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04 26 2007 Board Meeting NEW HANOVER COUNTY PUBLIC SAFETY COMMUNICATIONS CENTER 230 Government Center Dr, Suite 185 Wilmington, NC 28403 Phone: (910) 798-6920 Fax: (910) 798-6925 E-mail: llancaster@nhcgov.com Steve Smith Director Memorandum To: Public Safety Communications Center Policy Board Members From: Steve Smith, Director Subject: April 26, 2007 Board Summary Date: April 30, 2007 A Public Safety Communications Center Policy Board meeting was held on Thursday, April 26, 2007 in the Emergency Operating Center, 220 Government Center Drive, Wilmington, North Carolina. MEMBERS PRESENT: MEMBERS ABSENT: Chairman Sterling Powell Donnie Hall, Excused Wayne Pearce Sgt. Macneish, Excused Andre’ Mallette Frank Blackley, Excused Brenda Hewlett Larry Bergman, Excused Leslie Stanfield Brian Roberts, Excused Jan Kavanaugh Steve Smith, Excused Billy Younginer Michael Clemmons, Excused James Conway Cynthia Deacon Dennis Cooper Robert Matheson Duane Ward Cliff Robinson GUESTS: Bill Fink, New Hanover County IT Department Marty Adams, New Hanover Hanover County Sheriffs Department Michael Core, Wrightsville Beach Police Department Jerry Brewer, New Hanover County Sheriffs Department Charles G Smith, Carolina Beach Police Department Chairman Powell called the meeting to order at 10:07 a.m. Motion to approve March 23, 2007 minutes Warren Lee wanted to know what the interest of the board was for outside agencies, such as Leland Fire Rescue, to be included as an outside agency requesting to have access to the radios. Chairman Powell informed him that the Bylaws do not state that we have the authority until it goes before the Commissioners and is approved. It came before the NHPSCC Board and everyone agreed that there was not a problem as long as Leland filled out a Talkgroup request like everyone else and that it would be a good thing but that the NHPSCC Board does not have the authority to vote on this at this time. Warren wanted to know who had that authority. Chairman Powell stated that right now Emergency Management plays oversight to all radio system issues until the Bylaws changes are approved. Billy Younginer made a motion to approve the March 23, 2007 board summary and James Conway seconded the motion. Motion passed. OLD BUSINESS: BUSINESS: By-Law Changes Chairman Powell would like to bring this to a close and get it slated to go before the Commissioners. The changes included: 􀁸 Adding Wrightsville Beach Police, Emergency Management and UNC-Wilmington as authorized voting members of the board. 􀁸 Article VI, Section 1. Chairman Powell requested a final vote on this to move forward and get the changes before the Commissioners as soon as possible. Duane Ward made a motion to approve the Bylaw changes and Billy Younginer seconded the motion. Motion passed. Brenda and Warren will draft a copy of the Bylaws for the Commissioners for approval. Chairman Powell stated that they would let everyone know as soon as possible when it would go before the Commissioners. 800 MHz System Warren Lee stated that Jason was finishing up with the punch list items this week. All four tower sites have been visited and still found a few things that had not been completed and that are what is being worked on, hopefully to be complete this week. The first round of radios have been programmed on the new system for Kure Beach and Carolina Beach Police Departments. The “I” buttons have been created. The radios have been programmed for Kure. Billy Younginer said that Carolina Beach has not received the flash code for their radios and they are supposed to be here this week. Warren Lee said there will be one more form created to put in the system that details the ownership of the “I” button. The buttons created so far have a one year life on them and they will be renewed annually as needed. Warren Lee passed out the Radio Programming Practices and Recommendations. These are the standard way that the buttons will be programmed and if there is a real need for something totally different it can be worked out with the programmer when it is time to program. Warren is trying to keep radio buttons configured the same way with standard buttons on the radios for emergency situations so that Fire, EMS and Police can pick up any radio and each works the same way no no matter which radio is used. This is to create consistency across agencies on all of the radios and should benefit all of us. If there are any inconsistencies in the Practice and Recommendations handout, let Warren know, otherwise the changes will be incorporated into the network. Budgets Warren asked to please continue to budget money for the replacement of a portion of radios in each of the budget cycles. If anyone needs help with their ordering, Warren is going to place a large order for County Fire Services. 800 MHz Rebanding Project The final version of the Rebanding Project is in Legal & Finance for the funding formula, which is the amount of the planning portion of the project. Legal, Finance and Federal Engineering have agreed on the monetary amount that they will do it for. In the next month or so Federal Engineering will be showing up to get inventory and which of the radios will be eligible under the Rebanding Project. The list of eligible radios sent out earlier should not change. There should should be none found that are not going to be eligible but until we get to that portion of the project, Warren is not sure. If you had radios on the list that would not be able to be reprogrammed, you will probably get a replacement radio for those. If anyone needs the list again, send Warren a note and he will send it again. User training has been scheduled with Motorola with the first group of agencies who are going to switch over to the digital radios. On May 10th and 11th 2007 a trainer with Motorola will be here to do the training for Wrightsville, Kure & Carolina Beaches as they are fully ready to switch over. As the rest of the agencies become ready and have most of the radios in another session will be scheduled. Public Safety has been scheduled with the beaches for training. Chairman Powell wanted to know what was being taught in these training sessions. Warren said these training sessions are designed to teach the use of the buttons for the radios, how they work and the features that they have for both the mobiles and the portables. This will be an intensive hands-on class, not for the programming of the radios. The training session will take place in the Emergency Management conference room starting at 9am until 5, the second day starting at 8am until. If anyone is adding people, you need to inform Warren so that he can make sure to have enough radios for hands on training. Flemington Generator The generator will be replaced during a three day period between May 7 and 9th. This is part of the agreement from the Highway Patrol for access on our system; they are putting a new generator at Flemington. On May 7th, Jason will take down the Engineering SKATA System for about 1-1/2 hours while he reconfigures some cabling and Motorola is connecting a temporary generator in and hook into the system so that during the change out there should not be any difference in service. NEW BUSINESS: Information Technology Jan introduced Bill Fink, the new IT person. He will be one of the network administrators for the radios. He comes to New Hanover County as a retired Navy electronics technician. Message Switch Upgrade Leslie announced that last Tuesday, the Message Switch was upgraded. There shouldn’t be any difference seen by us but the biggest improvement will be that it will be easier to pull information when requests come in for tapes or recordings of traffic. It is capable of being saved in several different file formats. There were problems with the message switch last weekend and OSSI is recommending that we add more memory to that server. There may also been so problems with the Highway Patrol end which caused some down time. Leslie stated that the AVL equipment is still in the budget and has made it through the first round and did not get cut out of the Manager’s recommended budget. This AVL equipment will run through the existing message switch. Public Safety Communications Center: Brenda Hewlett distributed the monthly agency reports to Committee members and gave an update on the happenings in the Center. 􀁸 April 10, 2007 we switched to the two new shifts, straight days and nights, 12 hour shifts. In this 2 week time period we have seen a reduction in sick time by 122 hours. There was overtime (86 hours) but we still have a staff shortage and we are getting where we need to be. 􀁸 There are six new people to start, three have already and three more will shortly. 􀁸 Training is going on in the Emergency Management Center, using loaned laptops for the new hires. Chairman Powell adjourned the meeting at 10:40a.m.