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FCC Approves 10 Temporary Waivers of 9-1-1 Location Accuracy Rules

The FCC approved waivers of its wireless E9-1-1 location accuracy standards and reporting requirements for 10 rural wireless providers.
Each waiver will terminate six months after the provider receives a request for Phase 2 location data from a public-safety answering point (PSAP). Each waiver is conditioned on the carrier notifying the commission within 30 days of receipt of a valid request for Phase 2 location information from a PSAP.
Under the rules, commercial mobile radio service (CMRS) providers must meet increasingly stringent wireless 9-1-1 location accuracy metrics at periodic benchmarks. Providers must also periodically report aggregated data on the location technologies used in their networks for live 9-1-1 calls, both indoor and outdoor.
Nationwide CMRS providers must file quarterly reports aggregating live 9-1-1 call data from six representative cities, known as test cities. Every six months, non-nationwide CMRS providers must report live 9-1-1 call data, either for one or more of the test cities or for the largest county in their footprint, depending on the area served by the provider. Within 60 days after each location accuracy benchmark date, all CMRS providers must certify their compliance with the location accuracy requirements as of the benchmark date.
The carriers who requested the waivers are small, rural wireless providers and said that the PSAPs in their service areas are either not capable of receiving E9-1-1 Phase 2 location data or have not requested that the carriers provide Phase 2 location data. The carriers said they will provide the location data required by the rules upon request from a capable PSAP, but until then, they requested a waiver of the indoor location accuracy benchmarks and reporting requirements.
The FCC determined that the public interest would not be served by requiring the carriers to supply the enhanced location information to PSAPs that are incapable of receiving it and therefore, approved the petitions.
The carriers receiving the waivers are AST Telecom, Bristol Bay Cellular Partnership, Choice Wireless, Copper Valley Wireless, Docomo Pacific, Manti Tele Communications, PTI Pacifica, TelAlaska Cellular, Windy City Cellular and WUE.
Find the full order here.
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CentralSquare Acquires Tellus

CentralSquare, a provider of public-safety and administration software in North America, already works with 5,000 public-safety agencies. To accelerate the building of a single, virtual 9-1-1 dispatch system, current CentralSquare clients will immediately receive complimentary access to real-time situational awareness across jurisdictions.
An estimated 240 million calls are made to 9-1-1 across America each year. The calls come in to more than 8,900 different primary and secondary dispatch centers. These dispatch centers use multiple types of software systems, preventing dispatchers from easily identifying, deploying and coordinating emergency response across jurisdictions. This results in longer responses to life-threatening emergencies. This also leads to coordination challenges during natural disasters where dozens of police, fire and EMS services need to work collectively to prevent damage to life and property.
“CentralSquare already provides the broadest, smartest and most unified technology platform for nearly 5,000 public-safety agencies across North America,” said Steve Seoane, executive vice president and general manager of public safety at CentralSquare. “Going forward, seamless two-way integration between CAD systems will come standard out of the box on the CentralSquare Public Safety platform. As soon as a community deploys the CentralSquare Public Safety Platform, it will be able to seamlessly integrate law enforcement, fire and EMS resources with all neighboring communities. Our solution preserves the autonomy of each dispatch center as it integrates into existing CAD workstations. This eliminates the need for retraining dispatchers and builds on the unique local requirements at each center.”
With the acquisition, CentralSquare is promoting “public safety without borders” by building a single, virtual dispatch system across North America, where multiple agencies on disparate 9-1-1 software solutions can operate and communicate with each other as if they are on a single system, thereby reducing response time and saving lives. The FCC estimates that speeding up emergency response by one minute could save 253,032 nationally.
“For over 10 years, Tellus has been providing ‘safety without borders,’ erasing the lines between cities, towns and counties so that critical emergency response information can flow effortlessly to the closest first responder, expediting emergency response and saving lives,” said Tellus President Jonathan Mitchell. “Hundreds of agencies have using the Tellus solution to cut down emergency response time. … It’s exciting to join CentralSquare in bringing this powerful technology to the largest community of public-safety agencies in North America.”
CentralSquare will continue to support and upgrade all Tellus products for current customers, irrespective of the CAD system the agency uses, ensuring that citizens can benefit from faster response to emergencies.
“Seamless CAD-to-CAD connectivity is just one step in our vision to ensure that all agencies nationally can easily access each other’s data and resources,” said CentralSquare CEO Simon Angove. “We are making record-breaking investments in R&D to ensure that, in using artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning and other technologies, we are building a network where all agencies can quickly respond to emergencies, investigate crimes, pre-detect terror threats and mitigate casualties in natural disasters. Our mission is to make North America safer by making every community smarter and stronger.”
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Congressman Proposes Tying T-Band Delay to Ending 9-1-1 Fee Diversion

