As the third anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks nears, the First Response Coalition says most police officers, firefighters, EMTs and other first responders in the United States still do not have the ability to communicate with each other during a crisis. Coalition founding members William Fox, New York Metropolitan Fire Commissioner, and Gene Stilp, a volunteer firefighter, EMT and vice president of the Dauphin-Middle Paxton Fire Company No. 1, in Dauphin, Penn., testified this week before the U.S. House of Representatives.

Fox and Stilp urged members of the U.S. House Committee on Government Reform's Subcommittee on Technology, Information Policy, Intergovernmental Relations and the Census to take steps to end the interoperability crisis as soon as possible.

In addition to pointing out that fire and rescue personnel did not receive the police order to evacuate the World Trade Center towers because their radios operated on a different system, they noted it is not easy to solve the interoperability problem. “New equipment, training, and additional spectrum are required to achieve communications interoperability,” Fox and Stilp told the subcommittee. “Most importantly, providing interoperable communications to first responders will require enormous financial support. It is estimated that $18 billion or more will be needed to replace all the public safety communications equipment nationwide. Nonetheless, the problem must be resolved as quickly as possible.”

The First Response Coalition plan calls for auctioning spectrum in the 1.9 GHz band and earmarking the proceeds from the auction for public safety communications needs. They said the auction could bring in $5 billion-$10 billion. "This allocation would accelerate regional deployment of interoperable communications systems to ensure that a majority of systems nationwide are upgraded by 2006,” Fox and Stilp said. “Current FCC policies would prevent an auction of this spectrum and use of the funds derived from an auction for public safety communications interoperability. In a misguided effort to solve a separate interference problem on public safety radio bands, the FCC has all but given a portion of the 1.9 GHz spectrum away to a commercial operator,” they added.

The First Response Coalition plan would reverse this decision, auction the 1.9 GHz spectrum, and take some of the proceeds generated from the auction of this spectrum to establish a “realignment fund” that would cover the costs incurred by public safety departments and local jurisdictions for resolving the interference problem. Fox and Stilp said the commercial wireless provider causing the interference would be granted replacement spectrum in another band and would be responsible for its relocation costs.

There are more than 2.5 million first responders in the United States.