Emergency-911 reliability suffers from using pre-internet infrastructure and from institutional complexity, insufficient staffing and funding, experts said in interviews. Next-generation 911 won’t prevent outages and adds new challenges, they said. Over time, the IP-based network should be more reliable and will help detect and fix problems faster, they said. Funding NG-911 and ending state diversion of 911 fees would speed improvements.

APCO's executive committee and executive director met with the officers and CEO of the National Emergency Number Association July 29 to discuss joint positions on 911 issues. An APCO official said the group had nothing to say beyond a statement. “The collegial and productive meeting resulted in consensus by both associations for the need for all Next Generation 9-1-1 technologies to be both interoperable and interconnected including equipment currently described as NENA 13 ‘compliant,’” said a Friday joint statement. “The two associations also discussed and agreed on the need for federal funding to enable state and local governments to transition to Next Generation technologies as well as the need for consistent and transparent messaging concerning the current state of Next Generation 9-1-1 equipment offerings.” Look for joint communications on these topics in the next 30 to 60 days, the groups said.

New York City’s Next-Generation 911 project will have positive impact for the rest of the country, but more funding is needed, the National Emergency Number Association said Wednesday. The city’s Department of Information Technology and Telecommunications released a request for proposals seeking vendors to build the infrastructure supporting the IP-based 911 system, DoITT said in a Tuesday news release. Proposals are due Aug. 8, with work slated to start in December and NG-911 expected to launch in Q1 2022, DoITT said. While NG-911 is in development, the city plans to launch a text-to-911 service by Q1 2018, it said. “New York’s insistence on testing, validation, and standards will have benefits far beyond our largest city,” NENA said in a statement. “To bring NG9-1-1 to the entire country, however, we need a significant injection of federal capital, and soon. Otherwise, many 9-1-1 centers and the responders and citizens they serve could be stuck with expensive, less-reliable legacy equipment and systems for years to come.” New York City officials applauded the project. “Our number one priority is keeping New Yorkers safe, and developing the strongest, most state-of-the-art 911 system is essential to that mission,” said First Deputy Mayor Anthony Shorris. “In the 21st century, that means ensuring that New Yorkers who need to communicate with 911 can do more than make a phone call -- we want to give them the ability to send photos, stream video, and more.” NG-911 will make it easier for the city to make further 911 upgrades in the future, added DoITT Commissioner Anne Roest.

The National Emergency Number Association said it's pleased wireless carriers' privacy and security plan for the National Emergency Address Database (NEAD) got general support. The FCC Public Safety Bureau sought comment on the plan; replies were due Thursday in docket 07-114 (see 1702280051). NENA said it felt compelled to respond to earlier comments by the National States Geographic Information Council (NSGIC) and its supporters. They argue access should be provided to 911 entities and their authoritative geographic information system (GIS) data providers for purposes analogous to current address validation, discrepancy reporting and error resolution, NENA wrote. “It is at least implicit in the comments, however, that NSGIC seeks access to data beyond that which was contemplated at the time E9-1-1 and/or NG9-1-1 standards were developed, beyond that which was negotiated between NENA, APCO, and the four largest wireless carriers and included in the Commission's rules, and beyond that which was designed-in to the NEAD architecture. Although NENA agrees entirely with NSGIC that address data utilized for 9-1-1 purposes must be validated in advance of use, we are compelled to reaffirm our commitment to the standards, the agreement and rules, and the significant work that has already gone into architecting the NEAD.” The New York State Office of Information Technology Services said the request to add “pre-validation of a NEAD dispatchable location, including its additional ‘subaddress’ information, as an allowable government use for 9-1-1 purposes’ to the NEAD Privacy and Security Plan” is critical to public safety answering points and GIS data providers. Both “need to confirm civic address locations within the NEAD are valid prior to their use during a 9-1-1 call so that should a call ever come from that device, its associated location is routable for 9-1-1 and usable for dispatch, which ultimately will save lives,” the agency said.

The National Emergency Number Association told the FCC it agrees with T-Mobile, which sought FCC clarification of the December order establishing a common standard for the transition from text technology (TTY) to real-time text (RTT). T-Mobile sought clarification (see 1702240035) of the obligation of carriers to deliver calls to public safety answering points (PSAPs) using an emergency services Internet Protocol network (ESInet). “Carefully reviewing T-Mobile’s Petition, we are convinced that, in one narrow case, transcoding of RTT to TTY should not be the responsibility of an originating service provider or access network provider,” NENA said in comments filed in docket 16-145. “As T-Mobile correctly notes, it would be difficult, if not impossible, for an [access network provider] to insert its own systems between a terminating ESInet and a legacy PSAP,” NENA said. “Doing so would require a novel call-routing mechanism, or would require a carrier to pay for all or part of the costs of installing and maintaining a Legacy PSAP Gateway.”

Congress should consider hitching Next-Generation 911 legislation to the $1 trillion infrastructure package under discussion this session, West Safety Services Vice President Mary Boyd plans to testify Wednesday on behalf of the Industry Council for Emergency Response Technologies (iCert). Her advocacy echoes what key Senate Democrats have said this year, a growing push that goes beyond the telecom debate about including broadband funding (see 1702280062). Witnesses plan to tell the House Communications Subcommittee of the needs of NG-911 in funding and legislative tweaks, with significant attention on the i3 standard that the National Emergency Number Association worked on.

