Updated: 3-22-16

LINKS:
Background      Latest Update  
 "An Interesting Sequence of Events"
"All of Our Eggs In One Basket?"   The"Paper" Trail 

Firefighters Killed        LEOs Killed  

Please Note:  I was tempted to just upload the entire set of documents to this Web site and let anyone read them who had the desire to do so.  However, after discovering the personal nature and safety issues of many of the emails, I will not do that.  I may post a few quotations or even entire documents, but only to support my premise that we wouldn't have a communications safety issue if Emergency Management, Pro Comm Inc. and the Isabella County Board of Commissioners had not wasted hundreds of thousands of dollars on a VHF digital system instead of strengthening the existing analog system.


The FOIA Documents

prepared by

Mr. Robert Jerman, 
(Deputy Director Isabella County Central Dispatch And Emergency Management)

The Michigan Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) provides taxpayers with legal access to most government documents.  In January of 2016, I requested copies of records regarding the new (failed) fire service digital radio system which Isabella County substituted for the existing (working) analog radio system.  Finally, on February 26th, Ms. McAvoy, the Isabella County administrator, provided me with a box of well "scrambled" documents.  Click here to view the piles of documents and "padding" (after the 1st sorting).

Document Statistics

According to his time charts...
Mr. Robert Jerman, 
(Deputy Director Isabella County Central Dispatch And Emergency Management)
Spent about 60 hours searching/reviewing and about 6 hours duplicating ...

Here are my observations as I peruse the 1,100+ pages:
Weird Things

County Officials Knew There Would Be Problems

In October of 2011, Mr. Harold Stegman, owner of Pro Comm Inc. commented, 

"With the
migration to narrowband, 25 khz to 12.5 khz it is generally understood there will be a 3 db loss
or drop in signal. Simply stated this equates to a 20-30% loss of coverage area depending on
many factors that vary from system to system and geographic areas."  

In the same document, he also commented,

"Furthermore, such coverage losses do not result when the increased sites and
digital technologies are used."  

It is obvious from the emails and other documents that the County had prior knowledge of the impending loss of coverage and did not "increase sites" to prevent it from happening when they forced the digital system on the fire service.  Four years later, the County still hasn't expanded the tower & repeater system to compensate for the loss.  Expansion of the tower/repeater system would be much less expensive than the current push to adopt the digital 800 MHz system

County Officials Knew There Would Be Problems

In October of 2011, Mr. Harold Stegman, owner of Pro Comm Inc. commented, 

"With the
migration to narrowband, 25 khz to 12.5 khz it is generally understood there will be a 3 db loss
or drop in signal. Simply stated this equates to a 20-30% loss of coverage area depending on
many factors that vary from system to system and geographic areas."  

In the same document, he also commented,

"Furthermore, such coverage losses do not result when the increased sites and
digital technologies are used."  

It is obvious from the emails and other documents that the County had prior knowledge of the impending loss of coverage and did not "increase sites" to prevent it from happening when they forced the digital system on the fire service.  Four years later, the County still hasn't expanded the tower & repeater system to compensate for the loss.  Expansion of the tower/repeater system would be much less expensive than the current push to adopt the digital 800 MHz system

Power Points From
McCarther A. Griffis
Director,
Isabella County Central Dispatch And Emergency Management

2013 Isabella County Communications Plan
March 4th, 2013
Presented by:
McCarther A. Griffis

  • “Fire already knows the two towers doesn't meet the needs.”
  • “The coverage area needs to be improved, meaning better voice communications in existing areas, and better coverage in areas that we have never had coverage before within the county.”
  • “As it exists today every police, fire, and ems officer can talk directly to each other just by turning the knob on their current portable.”
  • “Today we have multiple back up options should the primary communications fail. (FIRE, EMS, County Parks, Main, Lein, Tac)”
  • “Today all public safety agencies are on one single platform. VHF analog.”
  • “If police move to the 800 Mhz spectrum and the fire services do not. We will have went backwards on the interoperability spectrum.”
  • “Fire Departments will have a very hard time making this work financially.”
  • “It is a permanent choice - no going back without serious costs. And it may not be possible.”
  • “The goals of being able to listen on a fire pager for most of the county area should be addressed.”

