After years of planning, Gloucester County recently put its new radio communications system into operation.
Garrey Curry, Gloucester’s public works director, said the new radio system went online Dec. 6. Initially, only the sheriff’s office is using the new system, Curry said, with plans to convert the radio service for volunteer fire and rescue squads and for several county departments—including utilities, animal control, and buildings and grounds—early in 2011.
"It’s fantastic," D.W. Warren, chief deputy of the Gloucester Sheriff’s Office, said of the new system. It provides law enforcement officers with "a comfortable feeling," he said, since they have much better access to emergency dispatchers, other officers and first responders in the field.
Previously, there were some "dead zones" in the county, Curry and Warren said, especially in Guinea in the lower end of Gloucester. Warren said there were instances where a deputy could see a firefighter nearby but could not contact him via radio because of the inadequacies of the outdated system.
The new $15 million communications package includes a state-of-the-art radio communications system, Curry said, and a new emergency communications center will be built near the jail by mid-2012.
In addition, Warren said the new system includes a series of communications terminals—which were put into operation last spring—that provide quick access for dispatchers to find where a call is coming from and reference points on a screen to target the call’s location. Then dispatchers can dispatch a deputy or fire or rescue crew as quickly as possible.
The temporary dispatch center is located in the law enforcement center adjacent to the jail, Warren said. The dispatch system will be relocated to the new operations center when it is completed, he said, with the temporary dispatch space to be used for other sheriff’s department needs later.
Besides giving the sheriff’s deputies improved reception, Warren said the portable radio units carried by each officer have emergency features. Also, there are more broadcasting channels for the sheriff, fire and rescue, and county offices.
Other portable units are in sheriff’s vehicles. Curry said the radio units will be used by fire and rescue and some county staff soon.
The new system will include an "event" channel, Warren said, on which sheriff’s officials and designated county or other event staff can be linked for short periods, such as during the busy Daffodil Festival.
The new system is part of a regional communications system, with York and James City County among the other key players. This regional link will mean seamless assistance from another county’s dispatchers or towers should there be a problem with the Gloucester system.
County officials have discussed emergency communications problems for a number of years, Curry said, with a committee investigating the issue about 10 years ago. The Gloucester Board of Supervisors authorized a new emergency communications system in late 2006.
The new system was custom designed to Gloucester specifications and needs, Curry said, and was built in Illinois by Motorola.