FirstNet Special Committee on Fitzgerald Complaint a Wrap, Though Investigation Continues
A FirstNet special committee examining allegations of misconduct on the part of members of the group’s board has effectively been dissolved, special committee Chairman Wellington Webb said Tuesday at the FirstNet board meeting in Boulder, Colo. The board also took further steps toward the launch of the network, including the selection of a headquarters site in Reston, Va., and the signing of agreements for early network deployments in Colorado and New Jersey.
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The board in October said the Commerce Department inspector general was taking over phase two of a probe that started after board member Paul Fitzgerald raised concerns at FirstNet’s April meeting. Fitzgerald, the sheriff of Story County, Iowa, questioned (CD April 24 p1) whether the board’s workings were open and transparent, including its hiring of consultants. In September, the board received part one of the report, which cleared FirstNet officials of wrongdoing (CD Sept 24 p1). The second part of the investigation focuses on procurement issues.
Webb, former mayor of Denver, said he and FirstNet Chairman Sam Ginn had agreed that the special committee should be folded into board committees overseeing governance and personnel issues. “Since we're now at a different place and time … that’s an appropriate place for it,” Webb said. “That would conclude our work.”
"I feel really good right now about where we are and I think we're going to have a good 2014, 2015,” Ginn said of the work FirstNet has done so far. “We're on the right track."
The board agreed on a lease for a headquarters building in Reston as well as for a technical facility in Boulder. More details will be made available when leases are signed, an NTIA spokeswoman said. The board also approved spectrum manager lease agreements for early network deployments in Adams County, Colo., and with New Jersey, two recipients of NTIA Broadband Technology Opportunities Program grants. The board also extended negotiations on an agreement with Texas through Feb. 24.
FirstNet earlier reached agreements with the Los Angeles Regional Interoperable Communications System Authority and New Mexico. FirstNet was unable to negotiate agreements with Charlotte, N.C., the Executive Office of the State of Mississippi and the Bay Area Regional Interoperable Communications Systems Authority in California, the board said in a news release.
The Adams County project “will be one of the first systems to have the capability to provide advanced mobile data services to a major airport complex and link adjacent public safety entities to airport public safety operations,” FirstNet said. “New Jersey revised its original project plan to focus on procuring deployable assets -- 37 cell sites on wheels. New Jersey will use these mobile cell sites to expand network coverage in the state and help inform FirstNet’s deployable strategy."
The Adams County project is located close to the Public Safety Communications Research center in Boulder and offers researchers “a real-life, real-time network to test additional features and functionality,” said FirstNet General Manager Bill D'Agostino. The New Jersey project “will enable us to look very closely at the ability to utilize deployables to provide service and recover service and that will be a very important part of our operational capabilities moving forward,” he said.
"I am very pleased with the progress that we're making with this,” said Chuck Dowd, BTOP board member and New York Police Department deputy chief. “I know a lot of hard work went into it. … I can’t stress enough the importance of early adopters and the lessons that we need to learn from those early adoptions. I think the more of those that we can do, the more effectively [what] we'll learn will shake out for FirstNet.”
D'Agostino said hiring senior management for FirstNet has been “priority one for me” and at this point five of the eight senior managers have been hired. FirstNet is close to filling the key slot of chief technology officer, he said. It has already selected a chief information officer “and we have an offer pending,” he said.