The Middle Class Tax Relief and Job Creation Act, which created the First Responder Network Authority (FirstNet), mandates that by 2021, Congress begin a process to auction the T-band spectrum. Within two years of the auction’s completion, public-safety licensees in the band must vacate the spectrum.
During a May 15 FCC oversight hearing by the House Subcommittee on Communications and Technology, Rep. Greg Walden, Republican leader for the House Energy and Commerce Committee, proposed delaying the start of that process to 2024.
“To be eligible for this delay, states and localities would simply need to comply with a very common-sense policy that bipartisan bills have already called for, which is to put an end to 9-1-1 fee diversion,” Walden said.
Walden said he would soon release a draft of the proposal and encouraged committee feedback.
The FCC’s most recent report on 9-1-1 fee diversion, released in December, found that nearly 10 percent of funds collected in 2017 were diverted to uses other than 9-1-1. According to that report, Montana, New Jersey, Nevada, Rhode Island, West Virginia and the U.S. Virgin Islands all diverted 9-1-1 fees during 2017.
“This ought to be mail fraud, frankly, because some communities and states are telling their consumers on their phone bill, ‘You’re paying for 9-1-1,’ when in fact they take the money and spend it elsewhere,” Walden said. “We need to take care of our 9-1-1 system, and consumers have the right to know that they’re being defrauded by their own governments in some cases.”
In his opening testimony to the subcommittee, FCC Commissioner Mike O’Rielly, who has repeatedly reprimanded states for diverting fees and pushed them to end the practice, said more legislation for the issue is necessary. Some states are working to end the practice, but a few are not, he said.
“The ‘name and shame’ process generated by our annual report has only been so helpful,” O’Rielly said. “The state leaders of certain recalcitrant states — New York, New Jersey and Rhode Island — don’t seem to care about the shaming part.”
O’Rielly said he found Walden’s proposal intriguing and was interested in learning more.
According to an FCC fact sheet on the T-band, there are 925 public-safety entities that hold licenses in the T-band. Those licenses cover 11 metropolitan areas across the country including Boston, Dallas, Houston, Los Angeles, New York, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, San Francisco/Oakland and Washington, D.C.
The Middle Class Tax Relief and Job Creation Act does not specifically address business/industrial (B/I) incumbents in the T-band. In April, the Enterprise Wireless Alliance (EWA) asked the FCC to designate the Part 90 800 MHz guard band spectrum as “green space” for relocating incumbents from the T-band.
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House Committee Infrastructure Bill Includes $12B in NG 9-1-1 Funding

The Leading Infrastructure for Tomorrow’s (LIFT) America Act includes $12 billion in grants for the implementation of NG 9-1-1 services. According to the draft bill released by the committee, grant funds could be used for implementing NG 9-1-1, establishing and maintaining NG 9-1-1, performing public outreach and education on how best to use NG 9-1-1 and its capabilities and usefulness, and covering administrative costs associated with the planning and implementation of NG 9-1-1.
Under the proposed bill, the grant funds could cover up to 80 percent of the cost of any eligible project. The rest of the project would need to come from matching funds.
The $12 billion in grant funding would be appropriated from 2020 to 2024.
The bill would also appropriate $40 billion for the deployment of secure and high-speed broadband service to move toward a goal of making broadband available to 98 percent of the U.S. Additionally, the bill would create a program, with funding of $5 billion, that would offer secured loans, lines of credit or loan guarantees to finance broadband infrastructure buildout projects.
The committee will hold a hearing on the bill May 22.
Find the full text of the bill here.
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Florida Agency Implements PowerPhone 9-1-1 Protocol

