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Funding for First Response Communications is Shrinking Government officials, in the wake of the September 11 terrorist attacks, pledged to better prepare the nation's first responders. Almost four years later, the funds for first response communications are shrinking dramatically. Have officials forgotten their promises? According to an article on the Wireless Week website, local governments who have been working to achieve the widespread radio compatibility necessary to respond to national emergencies are now faced with "shrinking federal funds and a thorny bureaucratic grant distribution process." "For the first time, grants are going away," Charles Werner, deputy chief of the Charlottesville, VA, fire department, says in the article. "The funding was there after 9/11, but now the government is looking for ways to cut money." The article says several grants dedicated to projects working on the interoperability of wireless communication for first responders "are drying up or are on the chopping block." Some examples are the Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) Interoperability Program - which received $83 million in funds for fiscal 2004 - that has now been eliminated, and the Department of Homeland Security's Office of Domestic Preparedness (ODP), which has seen its funding diminish from $3.2 billion in fiscal 2004 to $2.6 billion proposed for 2006. According to a report from the First Response Coalition, the steadily decreasing funding for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) could mean that police, fire and emergency medical services will be under-funded by about $100 billion through 2008.
To read the full article, click here: http://www.wirelessweek.com |
