A previous blog explored the advantages that can be gained by justice organizations via “big data” approaches that leverage artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML). This blog examines the importance of data governance.
“Big data” is an approach used to analyze extremely large, extremely complex, unstructured datasets. While the majority of data that courts create, manage, and are responsible for wouldn’t be considered “big data,” courts can benefit tremendously from recent advances in big data tools.
MCP Insights asked the firm’s subject-matter experts to predict what will occur this year concerning communications technologies, operations, and governance in the public safety sector (law enforcement, fire/rescue, emergency medical, and 911) and the public sector (government and justice). Here’s what they said:
A problem long has existed in the 911 community, which is that telecommunicators working in emergency communications centers (ECCs) from coast to coast are wrongly classified by the federal government. This has a profoundly negative effect on their self-esteem, compensation, and career development.
The National 911 Program created a toolkit, with Mission Critical Partners’ help, to address this. More on that soon — but first a little history.
Over the last two decades, I have written now and then about a relative who was a career firefighter for the city of Chicago. I am writing about him again today because he’s the reason I’m so excited about a panel discussion that I’ll be moderating in a couple of weeks during MCP’s second-annual Conference for Advancing Public Safety (CAPS).
The cost of standing up an emergency services Internet Protocol network (ESInet)—which provides the transport architecture that enables emergency calls to be delivered to Next Generation 911 (NG911) emergency communications centers (ECCs), traditionally known as public safety answering points (PSAPs)—is significant. Consequently, the news out of the nation’s capital of late has been encouraging concerning federal funding that might become available to the public safety community for such implementations and much more.
Last week, Mission Critical Partners (MCP) announced the acquisition of MTG Management Consultants (MTG), a Seattle-based firm that provides strategy and management services to local, county and state government entities. The acquisition further strengthens MCP’s credentials as the leading provider of consulting services—as well as data-integration, network and cybersecurity solutions—for public safety and justice sector clients.
More on that in a bit—but first, a history lesson that will provide some context for this development.
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.
Profound challenges often spur great progress. The COVID-19 pandemic is no exception. Not only is the public safety community staring an enormous challenge in the face, but also is looking at a tremendous opportunity to move the community forward.
Traditionally, public safety has been slow to adopt new technologies and embrace new strategies. However, the pandemic has forced agencies to do things they likely would not have contemplated before. The collection of new concepts not only will enable public safety to handle the pandemics and mega-disasters of the future, but also will enhance day-to-day operations personnel performance. Public safety is up to the challenge, as long as officials can get comfortable with being uncomfortable for a while.
As states begin to reopen and communities slowly return to normalcy, organizations, including mission-critical agencies, must evaluate their responses to the COVID-19 public-health crisis and leverage their experiences to prepare for future crises. Conducting an incident-response review, also called a hot wash, enables agencies to identify areas in which they performed well, as well as where their responses could use improvement. When conducted as part of an agency’s after-action reporting activities, this review can help build a better incident-response plan moving forward.
Geographic information system (GIS) data is a foundational component in the migration to, and continuing operation of, Next Generation 911 (NG911) systems.
But developing local GIS data so that it aligns with NG911 standards is a laborious and time-consuming process that can take months or years to complete.
Despite this, MCP’s Robert Horne, one of the firm’s GIS gurus, cautions in a recent whitepaper against taking shortcuts in developing GIS data for use in a NG911 environment. Spe cifically, Robert writes that public safety agencies should avoid using the U.S. Census Bureau’s open-source Topologically Integrated Geographic Encoding and Referencing (TIGER) data for 911 call-routing purposes. TIGER data is available free of charge, but does not meet basic public safety requirements, nor the established NG911 standards, Robert writes. This is due to incomplete data attribution, poor spatial accuracy, incomplete coverage of the PSAP’s jurisdictional footprint, inaccurate street names and address ranges, and a lagging data update schedule. local GIS data so that it aligns with NG911 standards is a laborious and time-c onsuming process that can take months or years to complete.
Next month, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is expected to vote on reconfiguring the 900 MHz band for the deployment of broadband services and technologies. This is an important issue that Mission Critical Partners (MCP) has been tracking for some time, and we are encouraged to see a conclusion on the horizon.
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