AFC Resource Room

Monday August 20, 2012

10:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. - Understanding How to License 700 MHz Frequencies

Where do I start? The application and licensing process can be difficult to understand and frustrating. Your Regional Planning Committee is there to help. This session takes you through the basics of working with your Regional Planning Committee to complete and submit your frequency application. Come learn about these important steps to successfully apply for and license 700 MHz frequencies for your system!

Presenters:

• Mike Jeffres
• Chris Kindelspire
• William Carter 

Mike Jeffres administers the state P25 radio network and has been involved in public safety communications for over 22 years. He has worked with hundreds of local, state and federal officials to improve public safety communications, interoperability planning and coordination. Mike chairs the Nebraska Region 26 700/800 MHz Planning Committees, and is an APCO local frequency advisor for Nebraska.

Chris Kindelspire  is responsible for voice & data communications infrastructure, including 800MHz trunked simulcast, VHF/UHF conventional, and microwave connectivity, radio consoles, and E911/telephony systems, IP fire station alerting, mobile assets including field dispatch unit and command trailer, and response planning, including Tactical Interoperable Communications Plan and CASM. His state memberships and leadership positions include: 700 and 800 MHz Regional Planning Committees for Regions 54 and 13, APCO frequency advisor since 2003, 2008 Illinois APCO Technician of the Year, Illinois Transportable Emergency Communications System Team 3, MABAS  (Mutual Aid Box Alarm System), Communications and Dispatch Committee, North Central Region Representative Motorola Trunked Users Group, and RPC representative on the Illinois State Interoperable Executive Committee. Chris has several local memberships and leadership positions: MABAS Division 15 HazMat team member, Communication Unit Leader, Morris Fire Protection and Ambulance District – 21 years as Captain, current member of the Grundy County Zoning Board of Appeals, and Alderman with the City of Morris 1996-2001. Chris holds degrees from Southern Illinois University – 1991 B.S. Industrial Engineering Technology, and A.S. in Automated Systems and Robotics.

William Carter serves as subject matter expert in NIMS and Communications for the Illinois Department of Health, Office of Preparedness, Division of Disaster Planning and Readiness. Responsibilities include, but not limited to, Public Safety Communications and Emergency Management, NIMS and ICS, Federal Communication Commission (FCC) Spectrum Management and Regulatory Compliance, Wireless Network Operational Validation, Dispatch and Field Communications, Logistics, Information Technology, Strategy Development, Project Management; Program Administration, Data Collection and Analysis, Training, Department/State Communications Policy Development, Event Management, Budget Analysis and Management.

2:00 p.m. to 3:30 p.m. - Incident Communications System (ICS) based Communications Plans

Public Safety relies on an extensive variety of public and private, wired and wireless, voice and data systems and applications supporting intra and inter-agency incident communications.  The application of appropriate solutions are best managed through the development, training and exercising of comprehensive communications plans.  The Communication Plan (Comm Plan) is a fundamental resource to manage public safety communications across agencies using common and disparate systems and applications. The Comm Plan facilitates effective and efficient Incident Communications System (ICS) operations during planned events and multiagency emergency incidents. Comm Plans also provide a formal operational plan and serve as an instruction manual to direct users on the appropriate situational voice and data communication systems and solutions employed during response events.

This session will focus on developing effective Communication Plans supporting interoperability among and between local, regional state, national and federal agency participants. Furthermore, attendees will learn how to design Communication Plans that achieve the following objectives:

• Comply with the National Incident Management System (NIMS)
• Guide users in selecting the proper voice and data communications solution to facilitate mission critical voice communications and data sharing across agencies and jurisdictions as well as public notification processes and procedures
• Provide in-depth reviews of current agency communications operations, capabilities and solutions with standard operating procedures for each system including Land Mobile Radio (LMR), Crisis Information Management Systems (CIMS), Messaging Systems, Telephony Systems, Data Applications, and Information Technology Systems
• Review contingency communications planning

Direct experience in developing multiagency planned event and emergency incident Communications Plans together with case studies from the District of Columbia (2009 Presidential Inauguration, 4^th of July and others) are incorporated into the seminar.

