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| Wednesday,
February 20, 2008 Todd County Board of Commissioners-Work Session New radio system could be expensive and not all inclusive by Karin L. Nauber Government initiatives cost money. Sometimes they cost a lot of money and often the federal or state government who passes the initiative does not provide the funding to allow the local governments to follow through with the initiative. While the new 800 Mhz radio system may not be required at this time, it is a system which looks at improving communications and meets initiatives set by the federal government especially since the terrorist activities of September 11, 2001, commonly referred to as 9-11. Todd County got on board with the Central Minnesota Radio Board and were able to receive grant money with which to have a radio study conducted. Mike Mazzitello from GeoComm Consulting in St. Cloud presented the information from the study which was conducted by his company. Part of the need for the radio study is that much like television frequencies changing to digital, radio frequencies are doing the same and are moving from an analog system which takes up more bandwidth to a digital signal which can handle many more "channels" in the same size bandwidth. Radio frequencies have been VHF or Very High Frequency. For many years the emergency channels have been in the 150-160 Mhz range. Mazzitello said that much of the equipment in use now will not be usable with the change to the narrower channels and a lot of new radios will have to be purchased with the idea that all emergency units will be on a common platform from the police to ambulance to the fire departments and hospitals. The money for the radios would come from bonds, the county and some grants which sound like they will be limited. Mazzitello said that the grants will be more firmed up when the state is ready to develop hard proposals from vendors. Commissioner Gary Kneisl, who has been on the committee for the radio board, said that there is a new tower that is proposed to go up at Hewitt and possibly Aldrich. He wondered about the Grey Eagle area. Mazzitello said that the state was now looking at the state as a whole and not as individual pockets and that the coverage would be better overall because the towers would be in places they were needed statewide. The state expects to be online with the 800 Mhz system by this fall. Counties will probably not be online for another year. Kneisl further wondered if the windmills near Hewitt would interfere with the signals. Mazzitello said the "techies" were looking into it. They are also aware of where the new power lines are going in. Todd County Economic Developer Alex Weego asked if it was line of site with the 800 Mhz? Mazzitello said it was and was pretty straight forward and well defined. He further said that the frequencies would actually go from 700 to about 821 for the public safety frequencies. "This will be just for voice, not video. Some video and high speed digital will happen later," he said. Commissioner David Kircher asked if there was a potential for bleed over? Mazzitello said that was taken care of. "A big system with a high level of care-that's a thing of the past." Kircher asked if they would still have to maintain VHF to use their pagers. Mazzitello said that in the 800 Mhz system pagers that are currently out there will not work with the system. He added that the cost estimates for pagers are not in the report either. It will cost approximately $1.2 million for the system which included mobiles and portable radios. Kircher asked if that included all the units that would need the upgrades. Mazzitello said it did not include the highway department or private ambulances. Kircher asked what the cost for encryption would be. Mazzitello said it would depend on the model of radio, but he thought it would be approximately $200 per radio. Kircher expressed his angst about this unfunded mandate and wondered if funding would be available. Mazzitello said they thought maybe about 50%. He said the county would not really be losing their VHF licenses by 2013, but there were initiatives to try to get pagers to work with the new system. Kircher expressed his main concern which was the reliability of the 800 Mhz system and officer safety. Mazzitello said that it would be as good as they have now or better because of more towers. Kircher asked if the radio board was available to help the counties find funding. He was told it would be. Weego asked if maintenance for the system and radios was available? Mazzitello said it was just the procurement. Maintenance was separate. He said their was no charge back currently to be on the network at this time. Infrastructure costs could go down for the counties because the state will take care of the towers. However, hospitals are not included in the cost study and most ambulances are not part of it, either. Meaning they are not included in the $1.2 million cost. According to Mazzitello only the Bertha Ambulance Service was included in the study. He said that the other ambulance services are included in a different cost study. "This has been my question all along. Who is going to pay for this? It's not peanuts," said Kircher. Mazzitello said FEMA could pay for some of it. There will be about $14.2 million that will be spread out for grants. However, the cost per radio could be as much as $2500. "But now we have to tell the ambulance services that they have to charge more so they can cover the costs of their radio systems. The state is very good at having a mess and not finishing it. The local taxpayers pay it or are charged a fee. The cost is $2500 versus $300 for portables and I am sure there will be higher maintenance costs," said Kircher. Mazzitello did say that if the county didn't go with the 800 Mhz system, there would be inoperability plans to help work out the details so the gap between systems could be bridged and they would not have to go with the 800 Mhz plan. There would be another level of training that would have to be done to make it so the people operating each system would work together. Watch for more discussion on the radio system at future board meetings. |