The county board passed a motion on Tuesday, March 9, 2010 indicating its intent to participate in the state’s Allied Radio Matrix for Emergency Response (ARMER) communication system. Funding for the rather expensive changeover will be needed, but it will allow all public safety and governmental agencies to communicate with each other. Thistype of communication network would have made cooperation among agencies much easier during the 2007 Ham Lake Fire.
The state started implementing the ARMER program in 2001 and is funding its
backbone.” The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is requiring all governmental agencies to switch to narrow bandwidths by 2013, and the state is encouraging everyone to switch to the same system.
Cook County Sheriff Mark Falk asked the county board to adopt a resolution indicating its intent to participate. “There is no requirement for us to join ARMER,” he wrote in a March 9 memo to the board, “however to date 66 counties out of 87 had indicated their intent to migrate to ARMER, including our Lake, St. Louis, and Carlton counties.”
Migrating to ARMER would involve an initial outlay of $1.4 million and a total cost estimated at $2.5 million. Passing a resolution of intent to move to ARMER would provide opportunities for the county to apply for grants and other funding, Falk wrote. Levy funds could also be used to fund the changeover.
If they don’t go with ARMER, Commissioner Bob Fenwick said, they would still have to spend money replacing old equipment at some point.
Going with ARMER would require placing some new towers around the county, Commissioner Bruce Martinson said, and these towers could be leased by cell phone companies to expand cell phone coverage as well.
“Thisis the route we need to go when it comes to communications interoperability,” Falk said.
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