N.C. City Faces Stiff Price Tag For Replacing Radios

Jan. 11--Things go out of date quickly these days. Now, that includes the two-way radio communication system used by the Burlington police and fire departments.

At a city council work session Monday, Assistant Supervisor Kenyon Harris of the police department's communications division explained to city staff and council why the current system needs to be replaced -- and soon.

The cost of the system replacement in Greensboro -- roughly $5 million -- would be split among Guilford County, Greensboro, Burlington, High Point and whichever other entities sign on to use the new system. Burlington's payments would be in the form of an annual fee per radio over the course of five years.

Burlington will also have to pay for the hundreds of new radios and consoles used by Burlington fire and police departments, said City Manager Harold Owen.

Harris said that when Burlington joined the Guilford Metro 911, 800 MHz radio system in 2001, Greensboro was already in the middle of the migration to newer technology. When the upgrade to the current 4.1 version was completed in 2004, Guilford Metro 911 absorbed Burlington's cost, since the city had just joined the system.

At the time, though, Motorola -- the system's manufacturer -- told Guilford Metro 911 that when an upgrade was needed, they'd have to go "full blown digital," said Harris. That's because come 2015, Motorola will no longer support the 4.1 version software, hardware or firmware.

Dennis Baucom, manager of technical services at Guilford Metro 911, said there are other reasons the agencies need to migrate to the new system, called P25 scanners. He said the Federal Communications Commission laid out requirements several years ago that are pushing communications systems to do what's called "narrowbanding" by 2013.

"Essentially, we're cutting our frequency bandwidth in half," which allows more transmissions per band, said Baucom. "Ultimately, we'll go further," continuing the narrowbanding process, he said. "To do that, you have to replace the equipment," since the older models don't support the newer technology.

Even though the FCC's narrowbanding deadline isn't until 2013, Baucom said Motorola is no longer going to support the old equipment, and some of the third party vendors that sell to Motorola have quit making pieces for the larger equipment.

"So we're running into some support issues ahead of 2016," Baucom said.

Since Guilford Metro 911 is going to have to convert to the P25 system, Harris said, "We have to migrate when they migrate, or we have to build our own system." That would be significantly more expensive.

City council agreed at the work session that Burlington should most likely move with Guilford Metro 911, which is also used by Guilford County and Greensboro, with High Point signing on soon. Though the total cost for the new core system will be about $5 million, Baucom said, "Investing in it in a regional platform, we get to share that cost." He added that if other entities join, the cost per entity would decrease further.

"The way we're doing this ... we're adding a capital debt to it," said Baucom. He said there would be a $132 a year per radio cost. Essentially, Burlington would pay its portion of the $5 million by paying $132 per radio unit per year; right now, the Burlington Police Department has about 474 radios.

"That's how they're going to pay for their portion of the $5 million ... over a five-year period," Baucom said.

Owen said that cost is just for the central hub replacement in Greensboro, and doesn't include the cost of the radios and equipment that Burlington will also have to pay for.

Owen said Burlington will also be paying about $2.6 to $2.8 million for consoles and radios used by Burlington police and fire departments. "It's going to have to come out of reserves," and replace the outdated equipment over a four-year period of time, he said.

Council would still need to approve a budget amendment for the capital project.

Copyright 2012 - Times-News, Burlington, N.C.