Happy Anniversary

Today marks the one-year anniversary of enactment of landmark legislation that created FirstNet and will lead to the deployment of an advanced, nationwide, interoperable public safety broadband network.  From the printed words of the law, we are witnessing tangible evidence of what public safety successfully fought for, including a dedicated FirstNet board, armed with spectrum […]

The Spectrum Alphabet

For folks unfamiliar with the concept of “radiofrequency spectrum,” it wasn’t easy to comprehend what the heck the “D block” was and why it was so important for public safety.  Think of spectrum like highways – some are wider than others, some are better paved, some have more traffic, some are more direct, etc.  But […]

Sandy

Unfortunately, Sandy, the Hurricane turned Superstorm, has become yet another large-scale disaster, with ongoing effects for the foreseeable future. During my tenure at the FCC, I had the opportunity to serve a role in the federal National Response Framework (specifically, Emergency Support Function #2 – Communications).  Throughout my career, including my current position with APCO, I […]

A terrific line-up for conference

While I’ve been a guest at APCO’s Annual Conferences in the past, this is the first year I’m on the “inside” and it’s been a terrific experience thus far.  I’m especially excited with the sessions that our Government Relations team has set up.  Not only do we have a number of highly esteemed government officials […]

FirstNet is Almost Here

A united public safety community achieved a great success this past February with enactment of the public safety broadband legislation.  In all significant respects, public safety received the spectrum, funding, and nationwide governance structure it lobbied for and which all agreed were essential to success.  With the reallocation of the D Block for public safety […]