Subject: [NEXTEL-1] New Orleans - Grant to improve emergency communications

From: "Matthew Anderson" <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 15 Oct 2003 09:47:26 -0500

Grant to help N.O. area improve emergency communications system 

      By JOE GYAN JR.

      New Orleans bureau 

      NEW ORLEANS -- A $7 million federal grant will transform emergency communications in the eight-parish New Orleans area from a "tower of Babel" to a model of regional coordination, Mayor Ray Nagin said Monday.
      "Emergencies do not recognize parish boundaries," Nagin said in announcing the Community Oriented Policing Services Interoperable Communications Technology grant from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

      New Orleans Office of Homeland Security Director Terry Ebbert said the one-year demonstration grant will help Orleans Parish and seven other parishes develop a radio system that will allow the region's 5,000 "first-responders" to talk to each other during emergencies and disasters.

      "We hope to meet those goals," the retired Marine Corps colonel said.

      Ebbert said the emergency radio system will rely on fiberoptic and laser technology rather than cellular telephone towers.

      "That's what we're trying to get away from," he said.

      The Bible tells the story of Babel, a city in which Noah's descendants tried to build a soaring tower to reach heaven but were prevented by God from doing so by a confusion of tongues.

      Nagin said new software technology, developed by Tulane University Health Sciences Center, will allow different types of radios to talk to each other and allow for video-conferencing between parish officials.

      "After the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, the federal government realized we had a serious problem," the mayor said.

      New Orleans, one of only 14 cities to receive COPS money, is the only city trying to implement the emergency radio system across an entire region, Ebbert said.

      "The COPS grant is a regional approach to a national problem," said William Steinmann, director of the Tulane Center for Clinical Effectiveness and Prevention.

      The New Orleans region COPS grant participants are Orleans, Jefferson, Plaquemines, St. Bernard, St. Charles, St. James, St. John the Baptist and St. Tammany parishes, as well as the Louisiana State Police, state Office of Emergency Preparedness, various federal agencies and Tulane University.

      The eight parishes cover 3,400 square miles and are home to 1.3 million residents.

      Jefferson Parish President Tim Coulon, who recalled the traffic gridlock that Hurricane Georges caused in the New Orleans area in 1998, said the COPS grant would have benefitted the area when Georges came calling.

      "It's a necessity for us to communicate," he said.

      Nagin said public safety agencies in the region use different types of communications equipment purposely designed to function at different frequencies.

      Roughly 70 percent of the COPS grant will fund related hardware and installation costs for the new system, which will connect the parishes' communications systems, Nagin said. 

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