FEMA TAKES LEAD FOR BROADER PUBLIC SAFETY WIRELESS PROGRAM

Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) is set to take over lead for Project Safecom, which now is designed to be “single point of contact for all federal wireless communications efforts for public safety,” FEMA Chief Information Officer (CIO) Ron Miller told us Fri. Move for White House Office of Management & Budget project comes as FEMA is set to be transferred to overarching Dept. of Homeland Security under proposal outlined by President Bush Thurs. CIO meeting of several federal agencies, including Depts. of Justice and Treasury, earlier this month decided to broaden direction of Project Safecom, which originally was envisioned as focusing on interoperability of federal public safety systems, Miller said. “We want agencies in the federal government to come together to ensure that we aren’t duplicating efforts and that we are solving problems that we have set out to solve,” he said.

Project Safecom, which has been supported by agencies such as FEMA and Treasury Dept., started out as one of OMB’s e-Gov programs, focusing on areas such as implementation of narrowband technology (CD June 6 p3). OMB program material described project as addressing communications requirements for 2 “highest probable threat scenarios” of bioterrorism and natural disasters. One goal of program is to “develop an integrated public safety response solution that addresses the top 2 threat scenarios by using existing infrastructure augmented by available commercial capability,” OMB said. Program also aims to “complete a gap analysis of existing inventories of public safety wireless communications at federal, state and local level,” by year-end 2002, it said.

At May 31 meeting of CIOs of several agencies, Treasury Dept. announced it was relinquishing management responsibility for program and it was redirected to more than federal interoperability as “the state and local infrastructure requirements and the first-responder requirements started to take center stage,” Miller said. “We started emphasizing those from the FEMA perspective because our constituents are the first responders.” Treasury still is participating in project and deputy managers from Commerce, Justice and Treasury Depts. and FEMA will oversee specific program areas. Besides federal-to-federal interoperability, program areas will include federal-to-state and local interoperability and first responders. Industry outreach will be broken into separate category, Miller said.

OMB Dir. Mitchell Daniels is expected to issue Clinger- Cohen letter to federal agencies involved in wireless projects. Letter is expected to address provisions of Clinger-Cohen Act that involve redirecting agency money toward single objective. Miller said funding level for Project Safecom for coming fiscal year hadn’t been determined. “At this point, we are evaluating the programs that are currently in progress throughout the federal government,” he said.

Regardless of ultimate funding level, Miller said, “we aren’t in a position to purchase new equipment.” Point isn’t to “dictate” to state and local govt. decisions they should make when buying equipment that’s designed to be interoperable. Instead, project will focus on new equipment guidelines “that will govern what they purchase,” he said. While choices ultimately will be up to state and local govts., such guidelines could help guide manufacturers in determining what kinds of equipment they make available. “You increase the amount of choice effective in the marketplace because you have provided a commonality,” he said.

Spectrum availability for interoperable communications among public safety agencies also will be examined in Project Safecom in partnership with FCC and NTIA, Miller said. Commerce Dept. is taking lead on industry interaction portion of program, Justice on federal-to-state interoperability issues and FEMA for first responders, he said.

Newly repositioned Project Safecom was cited several times last week at conferences held by Assn. of Public Safety Communications Officials (APCO) and Comcare as sign of increased profile that federal govt. was placing on public safety interoperability in context of homeland security efforts.