As the FCC considers the proposals in a further rulemaking on real-time text, it should ensure the rules “remain grounded in feasibility, subject to the statutory limitations on what is achievable and readily achievable,” T-Mobile replied. “T-Mobile encourages the Commission to reject calls for expanding the scope of the backwards compatibility obligation as well as to refrain from adopting new and onerous mandates on carriers.” The company said, for example, RTT can't be compatible with short-message service texting. “SMS and RTT are two entirely different communications protocols -- SMS is a best-effort, store-and-forward service, while RTT is a session-based, two-way communication similar to voice calling,” the carrier said. “Making RTT backwards compatible with SMS is not feasible.” The Alliance for Telecommunications Industry Solutions agreed. “RTT and SMS are two different technologies -- end-users make a choice regarding which technology to use and there is no way for service providers to automatically revert messages sent using one technology to another,” ATIS replied. “An RTT message therefore cannot automatically fall back to SMS.” The National Emergency Number Association in general supported an FCC proposal that it set a sunset date of 2021 for traditional text telephony (TTY), which RTT is replacing. “The Commission should carefully track data trends among consumers, access network providers, originating service providers (such as over-the-top RTT services), and [public safety answering points],” NENA wrote. “If it appears, closer to the tentative sunset date, that any one of these important constituencies has not yet adequately transitioned to technologies and business practices that natively support RTT, the Commission should be prepared to postpone the sunset for a limited time.” In December, the FCC approved an order on a common standard for the transition from TTY to RTT and asked a number of questions in an FNPRM (see 1612150048). Replies were due Friday in docket 16-145.

Witnesses testifying Wednesday on Next Generation-911 before the House Communications Subcommittee are National Emergency Number Association Director-Governmental Affairs Trey Forgety, Indiana Statewide 911 Board Executive Director Barry Ritter, Texas A&M University Internet2 Technology Evaluation Center Director Walt Magnussen, West Safety Services Vice President Mary Boyd and Steve Souder, who retired last year from leading Virginia’s Fairfax County 911 system. A GOP memo said that “several barriers remain to the realization of nationwide NG911,” citing funding concerns: “Costs of the transition to NG911 are significant, [but] an authoritative comprehensive cost study has not been produced to date. Congress directed the ICO [the E911 Implementation Coordination Office] to submit a cost study within one year of the passage of the NG911 Advancement Act in 2012, but no such study has been submitted, despite bipartisan concerns over the previous administration’s delay.” Consensus is that funding is “inadequate,” with proposals on the table to “include eliminating funding inconsistencies between states, within states, and between voice delivery networks -- landline, wireless, VoIP and prepaid,” the GOP memo said. It cites governance, network security and regulatory barriers as key issues. The Democratic memo noted funding issues with NG-911. The hearing follows a debate over the i3 standard between APCO and NENA last week (see 1703240052). “That operational and transitional NG911 systems based on i3 exist is a testament to the workability and permanence of the i3 standard,” said Evelyn Bailey, executive director of the National Association of State 911 Administrators, in a statement Monday. “We are well on the way toward achieving the vision of nationwide NG911 by the end of 2020. NASNA does not support anything that would slow down and disrupt that progress.”

APCO’s CEO is pleased with several signs from the National Emergency Number Association board, he told us. NENA took aim in a statement last week at the way APCO characterized language in a draft Senate NG-911 bill from Senate Commerce Committee ranking member Bill Nelson, D-Fla., and Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn. (see 1702280062 and 1703060020). Both groups said they back the draft legislation. NENA cited a message on the draft Senate bill that APCO sent to members March 17 that “attempts to cast doubt on NENA’s NG9-1-1 architecture standard, Detailed Functional and Interface Standards for the NENA i3 Solution,” known as i3. “APCO’s characterizations of the i3 standard are simply wrong," NENA said. "By sowing doubt about the best way forward, APCO has endangered the timely roll-out of NG9-1-1 systems for the American public whom we serve.” Now "that NENA has confirmed that i3 is incomplete and not an accredited standard, that helps to clear the record for 9-1-1 professionals and industry,” APCO CEO Derek Poarch said in a statement Friday. “I also appreciate NENA’s public commitment to finally put its i3 through the ANSI [American National Standards Institute] accreditation process to completion. It is our hope that at that point, i3 can become a build-to standard, and 9-1-1 professionals can rely upon it to ensure full interoperability.”

Caller overload at the Dallas 911 center, coming soon after a widespread AT&T wireless 911 outage, shows that maintaining the emergency-number service must be a priority for industry and government, 911 officials said Friday. The FCC said it will provide an update on the AT&T outage at commissioners' Thursday meeting, and 911 officials said they look forward to learning more information. Meanwhile, a few state legislatures are moving bills that could direct funding to 911 systems. And at the Nebraska Public Service Commission, industry said "no" to state requirements for 911 reliability exceeding what the FCC requires.