Richmond area gets grant for emergency communications

Eight local governments in the Richmond area will have a new way to talk to one another in an emergency, with no telephone wires attached.

A $1.73 million grant provided by the U.S. Homeland Security Department will allow emergency officials to complete a regional microwave system that allows them to share critical information in a natural or man-made disaster.

Gov. Timothy M. Kaine announced the grant last week for Richmond and the counties of Henrico, Chesterfield, Hanover, Goochland, Powhatan, New Kent and Charles City.

"We'll be able to put something on a computer in Henrico and somebody in the Charles City emergency-operations center will be able to see exactly what we're doing," said Todd Pugh, a Henrico communications specialist who is managing the regional project.

The microwave system will allow the localities to avoid the expense of using broadband telephone lines that have linked emergency responders in the region through the COMLINC network. The COMLINC network has been one way that emergency officials have improved interoperability of communications among localities and agencies since the problems that plagued the response to the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

However, some local governments in the region say they can't afford to remain on the network, so the region decided to develop a system of microwave communication towers.

Pugh said the system will be built in two phases by next summer, using the $1.7 million grant and an earlier $3 million award for the project's first phase.

Initially, the system will be built in Richmond and five surrounding counties, using existing public towers to hold the microwave dishes. The second phase will extend the system to New Kent and Charles City, where a new tower is planned. It will allow police, fire and rescue workers in all jurisdictions to communicate directly with one another, as well as Virginia State Police and the state Department of Emergency Management.

The network will allow emergency officials to participate in videoconferences. It also will allow police aircraft to relay images to emergency officials around the region, and provide a backup voice-communications network. Pugh said the system also will create a security firewall that will allow the jurisdictions' information networks to connect with one another to share data safely.

The Richmond-area grant was one of three announced by the governor last week. He also announced grants of $1.4 million to Stafford County to link jurisdictions in that region to the COMLINC network, and almost $700,000 to Greene, Madison, and Orange counties to buy equipment for a regional communications system.

Contact Michael Martz at (804) 649-6964 or .