In policing, records management systems (RMS) enable agencies to store, retrieve, and view information that is critical to law enforcement operations, from crime-solving to trend analysis and enhanced case management. While this technology is the cornerstone for agencies to effectively serve and protect their communities, it has remained largely unchanged for decades.
Topics: Technology, Data Integration and Analytics
The term “baby boomer” applies to anyone born between 1946 and 1964. There have been a lot of us—according to the U.S. Census Bureau, about 73 million in total. And by 2030, all of the baby boomers will be 65 or older—which means that many are leaving the workforce. In fact, the Census Bureau estimates that about 10,000 people cross the age threshold every day. It further is estimated that about 365 Americans retire every hour. Consequently, every emergency communications center (ECC) needs to start planning now for the so-called “silver tsunami,” which promises to exacerbate the staffing shortages that many centers already are experiencing.
Public safety and other critical-infrastructure agencies responsible for providing mission-critical and lifesaving services to their communities must be able to do so under any circumstances. To ensure that they are able to maintain operations, agencies develop continuity-of-operations (COOP) and disaster-recovery (DR) plans to help mitigate the impact of a crisis. What these plans often forget, however, is how an agency will communicate with its stakeholders, both internal and external, during a crisis.
As part of our effort to inform our clients about potentially serious cybersecurity issues, MCP provides advisories about vulnerabilities and exploits that could threaten the operations of their critical communications networks. Sign up to receive these advisories in your inbox as soon as they are released.
According to the old saying, time flies when one is having fun. The adage also applies when a new business unit is being built.
A little more than five years ago—has it really been that long?—MCP landed its first network monitoring contract, which marked the birth of our Lifecycle Management Services division. The initial concept for MCP to get involved in this business was the brainchild of Dave Boyce, with a helpful push from Brian Bark. It all started when the Pennsylvania Region 13 Task Force decided that once their Emergency Services Internet Protocol Network (ESInet) was complete, the region needed to monitor the ESInet. Because MCP subject matter experts had designed and deployed the network, Region 13 asked us for help in securing a monitoring service. The search didn’t go well. There weren’t many options, and those that were qualified to do the work were seeking fees that were markedly cost prohibitive, or they wanted to monitor only a specific network segment.
That’s when the proverbial lightbulb went on. “Maybe there’s a way that we can do this ourselves,” Dave said.
At MCP, our mission is to help clients improve emergency response outcomes.
Depending on the client and its unique environment and resources, this could mean providing guidance regarding technology, operations or governance, and often all three. The overarching goal is to ensure that 911 callers receive the most appropriate emergency response as quickly as possible. Lives often are on the line in an emergency, and every second matters.
Achieving a balance between sending the optimal response to an emergency and having it arrive as fast as possible is tricky. In fact, it is analogous to walking a tightrope. To achieve the former, many emergency communications centers (ECCs) rely on standard protocols developed for each type of emergency call that they receive, typically law enforcement, fire/rescue and emergency medical services.
As part of our effort to inform our clients about potential and serious cybersecurity issues, MCP provides advisories about vulnerabilities and exploits that could threaten the operations of their critical communications networks. Sign up to receive these advisories in your inbox as soon as they are released.
As we have previously discussed, emergency medical services (EMS) agencies are undergoing a seismic shift in the way they operate. While many of these changes can be directly attributed to the current landscape resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic, some challenges facing agencies today are not new. One such challenge concerns the billing and reimbursement process.
Nearly everyone is familiar with the story of Rudy Ruettiger, best known simply as “Rudy,” who walked onto the University of Notre Dame football team in the mid-1970s, despite being just 5-feet-6-inches tall and weighing a scant 165 pounds. Rudy had dreamt of playing for Notre Dame since childhood. After working extremely hard, Rudy was promoted to Notre Dame’s scout team, which helps the varsity prepare for its game each week.
Coach Dan Devine allowed Rudy to dress for the team’s final home game against Georgia Tech. Unexpectedly, Devine inserted Rudy for three plays. On the final play of the game Rudy found himself at—of all things, given his diminutive size—defensive end. Unbelievably, Rudy then sacked the quarterback. His tale is one of legend, and it was turned into a very popular feature film. As inspirational stories go, Rudy’s is difficult to beat.
Considerable inconsistency traditionally has existed in terms of how law enforcement agencies from coast to coast gather and report crime data, as well as the types of data captured. The National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS) was created to address that shortcoming.
NIBRS has defined standard ways of describing an incident, and collecting the data associated with it, so that apples-to-apples comparisons can be made at the national level. The idea is that, to truly have a national picture of crime in the U.S., data has to be collected in the same manner, using the same nomenclature, from the country’s largest law-enforcement agency—the New York City Police Department—to its smallest.
After years of swimming competitively while earning bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Ball State University, Molly Falls found her way into the public safety industry and then to Mission Critical Partners (MCP). Now a senior technology specialist who specializes in managing statewide 911 projects, Molly credits years of intense training and balancing the daily grind of athletics with academics as influential factors in her ability to multitask, manage tight deadlines, and remain focused as a project manager.
Topics: Life at MCP
Leadership has been defined by many people in many ways. A definition that I like goes like this: leadership is the ability to get people or organizations to do what they don’t naturally want to do, or to get them to do things that they don’t believe they can do.
At Mission Critical Partners, all of us are expected to “lead self,” i.e., to take ownership of one’s thoughts, actions and statements, while also having the discipline and drive necessary for meeting one’s responsibilities, both personally and professionally. But effective leaders understand that they can’t achieve their objectives by themselves. In other words, they need a team. And when leading a team, one’s mindset needs to shift from leading oneself to leading others. This is especially true for those working in the public safety sector.
How can we support your mission? From design and procurement to building and management, our national team of experts is here to help…because the mission matters.
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