The system combines protocol technology, certification training and assessment that improves the level of service provided to callers, responders and communities. The protocol software, Computer Aided Call Handling (CACH) Standard in Total Response, uses scenario based protocols operating with a centralized database. The protocols help dispatchers more effectively manage every call.
“PowerPhone’s Total Response solution is more user friendly than other vendors’ and is significantly more adaptable, which gives our dispatchers the freedom to really focus on helping a caller in distress,” said Mario Bryant, communications center manager. “This software is also simplistic with navigation and design. The questions being asked by our dispatchers come off very natural.”
Certification training uses a proven, adaptable framework allowing the dispatcher to adjust the line of questioning as scene conditions change. For Boynton Beach, this transition allowed the agency to flourish and confidently provide the best standard of care to the community.
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Lafayette Parish Deploys Carbyne’s 9-1-1 Technology

The plug-in enables Lafayette Parish telecommunicators to receive device-based location for 9-1-1 and nonemergency calls, receive call-taker enabled video streams from callers, and instant message with citizens in situations where verbal communications may be untenable.
“Lafayette Parish 911 is leveraging advanced 9-1-1 technologies such as Mark43 and Carbyne, to make citizens and first responders safer,” said Craig Stansbury, 9-1-1 director of Lafayette Parish. “Both solutions are built for the digital age, providing benefit to our 9-1-1 center today and in the future. Implementing Carbyne’s technology provides our citizens with easily accessible, next-generation emergency services — ultimately decreasing time to dispatch and saving more lives.”
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IAFC Officials Discuss T-Band Auction Challenges with FCC

The representatives touched on the pitfalls of spectrum relocation and the impact such an event will have on affected jurisdictions. Also mentioned were the many benefits that the T-band provides to public safety as a reliable communications resource.
The IAFC representatives also thanked FCC officials for the proposed ±3-meter metric for vertical location accuracy detailed in the fourth further notice of proposed rulemaking (FNPRM).
During the discussion, the representatives suggested that the FCC explore narrowing the margin of error over a reasonable timeframe as technology develops. The security of the technologies and methods used to determine dispatchable location, including that of the National Emergency Address Database (NEAD), was also stressed as being important to the IAFC.
The full ex parte letter is here.
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Recent Motorola Acquisitions Drive Growth, Affect Future Plans, Executive Says

