States and territories can apply for their shares of State and Local Implementation Grant Program (SLIGP) 2.0 funding that could total as much as $43.4 million and can be used…
Most governors will have at least until Dec. 21 to decide whether their states and territories will “opt-in” to FirstNet or pursue the “opt-out” option after the National Telecommunications and…
FirstNet updates the state-plan portals, but official state-plan delivery—the action needed to start the statutory 90-day decision window for most governors—must wait until the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA)…
The First Responder Network Authority (FirstNet) rejected a request for records from an attorney who specializes in Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests, saying the Middle Class Tax Relief and…
By Anna M. Gomez As Deputy Administrator at the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA), I was privileged to work with tremendously talented people in the Obama administration and…
The National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) publishes its final rule outlining the criteria and processes for it annual review of fees established and collected by FirstNet—a review that will…
Welcome to the first Public Safety Advocate column from our new web-home AllThingsFirstnet.com. After you read this week’s advocate take a look around the site, there is more to come…
Fri Jul 22 11:06:07 2016 NTIA Publishes State Opt-Out Guidelines This week NTIA released a document that will have a significant impact on states considering opting out. The NTIA’s document,…
Thu May 26 19:47:39 2016 Each state has the right to opt out of the plan FirstNet and the selected partner vendor presents to it. However, it the state does…
Fri Feb 26 13:57:04 2016 Okay, I am confused. FirstNet posted its responses to the first one hundred of the four hundred questions it received between the time the RFP…
Let’s hope that what comes out of this is more independence for FirstNet, leaving FirstNet to pick up the pace and get this network in the ground and operational.
As I see it, no meaningful private discussions means no partners. No partners means no more money for the network. No more money for the network means at some point FirstNet will not be able to continue to function, which means Public Safety will have lost the most important opportunity it will ever have to fix its interoperability problems.
The majority of the Public Safety community still believes today that this new network is about data and video and not about voice, at least for the foreseeable future.
The people needed for the CEO, COO, CTO, and CFO-type of positions reporting to the FirstNet board need to be high-level, skilled people who have been involved in planning and setting up a broadband network and handling the finances, technology, and operational aspects of such a system.