Public Safety Groups Question E911 Achievements Backtracking on hard-won rules regarding emergency cell calls Public safety groups lobbied hard in the past to strengthen FCC regulations regarding E911 services on cell phones. Their efforts were rewarded when stricter rules were adopted by the FCC last year. The rules related to such things as the accuracy with which operators must be able to pinpoint emergency calls, rules which resulted in big fines for cell phone operators that have been unable to comply. The public safety groups have now recognized that there are serious challenges posed to the ability of carriers to meet these requirements in some areas “because of variations in geography and systems” and appear to be changing their stance on the issue. Groups have even encouraged that the E911 rules they pushed so hard for now be relaxed. In related news, legislation improving VoIP 911 services has been officially passed into law after being approved by both House and Senate last month.
|
 | |  Don't forget about Business VoIP deployments!
Millions of people spend much of their day in an office building using advanced VoIP communications, yet very few understand the impact that technology can have on E911 if not properly implemented and managed. Defining and enforcing standards in this environment can only save lives. We are proud to be a contributor to the solution for this growing problem.
NENA »nena.org, the National Emergency Number Association has also been taking steps to encourage legislation at the state level, but the fact of the matter is that very few states (only 14 in fact)actually have any 9-1-1 laws on the books requiring enterprises to implement any additional functionality that would allow for a 9-1-1 dispatcher to obtain more accurate location information from their PBX. The saddest part of this story is that the technology actually exists, and is often left un-provisioned in many PBX systems installed today.
There have been stories in the news over the years of people who have experienced significant delays in emergency services response, or worse yet actually died, due to telephone system not having 911 implemented properly.
Thank you to all who contributed to this important legislation. Without the continued support from the telecommunications and Public Safety industry, actions like this would not be possible.
Mark Fletcher, ENP
Nortel Emergency Services Product Line Manager
NENA
MLTS Workgroup Technical Subcommittee Chair | |
|  funchordsHelloPremium,MVM
join:2001-03-11
Yarmouth Port, MA
kudos:5
4 edits | Ehhh-9-1-1 -- Believe it or not, it's a take-it-or-leave-it One of the provisions of this bill allows cities to collect 9-1-1 fees from VOIP providers.
That sounds good, but ... it's not.
Skype currently doesn't offer 9-1-1 and makes it clear that it's not in the VOIP telephone business. Why? I really don't know but my guess is that regulations like these will keep Skype from ever getting into the business.
Okay, so Skype never gets into the business, that sounds good, but ... it's not.
It won't keep people from using Skype and disconnecting their Plain Old Expensive Telephone Service since they have Skype. (And Skype is just an example, I might as well as say "Facebook Fone" or some new imaginary service).
Plus VOIP is boundryless. 9-1-1 is a United States thing.
We used to collect these fees from your home telephone bill. Everyone had one, just one. That's no longer true. Now you can reach 9-1-1 on your cell phone, your computer, your game console, your car's console, your "I've fallen and I can't get up" button, your iPod, your shoe phone ... now the average person may have 3-4 ways to call in.
Fees should be collected from the service districts -- police, fire, paramedics. These services are paid by our income, property and sales taxes.
Having VOIP providers pay to hook up to E9-1-1 is just going to encourage the opposite behavior.
--
Robb Topolski -= funchords.com =- Hillsboro, Oregon
Comcast: We never did anything wrong, and we'll never do it again...
| |
|  | | |  marigoldsGainfully employed, finallyPremium,MVM
join:2002-05-13
Saint Louis, MO
kudos:1 | said by funchords:Fees should be collected from the service districts -- police, fire, paramedics. These services are paid by our income, property and sales taxes. Having VOIP providers pay to hook up to E9-1-1 is just going to encourage the opposite behavior. Except that service districts are already at barebones budgets. Unlike cities and counties, they have no mechanism to directly implement a tax levy; they rely on the local government implementing the levy for them. So many departments are only staying at current levels because of homeland security grants. Having these districts pay the cell phone companies for e911 is going to result in direct cuts in emergency services.
So, the choice is having Skype cut e911 services, or having everyone lose emergency services.
