I understand Chief Suit's concern, but all radio systems do not have to be digital in order for personnel from different jurisdictions to communicate with each other during joint operations. The radios that operate on the 800 MHz digital systems here in the metro area are backward compatible meaning they can operate on the Fulton County analog 800 MHz System, plus there are, or at least should be, mutual aid radio channels in every 800 MHz radio used by public safety agencies throughout our State. There is no guarantee if the Fulton County System were to be upgraded to digital or if the North Fulton cities were to either join UASI or build their own radio system that their radios will work every where they go in North Fulton County, both outside and inside buildings. The incident involving the officer in Charlotte-Mecklenburg was a tragedy where someone didn't do their homework and should not be blamed solely on the radio system.

I don't think Chief Sult was trying to blame the death of the officer in Charlotte-Mecklenburg solely on the radio system, but was just using it as an example of how critical radio communications are for public safety agencies. I have worked in public safety communications for over 30 years and can tell you that no radio system is going to provide 100% coverage, 100% of the time everywhere an officer will go within his/ her jurisdiction. Even if one installed a system that provided this type of coverage within a jurisdiction today more than likely it will not provide the same level of coverage three or four years from now due to the construction of new buildings within that jurisdiction. I agree with Bobby Lee that agencies need to rely more on the use of mutual aid channels when providing aid to other jurisdictions instead of the expensive solution of linking systems together which has a huge up front, reoccurring and replacement costs. We must work to make two-way radio communications during mutual aid incidents cost effective, uniform across the State and simple for the officers and firefighters to use. It does not make sense to spend millions of dollars to link radio systems together for some agencies to use only once or twice a year, if that. One of the reasons our City has not joined the UASI Radio System is the Atlanta UASI Oversight Committee continues to push the agenda of charging all agencies a monthly fee per radio to have access to the network.

Amazing, sounds like another ploy to push a radio system sale. Moving to a digital radio system will not guarantee end-to-end interoperability. Ironically, before 9/11/2001, go all the way back to the mid 1980's when programmable portable radios became available on VHF/UHF, we had more interagency interoperability. I recall a day when all metro ATL agencies were either on UHF (in town) and VHF (suburbs) and we seemed to have no issue with interagency communications. Common radio channels like MRD and state band made working with other agencies effortless. Everyone had mutual aid channels in their radios, and knew how and when to use them.
Only when we started implementing closed, proprietary complex trunked radio systems, both analog and now digital, did this interoperability "crisis" emerge. And note how venerable these systems are to failure, and what do agencies do...reach for their old analog VHF/UHF conventional radios. Why did we ever stop using them in the first place? Time to stop listening to radio vendors and start using common sense. Maybe we wouldn't be furloughing public safety employees as we would be spending millions on new radios that don't work. Just an idea.

The problem is who will pay for such a system? A multisite simulcast 700/800MHz digital trunked radio system to cover the area in question will cost anywhere from 7-15 million dollars for the infrastructure alone, not counting subscriber units. The complaints about the Fulton county system are valid, but one must keep in mind, it was designed for FULTON county government users, the majority of which are now south of the river. Since the North Fulton cities have "declared their independence" from Fulton county, there is little incentive for Fulton county to add the needed sites and upgrades to a system that otherwise serves their needs adequately. Not to mention using the Fulton 800 system is cheaper than anything else right now, and with the lack of revenue to do otherwise, what is the alternative solution?
The bottom line is this is an expensive problem with no cheap solution. Obviously CHATCOMM decided against the UASI (which is a complete and utter SCAM BTW) or even DeKalb's Astro 25 network for Sandy Springs. Rural Metro uses the Fulton 800 system as well, and they have mostly analog radios (MTS2000 portables) at this point. Something else to take into consideration. It's all about money, something hard to come by these days, even in North Fulton county.

Millions of taxpayer dollars have been given to one vendor because systems were not put out to bid the way they should have been and the bad part of this is the employees of these government agencies will try to justify their reason for not bidding to the hilt giving their commissioners 10 or more reasons to give the project to a specific vendor with interoperability being one of the reasons. If anyone challenges them on it they will fight you to the death to cover up why they did not go out to bid for a multi-million dollar radio system and can smooth talk anyone that doesn't know anything about radio systems into believing they have done the right thing by not going out to bid. I personally would love to see the NF cities scrap the UASI idea and go out for bid for their own system if they would write a true RFP that is not vendor or technology specific. A true RFP allows vendors to assess an agency's needs based on information provided and submit multiple proposals to meet the agency's operational needs. There is no mandate for agencies to switch to P25 digital technology even though a couple of vendors and local radio shops want you to believe that. Need I explain more?