Those statements were presented 3-5 years ago. 

So, why did the County go digital and screw it up so bad the police had to go to the State owned 800 MHz system?

Contrary to what was reported in The Morning Sun*, THERE WAS NO FCC MANDATE TO GO DIGITAL. 

The move to digital was
-- approved by the Isabella County Board of Commissioners,
-- mandated by Director Griffis,
-- performed (bungled?) by Pro Comm Inc. and
-- paid for with OUR tax dollars.

Hundreds of thousands of dollars were expended on the digital VHF system WITHOUT providing additional tower/repeater systems to compensate for narrowbanding losses.

Now, because County officials failed to make VHF digital work, police & fire departments are being “forced” to turn to the State owned digital UHF system in the 800 MHz range. According to County documents, the move to 800 MHz is costing the County an estimated $600,000 for Central Dispatch. It will cost fire departments an estimated $934,000.  Total expenditures for moving to the 800 MHz system have been estimated at $2,122,400.00!

Can you guess who profits from those expenditures (purchases)? Why would our County commissioners approve this fiasco? These are OUR tax dollars at work… making emergency communications WORSE in NW Isabella County than they were 2 years ago.

* To view my response to the Morning Sun article...Click HERE

The Consequences ofFailure To Adequately Prepare
County officials had several years to prepare for the effects of narrowbanding, but they didn't.  
The problems were immediate and numerous:

(Note: Individuals' names have been replaced with a series of dashes ---- ----- .)

6/30/12      Dispatcher          pg 117 (compiled docs)
"… after narrow-banding the radios everything is worse than before. Tons
of static on primary and Lein. Fire frequency's are not any better the
Law frequency's. Sometimes it sounds like a high pitched echo, and I
have only noticed this on the fire side."

 7/7/12         Chief -----  ---------        pg 118 (compiled docs)
 “  … a P.I Accident today, …., the radios seemed to have less of
a range. We were on Blanchard Rd, between Coldwater and Brinton Rds
so not to far from Fire West.  Portables could not reach fire west
without being completely static, and Mobiles could get thru, however
even they were hard to read. While listening to the radio while on
scene, even dispatch's radio traffic was static and hard to
understand. I'm sure most of the issues stem from narrow-banding all
frequencies, and feel this is a safety concern.”

 
8/7/12         Dispatcher   pg 120 (compiled docs)
"This afternoon around 17:36 Fremont Fire was dispatched to the area of
Coe and Winn Rds for a mulch pile on fire. Deerfield,
Millbrook-Rolland, and Shepherd were dispatched for mutual aid. When
radio transmissions were on Fire West they were mostly static.
Millbrook-Rolland couldn't get out on the radios. Fremont tried
calling us at work on West and it was all static. They switched to
Fire East and it was clear. I'm wondering if during the recent storms
we encountered a lightning strike at the west tower and it harmed the
antenna."

 
8/7/12         Dispatcher   pg 122 (compiled docs)
 "Fremont Fire 5-3 was in the area of Gilmore and Millbrook Rds. He
tried transmitting on fire west and was all static, switched to Fire
East and was very clear. Radio transmissions were at 21:24:34 and
21:24:53 8-7-2012."

 
8/10/12      Dispatcher   pg 123 (compiled docs)
"As far as I am concerned fire west is not fixed. Radio transmissions
are hardly readable in the south/west part of the county, mainly
Fremont Township and the southern part of Deerfield Twp. Tonight we
dispatched Fremont Rescue for a run in Deerfield Township.  --------- ----
(5-1) was not readable on Fire West, he switched to Fire East and was
readable. Because of the poor radio transmissions ------- ------- (5-3)
tried to acknowledge the page and also could not get out, he switched
to Fire South and it was a little better, then he switched to Fire
East and the transmission was fine. Then ------- --------  (5-13) was the
third person who acknowledged the page. He lives in Shepherd, and was
clear on Fire South."