--
ISCABBS - the oldest and largest BBS on the Internet
telnet://bbs.iscabbs.com
Professional Geographer
Geographic Information Science researcher | |
| | | patcat88
join:2002-04-05
Jamaica, NY
kudos:1 | Re: Ehhh-9-1-1 -- Believe it or not, it's a take-it-or-leave-it Why not outsource PSAPs to Canada or India? The latency is great with fiber optics. | |
| | | | funchordsHelloPremium,MVM
join:2001-03-11
Yarmouth Port, MA
kudos:5 | Re: Ehhh-9-1-1 -- Believe it or not, it's a take-it-or-leave-it That's certainly a possibility, but I think the people that work in these centers would tell you that it is extremely helpful to be close to both the neighborhoods you are working with and the agencies for whom you are entering calls into Computer-Aided-Dispatch (CAD).
And they'd be right, IMO. | |
| | | | marigoldsGainfully employed, finallyPremium,MVM
join:2002-05-13
Saint Louis, MO
kudos:1 | The PSAP itself does not employ a whole lot of people anyway. Basically one person or less per PSAP. Dispatch is where the employment is, and dispatch is a difficult job to outsource (particularly when you add in the radio coverage). | |
| | | | | funchordsHelloPremium,MVM
join:2001-03-11
Yarmouth Port, MA
kudos:5 | Re: Ehhh-9-1-1 -- Believe it or not, it's a take-it-or-leave-it Is having a separate employer for PSAP and dispatch personnel a common model? I haven't heard of that, but I'm going on two-decades out of that business. | |
| | | | | | marigoldsGainfully employed, finallyPremium,MVM
join:2002-05-13
Saint Louis, MO
kudos:1 | Re: Ehhh-9-1-1 -- Believe it or not, it's a take-it-or-leave-it It might be peculiar to our area (we have 91 munis in our county), but it seems common to have multiple dispatches per routing center. Technically, every dispatch is a psap, but not every dispatch is employing all the technical staff to handle e911 requirements, phase 2, etc (I also think that, in our case, not every dispatch is in NENA either as a result). | |
| | | | | | bus7821
join:2003-08-07
San Pedro, CA | I found that a little puzzling, too. My experience is in urban areas, and the overwhelming tendency there is for PSAPs to be self-contained dispatch centers. In one room will be complaint takers and dispatchers for police, fire, and paramedics for one or more cities.
I believe a few fire departments in very large cities have managed to hold out and still make their separate dispatch center the PSAP for the city. If no fire response is required, a call is just transferred to the police dispatch center. | |
| | | | | | | marigoldsGainfully employed, finallyPremium,MVM
join:2002-05-13
Saint Louis, MO
kudos:1 | Re: Ehhh-9-1-1 -- Believe it or not, it's a take-it-or-leave-it Yeah, we are quite different. Police, fire, and EMS all have different dispatch centers. County police takes all of the calls and then routes them to the correct dispatch center. None of the other dispatch centers take calls directly.
Fire has 44 dispatch centers; EMS technically has 46 (but actually has significantly less than that since two contract ambulance companies are covering multiple ambulance districts); and police has 63 dispatch centers. All the calls though go through county police initially. Yes, our CAD system is a little complicated and our vendor probably hates us. 
--
ISCABBS - the oldest and largest BBS on the Internet
telnet://bbs.iscabbs.com
Professional Geographer
Geographic Information Science researcher | |
| | | | | | | | funchordsHelloPremium,MVM
join:2001-03-11
Yarmouth Port, MA
kudos:5 | Re: Ehhh-9-1-1 -- Believe it or not, it's a take-it-or-leave-it said by marigolds:our vendor probably hates us. As long as the checks clear, I doubt it.  | |
| | | | | | | | | marigoldsGainfully employed, finallyPremium,MVM
join:2002-05-13
Saint Louis, MO
kudos:1 | Re: Ehhh-9-1-1 -- Believe it or not, it's a take-it-or-leave-it As an update, I found out today that tomorrow we will now have 43 fire districts and 64 police districts (though the number of police districts will change again in September).