Presenter: Rick Burke, Televate LLC

Rick Burke is a co-founder and Managing Partner at Televate LLC. Rick has over 30 years of system engineering and operations experience with complex communication networks and applications.  He is a subject matter expert on public safety land mobile radio, wireless broadband systems, and information technologies and has substantial expertise in implementing large-scale interoperable voice and data communications plans and networks for city, state, and federal government organizations.

3:45 p.m. to 4:45 p.m. - Narrowband Analog Simulcast Workshop 

The design considerations of narrowband vs and wideband simulcast will be explored.  Tools for RF coverage analysis and products enabling system implementation will be identified.  A local project will be featured as an example, and then specifics of projects from participants can be discussed.

Presenters:

• Ed O’Connor, Simulcast Solutions LLC
• Steve Dubberstein 

Ed O'Connor is the founder and president of Simulcast Solutions LLC.  He has been involved in the implementation of well over 500 simulcast Radio systems over the past two decades and will be presenting this workshop. 

Steve Dubberstein, President and CTO of Communications Service of Portage, WI, has implemented  over a half dozen simulcast radio systems throughout Wisconsin and will share specifics of one of his recent narrowband conversions.

10:00 a.m. to Noon- A Nationwide 700MHz Public Safety Broadband Network: 

This session will explore how the Public Safety Communications Research (PSCR) Program, a joint program between NIST's Office of Law Enforcement Standards (OLES) and NTIA's Institute for Telecommunication Sciences (ITS) is providing research, development, testing, and evaluation in support of the effort to build a nationwide, interoperable public safety broadband network.

PSCR has been actively involved in the efforts surrounding public safety broadband, including playing a central role in gathering public safety’s communications requirements and representing those requirements to standards development organizations worldwide, like the 3^rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP).  In 2010, PSCR implemented a one-of-a-kind 700MHz Public Safety Broadband Demonstration Network that provides a vendor-neutral environment where first responders, industry, andgovernment agencies can test and observe how equipment operates and what challenges public safety will encounter as they build out their nationwide network. This talk will provide additional background and details of PSCR’s work in the public safety broadband arena and how PSCR plans to move forward with its cutting-edge research, development, testing, and evaluation projects to advance public safety communications interoperability.

Presenters: 

• Dereck Orr, Program Manager, PSCR
• Jeff Bratcher, Technical Manager, PSCR
• Andrew Thiessen, Lead Project Engineer, PSCR
• Emil Olbrich, Lead Project Engineer, PSCR
• Michael Souryal
• Dr. Robert Stafford

Dereck Orr

Dereck Orr is the Program Manager for Public Safety Communication Standards at NIST’s Office of Law Enforcement Standards, and has held that position since December 2002.  In that role, he leads the Public Safety Communications Research (PSCR) program that serves as an objective technical advisor and laboratory to the Department of Homeland Security and public safety to accelerate the adoption and implementation of the most critical public safety communication standards and technologies.  From October 2003 until October 2004, Mr. Orr was detailed to the Department of Homeland Security to serve as the Chief of Staff of the SAFECOM Office within the Science and Technology Directorate, to help establish the new program.  Prior to working at NIST, Mr. Orr served as a professional staff member of the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee for the Departments of Commerce, Justice, and State, and Related Agencies underSenator Fritz Hollings. In that position, Mr. Orr was responsible for the appropriations accounts relating to state and local law enforcement issues.  Prior to that, Mr. Orr served four years at the Office of Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) at the Department of Justice.  Mr. Orr received a Masters in Public Policy from the College of William andMary and a Bachelor of Arts in American History from the University of Texas at Austin.

