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Comtech Safety & Security Technologies
Latest News
Fifty-four years ago today, the nation's first 9-1-1 call was made in Haleyville, Alabama - the rest is history! We appreciate every one of you who have answered the call since then. Thank you for keeping our communities safe.
 

The health and safety of NENA event attendees is a top priority, and, as such, we have moved #NENAGTW to March. The new dates are March 15-18. Current registrants received an email on Friday, January 21 to confirm their attendance on the new dates. However, hotel reservations for the original February dates will be cancelled automatically. Attendees will need to rebook housing for the event here

9-1-1 Goes to Washington (#NENAGTW) is an interactive forum where you learn about and discuss national 9-1-1 issues and advance those issues on Capitol Hill. This dynamic, hands-on program provides you with increased knowledge of 9-1-1 and homeland security legislative and regulatory topics, as well as critical information on the federal-government process and how to work with federal policy makers. It is vital, now more than ever, that 9-1-1 professionals become active participants in the governmental process to advance the goals of our profession and industry. 

Top Five Reasons to Attend:

  1. Be a leader, not a spectator! Attending #NENAGTW is a great way to advocate for the national 9-1-1 agenda and let Congress hear the "Voice of 9-1-1."
  2. Hear from nationally elected members of Congress, the leadership of the Congressional NextGen 9-1-1 Caucus, and federal policy leaders from the FCC, the National 911 Program Office, and other agencies. 
  3. Participate in informative panel sessions on the nation's pressing 9-1-1 regulatory and legislative issues and other federal government activities impacting emergency communications.
  4. Learn and share information on emerging 9-1-1 issues with national policy leaders and 9-1-1 professionals from across the country.
  5. Meet with 9-1-1 leaders to advance a national 9-1-1 agenda and promote pressing local and state issues from your area.

Click here to register and here to book your housing.

The number of ENPs continues to grow at a rapid rate. ENPs have always been leaders in the 9-1-1 profession, in their PSAPs, and at state and national levels. Join over 1,700 current ENPs to make positive changes that improve the level and quality of 9-1-1 service, as well as accelerate the transition to NG9-1-1.

Now is the time to sign up for the April ENP testing window. You have the choice of going to one of many nearby testing centers, all conforming to COVID precautions, or testing remotely. The Spring 2022 testing window is April 2-16, with an application deadline of March 4. The next examination period will be in July, with applications due by June 10.

Click here to learn more. 

The William E. Stanton Award is NENA's highest honor. It is bestowed upon an individual who has not only excelled in his or her everyday job, but has gone above and beyond to further NENA's goals. Nominations for this prestigious annual award are now open.

Click here for additional information on the award, including criteria, past recipients and more. Click here to submit your nomination online. The deadline for nominations is March 31, 2022.

NENA has established a scholarship program to honor the commitment of William "Bill" McMurray, ENP, Past President, to the mission of NENA and 9-1-1 education. The scholarship will be awarded for the NENA 2022 Conference & Expo, and covers the conference registration fee and four nights of lodging at a conference hotel (to be determined by NENA upon awarding of scholarship). Travel expenses to and from the conference and meals are not included in this award.

Please visit the scholarship webpage for information about the criteria, application procedure, and responsibilities. Click here to submit your application online. The application deadline is March 31, 2022.

Application Data Systems, Inc. (ADSi)
Winsted
Training Update
Stereotype Threat: Diagnosing Potential Public-Safety Bias
Wednesday, February 23 | 3PM Eastern (live) or On-Demand
FREE for NENA Members | Click here to register!


As 9-1-1 professionals, we have a front-row seat to the social tensions that can be present in public-safety interactions. We witness, first-hand, the issues that can arise during multi-ethnic requests for emergency assistance and must make split-second decisions based on what may or may not be reliable information or accurate assumptions. The ripple effect of these situations can be far reaching, potentially affecting internal team dynamics, agency morale, and even the wellbeing of an entire community. How do we adequately equip ourselves for these 9-1-1 calls?

The stereotype threat model provides a holistic approach for diagnosing, discussing, and responding to the complex identity biases that can significantly shape the delivery of emergency services. Attend this webinar to: 

  • Learn how to recognize the hidden patterns of implicit bias;
  • Understand how the elements of negative biases can cascade into the delivery of emergency services; and
  • Gain resources for diagnosing and managing the delivery of public-safety services in diverse communities.

