within these bands there are uses other than public safety to contend with. "Not a pretty picture from an interoperability point of view," McCaughern told delegates.

Public safety groups, department struggle to find leader in public protection policy

News | 04/03/2002 5:00 am EST

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