Jeff Bratcher

Jeff Bratcher is the Division Chief for the Telecommunications and IT Planning Division at the U.S. Department of Commerce National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) Institute for Telecommunication Sciences (ITS) located in Boulder, Colorado. Mr. Bratcher has been with ITS since 2003. One of his primary roles is serving as the Technical Manager for the Public Safety Communications Research (PSCR) program which is a joint effort with the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Office of Law Enforcement Standards (OLES). PSCR serves as an objective technical advisor and laboratory to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and Public Safety practitioners to accelerate the adoption and implementation of the most critical public safety communication standards and technologies. Prior to joining ITS, Mr. Bratcher worked for multiple commercial cellular infrastructure vendors deploying 2nd and 3rd Generation cellular systems worldwide. Mr. Bratcher received his Master’s of Science in Telecommunications from Southern Methodist University and a Bachelor’s of Science in Electrical Engineering from Texas Tech University. 

Emil Olbrich

Emil Olbrich is currently Lead Project Engineer with the NIST Office of Law Enforcement Standards working on broadband initiatives and supporting the Public Safety Communications Research (PSCR) program. His work is primarily focused on 700 MHz wireless broadband technologies in public safety communications from the federal level to the state and local level. Prior to this position he was Senior Consultant with Protiro Inc. working at the Institute for Telecommunication Sciences (ITS) in Boulder, CO supporting the PSCR and NIST OLES teams. Mr. Olbrich has over 16 years of experience in the field of wireless telecommunications.  He has worked primarily in R&D at some of the largest telecommunication companies in the world, such as Motorola, Qualcomm and Ericsson. His past experience with cellular based networks is helping to advance public safety communications into the next generation of wireless communications.

Andrew Thiessen

Andrew Thiessen is the Lead for Public Safety Communication Standards, Requirements, and Compliance Assessment for the Institute for Telecommunication Sciences (ITS), in the National Telecommunications and Information Administration, Department of Commerce. Mr. Thiessen's work at ITS is part of a joint effort between ITS and the NIST Office of Law Enforcement Standards (NIST/OLES) named the Public Safety Communications Research (PSCR) program. Mr. Thiessen is the Project 25 Compliance Assessment Program (P25 CAP) Laboratory Program Manager. As such, Mr. Thiessen is responsible for the assessment process as it pertains to the P25 CAP. Mr. Thiessen is also the chair of the APCO Project 25 Interface Committee (APIC) Broadband Working Group (4.9GHz), Vice-Chair of the National Public Safety Telecommunications Council (NPSTC) Technology Committee, co-chair of the NPSTC Broadband Working Group (700MHz). Mr. Thiessen has worked as a principal in several small start-ups, as a Senior Systems Engineer for Sun Microsystems, an engineer for MITRE, and an engineer for the National Security Agency. Mr. Thiessen holds a Bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering for Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI), a Bachelor’s degree in English, also from WPI, and a Master’s degree in electrical engineering from Stanford University.

Michael Souryal

Michael Souryal works with the Information Technology Laboratory at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), Gaithersburg, MD. He received his D.Sc. in electrical engineering from The George Washington University (2003), M.S. in information networking from Carnegie Mellon University (1991), and B.S. in electrical engineering from Cornell University (1990). He first came to NIST as an NRC Postdoctoral Research Associate in 2004. From 1991 to 1999, he was with Telcordia Technologies (formerly Bellcore), Red Bank, NJ, where he was involved in new service development for public network providers. His research interests are in communication theory, dynamic spectrum access, and public safety communications.

Dr. Robert Stafford

Dr. Stafford holds a PhD from Virginia Tech and was one of the charter members of the LTE research program at PSCR. He is the principal architect of many of the RF infrastructure tests used in the program and has a background that ranges from instrumentation theory and precision RF metrology through propagation analysis and signal processing for software defined radios. Rob has done work in the fields of high speed time domain waveform metrology, voice over IP, cellular network discovery and RF signal processing techniques, as well as participating in standards bodies like the Internet Engineering Task Force and the IEEE 802 networking group.

Wednesday August 22, 2012 

9:30 a.m. to 10:30 a.m. – T-band: What is next?

The session will discuss recently enacted legislation that will force public safety to give up the T-Band, FCC actions to freeze applications and relieve T-Band licensees of narrowbanding requirements, and what steps T-Band licensees can take to address their short term, mid-term, and long term spectrum needs. 