Motorola’s acquisition of Avtec, announced in March, offers two advantages for the company, Motorola CEO Greg Brown said during an earnings call for the first quarter of 2019. The acquisition expands the markets Motorola serves by providing inroads to seaports, airports and rail ports, which are new markets for Motorola, Brown said.
Additionally, Avtec’s focus in research and development (R&D) will fit well with Motorola’s own dispatch R&D and provide economies of scale, Brown said. Motorola expects revenues of about $20 million from Avtec this year, said Gino Bonanotte, Motorola executive vice president and chief financial officer (CFO).
Brown said he thinks there is some concern among consumers about cameras containing Chinese components and that such concerns could help Avigilon, which Motorola acquired in February 2018.
“Specifically, from a components standpoint, you’re right,” Brown said. “Huawei has a silicon chip that is in a number of competitors, but if you look at the federal government and also critical infrastructure, which has many of the same attributes, yeah I think it is a growing concern. I think the NDAA takes effect in August of this year, but I think it’s clearly favorable in terms of what we’re doing with Aviligon.”
The National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) prohibits federal agencies from procuring wireless technology and components from specific Chinese manufacturers.
Brown noted that Avigilon saw good growth in the first quarter, and is expected to grow at about 15 percent because of improved traction in federal, state and local government. When Motorola first purchased Avigilon, it was focused entirely on commercial, enterprise video solutions, but Motorola has begun directing sales and marketing resources to take it into the public-safety market, helping fuel its growth, Brown said.
The company’s recent acquisitions have helped it build out and diversify its product offerings, Brown said.
“We feel very good about the components that we have, and the width and breadth of what we’ve acquired to include 9-1-1 call-handling, CAD dispatch, records and evidence management, and we do not believe that competitively, anyone else has the width or breadth of this suite we’re building,” he said.
The company’s transition of its command center software suite to cloud-based solutions is going well, said Kelly Mark, executive vice president, services and software.
Motorola expects to have the majority of its software platform cloud ready by the end of 2020, Mark said. However, even with that transition, on-premises software will still be available.
“That transition will be gated based on our customers’ desire and how they want to execute on a deployment, but we view it as moving along quite well on that transition,” Mark said.
Motorola is also monitoring and exploring governments’ legal ability to store certain data in the cloud and will use that information to guide the future of products as needed, Mark said.
For the first quarter of 2019, Motorola reported revenue of $1.7 billion, up 13% from the year-ago quarter. Operating cash flow for the quarter was $251 million, up $751 million from the year-ago quarter. That previous year’s quarter included a $500 million voluntary debt-funded pension contribution.
Generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP) operating earnings for the quarter were $229 million, up from $171 million for the previous year, and non-GAAP earnings were $315 million, up from $260 million in the previous year’s quarter.
Revenue growth of 4 – 5% is expected in the second quarter of 2019 compared with the previous year, and revenue growth for 2019 is expected to be 6 – 7%.
“Q1 was an excellent start to what I believe will be another strong year, with first quarter records for sales, operating revenue and ending backlog,” Brown said.
Motorola’s products and systems integration segment reported GAAP earnings of $108 million, compared to $90 million from the previous year, and non-GAAP earnings of $147 million, compared to $125 million from the previous year quarter.
Key wins in the quarter for the segment were:• An award to build a new statewide Project 25 (P25) radio system in North Dakota,• An $25 million P25 award from the New South Wales Telco Authority in Australia, and• An $8 million TETRA order for a utility customer in Chile.
The services and software segment reported GAAP earnings of $121 million, compared with $81 million in the previous year’s quarter, and non-GAAP earnings of $168 million, compared with $135 million from the previous year’s quarter.
Key wins in the quarter for the software segment were:• A $17 million managed services contract with a mining customer in Latin America,• A $7 million CAD and records contract for a large government customer in California, and• $5 million video services renewal with the Chicago Office of Emergency Management.
The double-digit growth in sales for both segments was driven by the Americas and Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA), Bonanotte said.
Jack Molloy, executive vice president of product and sales, said that Brexit and a downturn in the German auto industry impacted Motorola sales, but had not had a major effect.
“Our European business is largely insulated as we’re largely a managed services company when you consider Airwave and other networks,” Molloy said. “The preponderance of our business is recurring revenue and management and support services in Europe.”
In the quarter, capital expenditures were up $25 million compared with the previous year’s quarter. That increase was primarily related to Airwave and U.K. Emergency Services Network (ESN) investments, as well as Avigilon, Bonanotte said. Motorola also spent $445 million acquiring VaaS International and $136 million acquiring Avtec in the quarter.
“I think the strength and continued performance of what we’re doing is because of the width and breadth of our product portfolio led by a healthy economy in North America but also reflecting at its fundamental base, the criticality and consistent demand for land mobile radio,” Brown said.
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New NG 9-1-1 Network Deployed in West Virginia

Much has changed since the first 9-1-1 call was placed in West Virginia. The state’s 9-1-1 service has been dependent on technologies that are now becoming obsolete and unserviceable. NGA 911 is a springboard for emergency response operations in West Virginia, taking emergency calling into the future of Next Generation solutions.
“NGA911 will move us into the future of 9-1-1 call-taking by cutting the cord with decades old technology, to state-of-the-art IP and cloud technology,” said Michael Mayhorn, Boone County (West Virginia) Emergency Management Agency. “With NGA911’s strong background and commitment they have already shown us, I am confident their service will reliably connect our citizens to 9-1-1 services, no matter what method or device they use.”
9-1-1 professionals and first responders can receive voice calls, photos, streaming video, real-time text, and building plans with the platform, leading to faster response and more lives and property saved.
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Elkins Joins NHTSA, National 911 Program