Can't attend on the 23rd? Register now and you will receive an email after the live presentation with instructions for accessing the on-demand webinar archive.

Presenter: R. Tyrone Kelsey - 911Training Institute

CEUs: Attend this webinar and receive one-half ENP re-certification point towards the ten-point maximum for NENA courses in the Professional Development CEU/Course Credits section.

Webinar Access Info: Dial-in and web-access details provided automatically via email upon registration.

Questions? Contact Amanda Tegtmeyer with the NENA Education team.

The NENA Education Advisory Board seeks engaging and enthusiastic instructors to support NENA's Education & Training program. If you are a subject-matter expert in one or more of the below areas and you have a proven track record as an excellent instructor, then you are invited to help NENA provide exceptional training across North America. Instructors are sought to provide instruction on: 

  • Cybersecurity
  • Legal-liability issues
  • Fire dispatch
  • Leadership
  • Bias and diversity

Instructors may be asked to teach up to ten times per year. Attendance at annual development and training events is required, normally one weekend per year. Instructors are paid on a per-day-of-instruction basis with highly-competitive compensation rates.

For consideration, please submit the following to NENA's Education Director, Vicki Pickett, by February 18:

  • A ten-minute video of yourself instructing a class and teaching a concept
  • Three letters of recommendation, at least one of which should be from a former student
  • A letter of support from your employer, if applicable
  • A resume, including previous work experience, references, and contact information
02.17.22 | Leadership in the 9-1-1 Center | Hilton Head Island, SC | Register 
02.24.22 | Preventing Telecommunicator Tunnel Vision | ILO* | Register 
02.28.22 | (3-day course) | Center Training Officer (CTO) Program | Paramus, NJ | Register 
03.01.22 | (3-day course) | 9-1-1 Center Supervisor Program | Elkhart, IN | Register 
 
*ILO stands for Instructor-Led Online
Association Business

NENA 2022-23 Second Vice President Candidates Forum
Tuesday, March 1 | 3PM Eastern (live) or On-Demand
Click here to register!

Join NENA for this special webinar featuring the candidates for NENA Second Vice President. The candidates will have a chance to introduce themselves and share their campaign messages. Then, a Q&A session moderated by a NENA Past President will provide additional insights.

Don't miss this opportunity to hear from your 2022-23 Board of Directors candidates before voting opens on March 15.

Can't attend on the 1st? Register now and you will receive an email after the live presentation with instructions for accessing the on-demand webinar archive.

Webinar Access Info: Dial-in and web-access details provided automatically via email upon registration.

Integrating all elements of the next generation public safety experience
Lumen®
Because data is the future of public safety, our NG9-1-1 platform will enable seamless integration, management, and protection of the expansive data available to public safety professionals to aid in the emergency response.  Our platform will help deliver all the functionality to securely manage all the new data.  This data will then be integrated into a single platform.
Learn more
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Document Announcements

The NG9-1-1 Interoperability Oversight Commission (NIOC) is pleased to announce completion of Version 1.0 of the NIOC PSAP Credentialing Agency (PCA) Certificate Validation Guidelines for the NG9-1-1 Public Key Infrastructure (PKI). Otherwise known as the Validation Policy (VP), it is a companion to the PCA Certificate Policy (CP) and contains guidelines for verifying the identity and role of NG9-1-1 certificate requestors. Like a background check, it ensures that these stakeholders in the NG9-1-1 ecosystem, from agencies, to users, to the equipment itself, are who they say they are. This ensures a high level of security and establishes trust in the PKI, both within ESInets and between them. The completion and approval of the VP allows the PCA to move closer to production, and NG9-1-1 closer to its end-state of trusted, interoperable networks.  The NIOC adopted an industry baseline Validation Policy as its foundation to ensure interoperability and the NIOC further collaborated with volunteers from the NENA Development Group Core Services Committee, which is also responsible for other NENA technical standards including i3, to refine the baseline policy into a policy that ensures NG9-1-1 security and interoperability standards are fully considered in NG9-1-1 operations.

Click here to read more. The full VP is available here.

Advanced NG-911 and P25 Recording Solutions
Eventide Inc®
Eventide’s NexLog DX-series recording solutions are the most reliable, comprehensive, and easy to use recording products for NG-911, P25 and other critical communications.  NexLog DX-series recorders are highly secure and integrate with many PSAP systems including RapidSOS, RapidDeploy, ProQA, CAD and NG-911.  The NexLog DX-Series recording software is 100% designed, developed, and supported by Eventide in the USA. 
Learn More
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The NENA Standard for Social Media Emergency Requests provides guidance to PSAPs in establishing standard operating procedures in the handling of emergency requests for public safety assistance that originate on social media networks and interacting with providers for exigent circumstances.

