Subject: [NEXTEL-1] County loses licenses (Rockland, NY)

From: [email-masked]
Date: Sun, 04 Jul 2004 11:51:26 -0400

County loses licenses  
By REBECCA BAKER ERWIN - Sunday, July 4th, 2004 'THE JOURNAL 
NEWS'  / White Plains, NY  

County public safety officials are trying to get back 10 emergency 
radio frequencies that were taken away last month during a national 
recall of unused broadcast channels. 

The county paid $5,000 in filing fees for the frequencies at a 1998 
auction, with plans to create a countywide communications system. 
The system has yet to be activated. 

The Federal Communications Commission took Rockland's frequencies 
back, along with thousands of other unused bandwidths, during an 
audit of its files. That prompted the county to hire Washington, 
D.C., attorney John Logan, an FCC specialist, to get the frequencies 
back before they were sold to other interests. 

The price of failure is steep. The county could lose the $5,000 and 
have to spend thousands more to buy new frequencies on the open 
market, if they became available. 

The county already has invested in the new system, which is expected 
to cost at least $27.2 million and take three more years to develop. 

"What's ultimately at stake is millions of dollars," County 
Executive C. Scott Vanderhoef said. 

Gordon Wren Jr., the county's director of fire and emergency 
services, said Logan was confident Rockland would get the 
frequencies back. 

"He's calling this just a bump in the road," Wren said. 

Rockland has no central communications system that allows police, 
firefighters and emergency medical workers to talk with one another 
at the same time. The county agreed to borrow $4 million last year 
to design the new system. 

Pablo A. Ramos, director of Rockland's enhanced 911 system, said the 
county bought as many frequencies as possible when the FCC offered 
them to public safety agencies at a discount in 1998. 

"They don't do that very often," he said. "Frequencies are very 
limited. It's why they don't want you sitting on them." 

Once the county had the frequencies, the Rockland County Radio 
Committee, a group of police, fire and EMS administrators, hired a 
consultant for $40,000 to develop a five-year plan to create a 
system that could use the new frequencies. 

Ramos said the county filed the plan with the FCC in January 1999 
and the committee started looking for government grants. But after 
Sept. 11, 2001, Ramos said, state funds for such projects dried up, 
and the county's economy worsened. 

"We have a plan," he said. "It's just taken us a little longer. 
We've been behind the scenes getting things ready." 

Ramos questioned if the FCC's Washington office had shared the plan 
with its Gettysburg, Pa., office, which sent out the recall notices. 
But FCC spokeswoman Lauren Patrich said employees in the Gettysburg 
and Washington offices talk to one another every day. 

"I don't believe there's a right-hand, left-hand problem," she said. 

Patrich also said the agency sent at least four letters to license 
holders during the past 18 months asking them to respond. 

"We said, 'We're doing an audit, so if you're not using your 
licenses, let us know,' " she said. 

Wren said he never received letters from the FCC before getting the 
recall letter. 

"They may have sent them, but I don't know who they sent them to," 
he said. "It wasn't to me." 

In the next few weeks, the county will start looking for vendors to 
design and engineer the new system, Ramos said. Buying a dispatch 
console and radios and getting the system operational will take 
three more years, he said. 

But without the frequencies, the new system would be silent. 

"It sort of freezes the clock," Ramos said.

http://www.thejournalnews.com/newsroom/070404/a0104rockfcc.html

------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor --------------------~--> 
Yahoo! Domains - Claim yours for only $14.70
http://us.click.yahoo.com/Z1wmxD/DREIAA/yQLSAA/61FxlB/TM
--------------------------------------------------------------------~-> 

-- 
    "NEXTEL-1 IT'S NOT JUST NEXTEL"
  Note The New address 
Subscribe to Nextel-1: http://www.groups.yahoo.com/subscribe/NEXTEL-1

  "NEXTEL2 FOR iDEN SOFTWARE DEVELOPERS"
Subscribe to Nextel2: http://www.groups.yahoo.com/subscribe/NEXTEL2

  "WIRELESS FORUM HOMELAND SECURITY GROUP"
     The Complete Resource for Wireless Homeland Security.
Subscribe to WFHSG:  http://www.groups.yahoo.com/subscribe/WFHSG

Yahoo! Groups Links

<*> To visit your group on the web, go to:
    http://groups.yahoo.com/group/NEXTEL-1/

<*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to:
    [email-masked]

<*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to:
    http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/