Subject: [NEXTEL-1] N.Y. Governor Rejects Funding Plan for Wireless E-911

From: Marcel <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 02 May 2003 16:25:53 -0400

N.Y. Governor Rejects Funding Plan for Wireless E-911

New York Governor George Pataki rejected a legislative proposal that would
fund the cost of equipping emergency dispatch centers to receive location
information on 911 calls from cell phones. The proposal called for selling bonds
backed by the proceeds of the state's surcharge on cell phone service. Aides
to the governor said that the revenue from the cell phone surcharge had been
allocated for other police and homeland security needs.

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Gov nixes cell-phone tracking
05-02-2003

By JOE MAHONEY
DAILY NEWS ALBANY BUREAU CHIEF

ALBANY - The Pataki administration rejected yesterday a legislative plan to fund
a system for tracking emergency calls from cell phones.

Lawmakers pushing for the system said they are trying to prevent tragedies such
as the Jan. 24 drownings of four youths in Long Island Sound.

One of the teens made a desperate 911 call for help from their sinking dinghy. But
because the call came from a cell phone, no address popped up on the operator's
computer. A 911 supervisor failed to notify the NYPD harbor unit of the call, as
required, delaying the search by 14 hours.

The legislation would pay for a tracking system by selling bonds backed by a
portion of the revenue from the state's surcharge on all cell phone users.

But the bill became snared yesterday in the budget showdown between the
Legislature and Gov. Pataki, who has vowed to veto portions of the spending plan
he considers excessive.

'Insufficient resources'

A Pataki administration analysis of the lawmakers' plan said "prior commitments
for public safety" programs have led to "insufficient resources to implement this
initiative."

That conclusion angered Virginia Badillo of the Bronx. Her 17-year-old son, Henry,
was the one who made the 911 call from the boat, telling an emergency dispatcher,
"We're gonna die!"

"By not passing this bill, other people's lives will be lost," Virginia Badillo told the
Daily News last night. "When my son made that 911 call and then died, I had to
pay those surcharges, and I have promised my son I will keep working for this
bill."

The author of the legislation, Assemblyman David Koon (D-Rochester), called the
rejection of the bill "a sign of arrogance."

"The governor and his people think they have better ideas than the Legislature,
and I think they are wrong," said Koon, whose daughter was raped and murdered
after she used a cell phone in an unsuccessful effort to summon help.

But Pataki aides said the cell phone revenues already have been allocated to pay
for other policing and homeland security needs.

"This is just one more flaw in a profoundly flawed budget," said Pataki spokesman
Joe Conway.

Joseph Belluck, a Manhattan attorney for the estates of Henry Badillo, Max
Guarino and a third youth lost in the mishap, Charles (Carlo) Wertenbaker, said the
governor's rejection of the 911 tracking program "compounds the tragedy these
families have suffered" and could expose the state and local governments to
lawsuits.

http://www.nydailynews.com/05-02-2003/news/wn_report/story/80148p-73630c.html

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