Members of the Working Group can download the document and submit comments by going here and then selecting "Add a Comment" from the "Edit" icon.

All others may download the document and submit comments by going here and then selecting "Add a Comment" from the "Document Actions" icon.

When submitting comments, please include the line number(s) associated with each comment, a brief explanation of the comment, and suggested resolution of each comment. Please complete all requested data and click "Save," or, if submitting multiple comments, click "Save and Add Another."

If submitting a substantial number of substantive comments or edits, you may add a single comment in the Comment Manager and attach an edited version of the document containing your tracked changes. To do this, scroll down and click on "Add Supporting File" on the comment page and upload the file you have edited.

If you are providing editorial comments, such as corrections to typos, grammatical errors, style/numbering errors, and incorrect references/links to documents, please document them under one comment and list the page and line number for each. For example:

  • Page 22, Line 761: correct moist to most
  • Page 51, Line 905: correct Maine to main
  • If the correction is within a table, provide the table name and page number of error and specific details of change 
All comments are due by March 7, 2022. You may contact the NENA Committee Resource Manager with any questions or concerns.
Having adjudicated all comments, the T-CPR Standard and the LSRG Standard are now considered "stable." Per NENA IPR & Antitrust Policy, Section 4.5.1 "Stable Form Notices" are being issued and can be viewed here.
Washington Briefing

These free information sessions help the 9-1-1 community navigate and utilize the newly released four-part telecommunicator reclassification toolkit developed by the National 911 Program. This toolkit provides actionable steps to help ECCs and the public safety community create or revise job descriptions, establish and/or expand a public safety telecommunicator training program, and ensure operational integration of technologies and tools used in ECCs.

All sessions will be virtual and led by members of the 9-1-1 profession who helped to create the toolkit. Sessions will be available for playback anytime. For more information please register for each session:

  • Session 1: Overview of the Four Toolkit Chapters - On-Demand
  • Session 2: Job Descriptions and Training - Tue., Feb. 22, Noon EST
  • Session 3: Technology Integration/SOPs and Legislative Strategy - Fri., Feb. 25, 10 a.m. EST
Volunteers Wanted

The Virtual PSAP Management Work Group (WG) is being formed to update the Virtual PSAP Management Information Document which has not been updated since 2017. Since that time, PSAPs have experienced significant lessons learned during the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as other significant events, that should be captured and standardized to address future needs where traditional brick and mortar operations are not feasible in order to maintain service delivery to the public. This could be due to situations outside of the Authorities Having Jurisdiction (AHJ) control, e.g. pandemic, natural disaster; but could also include a strategic decision by PSAP management to temporarily relocate operations when the PSAP may be at risk, e.g. civil unrest.

In addition to operational experience, SME experience with development and implementation of 9-1-1 solutions should be leveraged to provide recommendations to AHJ’s to further develop contingency plans for future events. This working group will convert the current Information Document to an American National Standard as well as update content to incorporate best practices gathered from real-world examples observed during events such as COVID-19 and other events where PSAPs have to employ non-traditional call processing operations to ensure continuity of operations. WG calls will be held Wednesdays at 2 pm Central, for 1 hour weekly.

Click here to join this WG.

The NG9-1-1 Operational Diversity and Redundancy Work Group (WG) is being formed to provide best practices for applying redundancy and resiliency concepts to operational aspects of NG9-1-1 systems. The WG will develop a document detailing best practices for operating an NG9-1-1 system with a specific emphasis on avoiding outages impacting the performance of the system. The document is primarily a resource for NG9-1-1 System providers that provide a service to 9-1-1 Authorities. However, any 9-1-1 Authority that procures NG9-1-1 products and operates the NG9-1-1 system themselves should also implement the proposed best practices.

Click here to join this WG.

Every Second Counts in Emergency Response
GeoComm®
Today public safety GIS data and location information is disparate, inconsistent, and expanding. Public Safety Location Intelligence® from GeoComm provides a new way to get the right location information, on the right map, for the right people, at the right time, in order to respond to emergency calls faster.
Download this article see why it's a crucial element of public safety 9-1-1 and response.
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