Presenter: Robert Gurss 

Robert Gurss has long served as APCO’s Regulatory Counsel.  He is also a telecommunications attorney with the firm of Fletcher, Heald & Hildreth, through which he represents state/local governments and other clients, including both large and small licensees in the T-Band. 

11:00 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. -Utility/Public Safety Broadband Sharing 

Under provisions of the Middle Class Tax Relief and Job Creation Act of 2012, utilities may share the 700 MHz Nationwide Public Safety Broadband Network (NPSBN) through covered leasing agreements, and they could serve as important partners in the construction, operation and maintenance of the network.   In addition, the FCC is conducting a rulemaking to consider sharing the 4.9 GHz band with utilities.  Sharing makes sense because they have similar communications needs as public safety and there are synergies that can be achieved between utilities and public safety.  Utilities have extensive infrastructure and other resources that could help to offset some of the cost of construction and accelerate deployment, particularly in remote areas that utilities  must serve as part of their public service mission to provide essential electric, gas and water services to the public at large.   They also could help promote the sustainability of the network by providing a potentially large end-user base of subscribers and devices that would access the network.  Finally, access to the network would promote interoperability between utilities and public safety during emergencies, such as hurricanes, tornados and ice storms. Utilities have successfully shared networks with public safety in several states and they should be able to successfully share the 700 MHz PSBN and the 4.9 GHz spectrum.  This session will identify these and other benefits from sharing the network with utilities, and it will feature an interactive discussion with utilities on the issues that they see for sharing going forward.  Find out how utilities and public safety can share and partner together on the 700 MHz PSBN and the 4.9 GHz spectrum during this informative and interactive session.

Moderator:  Brett Kilbourne, Deputy General Counsel, UTC

Session Speakers:

1. 1.Kathy Nelson, Chair of the UTC Public Policy DivisionPrincipal Telecommunications Engineer at Great River Energy in Minnesota.
2. 2.Klaus Bender, Senior Director of Engineering at UTC
3. 3.Harlin McEwen, PSST
4. 4.Mike Koch, Motorola

Mr. Kilbourne is currently Vice President of Government Affairs and Deputy General Counsel at the Utilities Telecom Council (“UTC”) where he provides legal guidance to utilities on telecommunications issues both pending before federal and state agencies and being considered in Congress.

UTC is the national representative on telecommunications matters for its electric, gas and water utilities and natural gas pipeline company members, which range in size from large combination electric-gas-water utilities which serve millions of customers, to smaller, rural electric cooperatives and water districts which serve only a few thousand customers each.

Prior to joining UTC in October 1998, Mr. Kilbourne was employed at BellSouth Corporation from 1994-1998 in its Washington, D.C. office where he assisted the legal department on a variety of common carrier, wireless and cable issues. He was also employed at the law firm of Baker & Hostetler from 1991-1994 where he assisted the communications practice, primarily on broadcast and cable television matters. Mr. Kilbourne graduated in 1987 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in History from the University of the South in Sewanee, Tennessee. He received his Juris Doctor degree in 1998 from The Catholic University, Columbus School of Law and is licensed to practice law in the State of Maryland.

AFC Local Advisor Lab Schedule

77^th APCO Annual Conference

Minneapolis, MN

August 19 – 22, 2012

Convention Center – Room 101 E

Lab Hours (Room TBD) 

Sunday August 19, 2012:  1:00 p.m. – 5:00 p.m.

Monday August 20, 2012:  8:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m., Closed Noon-2:00 p.m. Advisor Luncheon

Tuesday August 21, 2012: 8:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m.

Wednesday August 22, 2012: 8:00 a.m. – Noon

• 1:30 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. – Mandatory Training Session 
• 1:30 p.m. to 2:45 p.m. – ATDI – Spectrum-E
• 2:45 p.m. to 3:45 p.m. – Dave Buchanan – TSB-88
• 3:45 p.m. to 4:30 p.m. – Robert Gurss – Regulatory Update
• 4:30 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. – AFC Staff – Q/A session