Elkins first worked for the Maryland Health Department on injury prevention programs. She then oversaw grant management and program implementation for two large counties in Maryland.
At NHTSA, Elkins splits her time working on initiatives for the National 911 Program and Office of EMS. She is supporting the 911 Grant Program to ensure states have access to additional funding needed to upgrade emergency communications systems.
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Comtech Buys General Dynamics NG 9-1-1 Business, Gains $100M Contract

The contract award, acquisition and hiring of new employees are expected to strengthen Comtech’s position in the growing NG 9-1-1 solutions market. Under the five-year contract award, which begins Aug. 4, Comtech will develop, implement and operate a secure, IP-based NG 9-1-1 system for the state that permits emergency service requests from its existing public networks through new and emerging modes of communications and devices. Comtech will perform similar services from April 29 through Aug. 3, 2019.
Comtech will provide financial and other information concerning this contract award and the NG 9-1-1 acquisition during its regularly scheduled conference call to review the results of its fiscal quarter ending April 30.
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San Francisco Partners with RapidSOS for 9-1-1 Integration with Uber

“The San Francisco Department of Emergency Management is always seeking ways to increase location accuracy from cellphone callers,” said Mary Ellen Carroll, executive director of SFDEM. “This new technology with enhanced location services and travel information will help save lives. We are grateful that our private partners are working with us directly in making San Francisco safer for all our residents and visitors.”
Since late 2018, San Francisco’s 9-1-1 dispatchers began receiving more precise location information from 9-1-1 callers. Developed by RapidSOS, this enhancement gives 9-1-1 dispatchers the ability to toggle between standard carrier automatic number identification/automatic location identification (ANI/ALI) and the phone’s own coordinates, allowing for greater location accuracy. This technology and additional location information is only available on updated versions of iPhones and Androids.
Prior to RapidSOS integration, basic location information that users agree to provide on a mobile device was not provided to San Francisco’s 9-1-1 system when a person called for emergency assistance. As a result, if the mobile caller could not provide location information, the dispatcher would have to initiate a lengthy process in an attempt to approximate a caller’s location. In 2014, the FCC issued a report estimating that improved mobile location information for 9-1-1 would save 10,000 lives annually.
In addition to this enhancement to 9-1-1 call processing, SFDEM, under agreement and through an integration with RapidSOS and Uber, will be the first agency in the Bay Area to receive accurate caller location and additional emergency data from Uber passengers initiating a call to 9-1-1 via the Uber app’s “9-1-1 Assistance” feature.
This new emergency button feature on the Uber app allows 9-1-1 dispatchers to automatically obtain key details, including Uber driver and rider information, vehicle description, license plate, current location and direction of travel. When Uber’s in-app emergency button is used, the information is sent digitally to the RapidSOS interface, which a dispatcher can then access once a caller indicates they are using the Uber service.
“We believe technology can help make the roads safer. This feature is available in more than 60 cities, and we are proud to add San Francisco, our home, to the growing list of cities using this technology,” said Krishnaja Gutta, Uber product safety manager. “Every second counts in an emergency, and we want to make sure Uber users have important information to get help quickly if faced with an emergency situation.”
The new technology will directly benefit and assist with the response from the San Francisco Police Department.
“Our core mission is to ensure the safety of the public,” said San Francisco Police Chief William Scott. “We welcome the use of technology that enables our City’s first responders to react more quickly and efficiently during an emergency.”
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Orion Labs Offers Floor-Level Location Accuracy with Voice Platform

The integration delivers enhanced situational awareness and improved operational efficiency in GPS-deprived environments by tracing the location of Orion managed devices.
“The indoor location of personnel and equipment assets is a vital piece of the puzzle for many mobile business-critical applications,” said Ramon Llamas, research director at global market intelligence firm IDC. “The Orion Voice Platform addresses this challenge by deploying the comprehensive Polaris 3D location toolkit with APIs (application programming interfaces), providing proven location technology.”
The technology allows users to know exactly what floor or room a team member or 9-1-1 caller is located. Plus, Orion customers in any industry using Advanced Location Services can locate team members on the vertical axis accurate to 3 meters’ distance to keep teams better informed and connected. The technology offers enhanced team performance and improves worker safety across the board.