"I spoke with -----  as he had questions as to how it was working and he
said that they only replaced the antenna, not the wiring. He also
mentioned that they used an omnidirectional antenna, not a directional
based antenna like there was on West"

 
8/11/12    Dispatcher   pg 124 (compiled docs)
"Must be Fire West only works well for NSFD...
Dispatched Millbrook Rolland for a car fire on Remick Rd between
Coldwater and Woodruff. ------ ------ (10-2) who lives just west of
that location 1/2 mile could not get out on Fire West. He tried
multiple times, I finally asked him to switch to Fire East and was
able to understand him, although still a little static in the
transmission."

 
9/26/12     Chief   ----- -------        pg 124 (compiled docs)
"------------- fire would like to switch to Fire East for pages. This would assist in us missing pages since the narrowbanding took place."

 


Failure To Do The "Homework"
Radio equipment is designed for specfic uses.  Isabella County officials didn't do their "homework".

(From an article provided by a law enforcement official in Isabella County.)
Phoenix, AZ
When Fire Department officials in Phoenix, Ariz., field-tested Motorola's system for eight weeks in 2004, they found that their old analog system held up better during emergencies. The Motorola "digital... radios had a higher failure rate" and did not meet fire service standards, the Arizona study said.  "Look, we're using a system that is not as reliable as the one we had in place," Kearney said. "Yeah, it has a lot more bells and whistles, but it's only good when it works."

02/28/13 
(Email from a Michigan State Police Lt.) (Pg. 363 OCR compiled)
“Flying back Saturday. I met with Motorola reps before I left. They would like me to set a meeting with you Tim and I to discuss our radio options.
They let me know that moto-turbo is not meant for public safety.”

3/11/13
   (Email from a Motoro!a Representative) (Pg. 363 OCR compiled)
“I joined Rich Usian when we met with F/Lt. ----------  a few weeks ago, and am the Area Sales Manager for Ohio and Michigan with 30 years of government sales experience. As you are aware, we discussed at length the concerns that we have with Isabella County considering a non mission crititcal, not built for public safety system such as TRBO with I Chris and he agreed.”
 “We have grave concerns this type of system for first responders, and they are numerous.”

Can you guess which Motorola system the County decided to use for “digital” communications?
Good guess! 
The County and townships have spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on the MotoTRBO system which is 
“…not built for public safety…”. 
Due to the failure of the County to take corrective action to fix the problems, the fire chiefs are desperate to regain communications security for their personnel and the citizens they serve.  In my opinion, they are being “forced” to the very expensive State 800 MHz system without adequate research.  Motorola 800 MHz systems have been at the root of death and injury in many jurisdictions. 

A SOLUTION: 
Instead of “forcing” the townships to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to join the State system Isabella County, should put up two or three more tower/repeater/antenna systems to fix the coverage problems with the current VHF digital system.  Hundreds of thousands of dollars have already been invested in this equipment, already ($321,342.58 to Pro Comm Inc. from 10/18/12 to 3/6/14 ).  What happens to that investment if the County abandons the system?  Ebay?  Why don't they just fix it?

 Better yet, get additional towers in place, put the old “analog” system back in service along side the digital and keep it in good repair.  Why? Several of our mutual aid fire department partners in other counties do not have digital capability.  It would be a good thing to be able to talk to our own pagers and our mutual aid partners via the Fire West or NSFD repeaters, again.

SPENDING OVER $1,000,000 ON 800 MHz EQUIPMENT WILL NOT SOLVE ALL THE PROBLEMS CREATED BY ISABELLA COUNTY. (Read the above paragraph again.)

 THE BOTTOM LINE:
Isabella County needs to restore what was taken from us in March of 2015; reliable communications with handheld radios, not only with Isabella County agencies, but with mutual aid partners in other counties and our own pagers.



More to come... maybe (see my note at the top).