Subject: [NEXTEL-1] Johnson County, IN Radio project a creative effort

From: Marcel <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 01 Feb 2003 12:34:57 -0500

Johnson County, IN Radio project a creative effort

[email-masked]
The Indianapolis Star

January 31, 2003

The way officials are bankrolling a much-needed, $7.5 million
radio system in Johnson County could serve as a model for fire,
police and other emergency services across the state and nation.
Firefighters and other emergency personnel in the county long have
struggled with a flawed radio system that was tough to maintain
and failed at key times, slowing responses to emergencies.

In 1998, lightning struck a house in White River Township
southwest of Greenwood. The fire chief at the time, Mike Dutton,
repeatedly tried to radio for firetrucks to come to the scene, but
messages from other departments drowned him out.

"Carmel dispatchers kept covering him up time after time," said
Johnson County Manager Joe Pitcher, "and that caused a 15-minute
delay, and the house was destroyed."

Greenwood Fire Chief Steve Dhondt and Assistant Police Chief Rick
McQueary began investigating how to replace the radio system, but
there was little money for the project.

So Pitcher came up with a plan, volunteering the county to pioneer
an effort to create a statewide emergency radio system and turning
to bonds to raise some of the money.

The project will serve 12 fire departments and nine police
agencies.

Pitcher won approval to raise $5.5 million in bonds and become a
charter member of the Integrated Public Safety Commission's
Project Hoosier SAFE-T network in return for an additional $2.5
million in services and hardware from the state.

"It didn't cost the local agencies anything," Pitcher said.

The county's approach has appeal.

"They are a perfect model," said Lester Miller, state Integrated
Public Safety executive director. "But we don't tell the local
agencies how to go about funding."

When Project Hoosier is completed, police officers and
firefighters from Evansville to South Bend will be able to talk to
one another.

The system was activated last year after John Asher,
communications director for the Johnson County Sheriff's
Department, and assistant Mike Combs programmed and distributed
800 handheld radios, 150 fire vehicle radios and 200 laptop
computers.

Franklin Police Capt. Joe Gruss is preparing a program to allow
officers to use laptops in their cars to access state and national
data, Asher said.

Work on a radio relay tower near Main Street and Ind. 135 in
Greenwood will begin next week. The communications tower behind
the county jail had a lean of more than 5 feet, Pitcher said.

Under the old system, nesting bees, hornets and mice often caused
a loss of power. When trouble struck, the standard procedure was
for employees to grab a can of hornet spray and rodent poison and
head to the shack where broadcasting equipment was kept at the
base of a 400-foot tower.

"We used to jerk the door open and start spraying," Asher said.

It was not uncommon for power to fade away and police and
firefighters' transmissions to fail.

"That was usually a mouse who shorted out the equipment," Asher
said.

That shack has been replaced with an $80,000 building.

Johnson County's system soon will be recognized as a national
model, Miller said.

The infrastructure for 26 northern counties will be built by
year's end.

"Then, it's a matter of money for the locals to come up with,"
Miller said. But on the horizon may be federal money tied to
homeland security.

"There could be a break for taxpayers," Miller said.

http://www.indystar.com/print/articles/2/019321-2712-009.html

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