| |
|
| | | | | | | bus7821
join:2003-08-07
San Pedro, CA | Is complaint entry (into the CAD) done at the county, or at the individual dispatch centers? | |
| | | | | | | | | marigoldsGainfully employed, finallyPremium,MVM
join:2002-05-13
Saint Louis, MO
kudos:1 | Re: Ehhh-9-1-1 -- Believe it or not, it's a take-it-or-leave-it said by bus7821:Is complaint entry (into the CAD) done at the county, or at the individual dispatch centers? Fire is done at the individual dispatch centers. Police is done at the county for some munis, done at the individual dispatch center for others. | |
| | | | | | | | | | bus7821
join:2003-08-07
San Pedro, CA | Re: Ehhh-9-1-1 -- Believe it or not, it's a take-it-or-leave-it said by marigolds:Fire is done at the individual dispatch centers. Police is done at the county for some munis, done at the individual dispatch center for others. Wow, they did make it tough on themselves, didn't they? Sounds like a design based on politics rather than functionality. They could have saved a lot of money, initial and ongoing, by having all of the complaint entry at the county.
Where do the old 7 digit emergency numbers ring? And who is the CAD vendor? | |
| | | | | | | | | | marigoldsGainfully employed, finallyPremium,MVM
join:2002-05-13
Saint Louis, MO
kudos:1 | Re: Ehhh-9-1-1 -- Believe it or not, it's a take-it-or-leave-it Well, the political structure of St Louis goes back to the civil war, and was heavily influenced by the Jim Crow era (when a whole bunch of cities incorporated solely for the purpose of banning blacks from living in them).
Once you put 91 municipalities into such a small place, cooperation is pretty much impossible.
Police is almost a full cooperation though; it's really only the larger muni departments that do their own entry.
Of course, the city of st louis seceded from the county a long time ago, so their government, as well as all emergency services, are completely separate from the county.
--
ISCABBS - the oldest and largest BBS on the Internet
telnet://bbs.iscabbs.com
Professional Geographer
Geographic Information Science researcher | |
|
| | | marigoldsGainfully employed, finallyPremium,MVM
join:2002-05-13
Saint Louis, MO
kudos:1 | I forgot a huge factor too. PSAP employees are subpeonaed very frequently (at least weekly). Dispatchers can be too, but not nearly as often. Having your PSAP employees outside the country would be a bit difficult with the level of travel that would be required. | |
|
| patcat88
join:2002-04-05
Jamaica, NY
kudos:1 | Well the Police need E911 to get fake hostage reports by jealous wives so they can roll the new SWAT team that Homeland Security paid for. | |
|
marigoldsGainfully employed, finallyPremium,MVM
join:2002-05-13
Saint Louis, MO
kudos:1 | Not much of a backtrack In the last 5 years, PSAPs have consolidated to the point that PSAP boundaries are often essentially county boundaries. So, changing the rule to allow county level averaging instead of PSAP level averaging is not much of a backtrack. The same accuracy levels are still required, just the scale of the accuracy has changed. It's like comparing 1' accuracy at 1:1200 scale to 2' accuracy at 1:2400 scale. The number looks bigger, but it's still the same precision.
--
ISCABBS - the oldest and largest BBS on the Internet
telnet://bbs.iscabbs.com
Professional Geographer
Geographic Information Science researcher | |
| | | Cost worth it? As a nation, we've become so risk averse, we're willing to spend limitless amounts of money for things that in theory may be noble but in real life may be less than effective. At a certain point, you spend so much money on these myriad of projects that your personal tax rates rise to the point where working people don't take home much money, definitely not enough to live on. (The rich and corporations have pretty much cornered lower tax rates and tax shelters through deep-pockets lobbying and will continue to exercise that advantage for the foreseeable future.) At some point in time, common sense needs to kick in. The cost of E911, with all the bells and whistles (which weren't necessary), is ridiculous. Tech companies jumped on board to ensure a piece of the pie--reassigning addresses is a prime example of waste of both tax payer, individual and business dollars. (Our county just finished that exercise and most people and business are spending money to update all their data with the newly assigned addresses. No one believes that the changing of addresses (base on GPS coordinates) will increase efficiency of emergency services. It simply enriched the pockets of tech consultants and companies, who had cost over runs, naturally.). | |
| | bus7821
join:2003-08-07
San Pedro, CA | Re: Cost worth it? When you are having a heart attack in your office, and the paramedics show up at the building containing the PABX rather than the building where your office is, get back to us about how much of a waste accurate addresses are. | |
|
| |
|
|
·
·