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9/11 Firefighters, Senior and Minority Groups to Warn Nextel Spectrum 'Grab' Will be Setback for Efforts to Improve Post-9/11 Emergency Communications WASHINGTON, June 23 /PRNewswire/ -- A newly formed "First Response Coalition" of firefighters (including New York City veterans of the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center) and other groups will release a white paper warning that a Nextel spectrum grab scheme now being considered by the Federal Communications Commission would make it much more difficult for police and firefighters struggling with post-September 11th demands to improve and coordinate emergency communications.* Commissioner William Fox, Metropolitan Fire Association, New York City; * Robert Stephens, chief of dispatch, Fire Department of New York (retired); * Gene Stilp, firefighter, EMT and vice president of the Dauphin-Middle Paxton Fire Company #1, Dauphin, PA.; and * Will Thomas, director, Corporate Accountability Project, Gray Panthers. The experts will warn that the Nextel plan will stymie post-9/11 progress toward "interoperability" of communication between police, firefighters and other first responders. The Coalition's white paper report also objects to the fact that the Nextel plan will require public service agencies to put up the front-end money to upgrade their communications facilities and then apply after the fact for reimbursement. This would impose a huge burden, since there are 20,000 cities and counties in the United States, and thousands of other local jurisdictions. In 2003, there were over 2.5 million public safety first responders in the United States, with no uniform standards in existence to govern their communications. TO PARTICIPATE: You can join the live phone-based news conference (with Q&A) by calling 1 (800) 860-2442 by 10:30 a.m. EDT on June 24, 2004. Ask for the "first response coalition" news event. CAN'T PARTICIPATE?: The coalition's white paper, a related news release and a streaming audio replay of the phone-based news conference will be available on the Web on June 24, 2004 at http://thehastingsgroup.com/firstresponders.html. First Response Coalition, Washington, D.C. CONTACT: Stephanie Kendall, +1-703-276-3254, [email protected], for the First Response Coalition Web site: http://thehastingsgroup.com/firstresponders.html |