Emergency Communications Board

BRISTOL TENNESSEE EMERGENCY COMMUNICATIONS DISTRICT BOARD OF DIRECTORS’ MEETING May 15, 2013 ITEM 1. Roll Call Frank Blanton and David Warren were absent. Ricky Curtis, Attorney, also absent. ITEM 2. Recognize Guests Nathan Cole, Century Link Greg Cross, City of Bristol IT Manager Mike Callahan, Supervisor ITEM 3. Minutes of Previous Meeting – April 17, 2013 Tim Eads made a motion, seconded by Jim Messimer, to approve the minutes from the April 17, 2013 Board meeting. All voted in favor. ITEM 4. Financials A. Receipts & Expenditures The receipts were passed around for review by the Board Members and signatures. B. Treasurer’s Report In the absence of the Treasurer, Virginia Smelser presented the Treasurer’s Reports. Copies of the reports are attached. Tim Eads made a motion, seconded by Shelton Hillman, to approve the Treasurer’s Reports as presented. Roll call vote: Blanton – absent, Eads – yes, Hillman – yes, Honaker – yes, Messimer – yes, Wade – yes, Warren – absent. Motion passed. ITEM 5. Old Business A. Report on Operations & Equipment 1. Overview of Operations a. Radio Low Volume Mrs. Smelser reported there has been no progress on this issue. However, she advised she has programmed a new APX radio for the Fire Dept. that has been having issues. After consultation with a Motorola engineer, the programming template has been ruled out as the cause of the issue. She has since programmed a second APX radio for testing to eliminate the radio as the problem. The Motorola engineers feel the problem is in the overall system infrastructure. She stated that Motorola and staff are trying very hard to keep the system operating; however, it is getting worse daily. b. Internet connection City IT Manager, Greg Cross, advised they have ordered and acquired the equipment to make the redundant internet connection  BRISTOL TENNESSEE EMERGENCY COMMUNICATIONS DISTRICT BOARD OF DIRECTORS’ MEETING May 15, 2013 functional; however, the equipment has not been programmed or installed as of this date. c. Status Update on Web page Move to City Server The City is in the process of changing and updating their web page. Mrs. Smelser is working with Jared Peters in City IT to update the Police Department web page and move the 911 web page to the City server. d. Update on GEO/GIS/TIPS After receiving a score of 95% on the last report from the State on our GIS/GEO, Mrs. Smelser called a meeting with the GIS representative from the State, Jon Hamic, David Metzger, and the Communications Center supervisors to discuss the grade and any problems. We were advised that once the known anomalies are removed, we are less than 2% in our error rating and well in compliance with the State requirements. e. Update on Upgrade to New Protocol/QA This item remains on hold. B. Statistics Mrs. Smelser reviewed the monthly statistics. Copies of the statistics were provided to each Board member. C. Update on Regional 911 Solution 1. Recent meeting with Century Link, Cassidian, and Regional Directors Mrs. Smelser requested a meeting to discuss the outages experienced by Washington County and Johnson County after they went live on the new 911 equipment. The State ECB Technical Director also attended this meeting. The group discussed the causes of the outage, fixes that have been put in place, and options for additional redundancy. Mrs. Smelser stated she felt more comfortable with the design of the system after the meeting. 2. Review and possible approval of $8,880.66 proposal to provide additional redundancy to 911 system and administrative lines in Communications. As a result of the meeting described above, Mrs. Smelser asked Century Link to price a backup phone system for the Communications Center that would be capable of accepting 911 calls with voice only, and admin calls in the event of a system or console failure. A copy of the proposal was provided to each Board member. Mrs. Smelser stated she had met with Greg Cross and Nathan Cole to discuss the options. Mr. Cross stated he is supportive of this proposed solution. This is a hard wire solution and thus not susceptible to failure in the event of a network outage. This solution  BRISTOL TENNESSEE EMERGENCY COMMUNICATIONS DISTRICT BOARD OF DIRECTORS’ MEETING May 15, 2013 will allow our calls to flow to these phones (voice and caller id only) in the event of a major outage. Mrs. Smelser stated that the admin phone lines are property of the City and the City would continue to pay the monthly phone line fee for these lines. She stated that because this system would be installed in order to provide redundancy to the 911 system, the 911 District could pay for the purchase and install. Blaine Wade asked if the install of the next generation 911 has created a need for additional redundancy. It was explained that because the new technology is VOIP based and not hard wired, there is a need for additional redundancy. Mr. Cole stated that all of the 911 trunks and ALI circuits come into this building. By moving into the next generation equipment, these trunks and circuits come into the building through fiber connections. There is a single connection that delivers the calls and ALI information. In the current hard wire system, there are two separate routes and connections that deliver the 911 service. There is a higher probability of failure on a VOIP network. Chief Wade asked if the State has a suggestion for a backup. Mrs. Smelser stated that the State is trying to implement a system, statewide, that connects all the 911 centers together so that in the event of a regional outage in our system, they could reroute our calls to Knoxville or some other location. Mr. Cole stated that he was talking with the State to engage AT&T in talks about additional connectivity and redundancy. He stated he has been led to believe that the State feels it would be cost prohibitive. This network is built separate from the internet so an internet outage would not take this system down. During the recent outage, the tunnel for the bandwidth started receiving more traffic that it could handle. A technician identified the problem but when he attempted to fix the issue, it caused a complete 911 system outage. The size of the tunnel has since been expanded; however, it has shown there are failure points in the system. The proposal of $8,880.66 includes the installation and five years maintenance. The only recurring cost will be the phone line cost that is paid out of the Communications budget. The cost of the phone lines will not change as we are using the existing admin phone lines in Communications. Once this system is installed, if the 911 system fails, our 911 and admin calls will reroute to these phones on the consoles. The transfer is automatic in a failure and requires no manual intervention. Chief Wade asked Greg Cross about any upcoming changes with the City that would affect these phone lines and Mr. Cross responded that the plan would not affect these lines. Tim Eads made a motion to proceed with the $8,880.66 purchase of this additional phone system for redundancy in the Communications Center. Motion was seconded by Jim Messimer. Roll call vote: Blanton – absent, Eads – yes, Hillman – yes, Honaker – yes, Messimer – yes, Wade – yes, Warren – absent. Motion passed. ITEM 6. New Business  BRISTOL TENNESSEE EMERGENCY COMMUNICATIONS DISTRICT BOARD OF DIRECTORS’ MEETING May 15, 2013 1. Mrs. Smelser advised that she would be attending the NENA Conference in Charlotte. 2. Dwayne Honaker and Tim Eads’ terms on the Board will expire on June 30, 2013. Mrs. Smelser reminded them to look for their notice and application from the City. 3. This month when Charter sent in their surcharge revenue remittance, the amount was reduced by almost $1,500. Mrs. Smelser contacted them and the State ECB and was told the ECB is investigating and verifying the Charter remittances from across the State. She was advised that the reduction was due to multiple lines being changed to a classification that does not fall under the law governing the 911 surcharge fees. The State ECB will be following up on this issue. Mrs. Smelser stated this will reduce our annual income by about $18,000. 4. Chief Wade stated the City Council has approved the Inter-Local Cooperation Agreement for 2013-14. ITEM 7. Discussion Items ITEM 8. Other Matters ITEM 9. Citizens and Delegations Presentation ITEM 10. Next meeting June 19, 2013.