Derecho Order Appears Almost Ready for Primetime, APCO Official Says
ANAHEIM, Calif. -- The FCC is expected to soon take up a follow up order on last year’s derecho storm, Association of Public-Safety Communications Officials Regulatory Counsel Bob Gurss told APCO members Sunday. Gurss said the initial hope was it would be ready in time for APCO’s annual meeting, which ends Wednesday. No order had circulated for a vote by commissioners as of late Monday, FCC officials confirmed.
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A number of public safety officials told us they have also heard an order is likely shortly, though staff are still working through the details and reply comments weren’t even in until June. FCC Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel urged the commission to act before the first anniversary of the June 29 storm when the FCC approved an NPRM following up on the storm (CD March 21 p4). One official said a September order is more likely than one this month.
"There was some hope that it could be out during this conference so the [FCC] staff people could discuss it,” Gurss said of the order. “I've heard they're close, but nothing that definitive,” a public safety industry official said.
The FCC proceeding “mainly addresses questions related to backup power situations, redundancy, and the audits that the carriers do of their systems to ensure they have these capabilities,” Gurss said. It will affect 911 call centers due to potential rules about when a carrier must inform the centers of outages, he said: “One of the biggest problems in the storms last year was, ironically, communication between the carriers and the” public safety answering points.
Expect the derecho report and order “soon,” said FCC Public Safety Bureau Chief David Turetsky during remarks at a Sunday NG-911 Institute reception. He outlined a “plethora” of emergency communications issues under scrutiny at the FCC, including text-to-911 and location identification accuracy.
Several other priorities will dominate the FCC, Gurss said. He expects a forthcoming FNPRM issuing “specific recommendations” and “specific deadlines” on which “improved accuracy has to be met indoors,” he said, mentioning the priority of identifying location on the vertical z-axis. He called this vertical identification “obviously a very important issue in larger cities.” The potential further notice, a “major issue in the coming year,” may debate whether the same rules should apply in urban areas versus rural areas, he said. “XYZ is becoming a reality,” said APCO Director of Communication Center and 911 Services Jay English Sunday, pointing to the work of different vendors. He described changes under way that will allow 911 call centers to identify the floor of a building people are on.
Gurss also pointed to the conflicting arguments of APCO and CTIA on roaming mandates for text-to-911 bouceback requirements (CD Aug 19 p4). “I would expect the commission to rule on that in the next month or so,” he said, specifying a time before the Sept. 30 bounceback requirement deadline. Other areas of interest include Verizon’s petition to end landline service in parts of New York and New Jersey damaged by Superstorm Sandy, he said: It “might be the beginning of a long term trend -- not just because of storms but because of economics.” The FCC may also nix companies’ obligations to provide 911 service to wireless phones without a subscription, which have been shown to yield “fraudulent calls, abusive calls,” Gurss said. He also criticized the 2016 narrowbanding deadline: “Almost no one thinks that’s a good idea.” ,