The Hot Topics at the 2023 NENA Standards & Best Practices Conference

The NG911 Standards and Best Practices Conference deep-dived into caller location, data security, swatting, and more

Grant Alert: National Criminal History Improvement Program (NCHIP)

As part of our effort to help clients find applicable grants to achieve their goals, MCP provides alerts about grants that can fund their initiatives. 

Integrated Justice Is Needed Nationwide to Improve Outcomes and Prevent Senseless Tragedies

On July 23, 2007, a home invasion occurred in Cheshire, Connecticut. During the invasion, the family that owned the home suffered numerous horrors — the husband was severely injured when beaten with a baseball bat, while his wife and two daughters were murdered; the wife and one daughter were sexually assaulted. The perpetrators then burned down the house to destroy the evidence.

Effective Data Utilization Begins with Governance — Here’s How Courts Agencies Should Begin

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 Helping Justice Organizations Address Their Biggest Challenges

“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.

These Are 2022’s Most Important Public Safety Trends

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:

Innovative Data Integration Strategies to Solve EMS Billing Challenges

We write every now and then about the billing woes that traditionally have plagued the emergency medical services (EMS) community. The inability to efficiently bill patients and collect payments cost EMS agencies hundreds of millions of dollars every year. The trickle-down effect is that many agencies often find it difficult to maintain their service-delivery models, pay salaries and benefits, ensure that existing equipment is operational, and upgrade or replace equipment that has reached or is approaching the end of life.

A Few Words of Praise for the National 911 Program’s Laurie Flaherty

On Friday, December 17, Laurie Flaherty, the longtime coordinator of the National 911 Program, will retire. That will be a sad day for the 911 community and for me personally. I first got to know Laurie when I was editor-in-chief of Urgent Communications. Our paths crossed often over the years at conferences, usually when I was covering an educational session where she was speaking. Inevitably, I would make a beeline to her as soon as the session ended, at which time she would patiently answer every question that I had, generously giving me all of the time that I needed.

An Introduction to Data Lakes for Public Safety and Justice Organizations

Imagine that you're a fisherman, and you need to catch a large volume and wide variety of fish. Now imagine that the fish scatter amongst numerous rivers and streams, a situation that makes your task far more time-consuming and difficult. Moreover, you risk missing some types of fish you need to catch to fulfill your mission, either because you can't find them or you run out of time.

This metaphor describes the environment in which public safety and justice organizations are working today. Many systems exist that generate or store information vital to investigators, prosecutors, judges, and corrections officials. However, many are unable to access the information when they need to do so. That's because siloes exist in these systems, making it incredibly challenging for the individual entities that comprise the public safety and justice ecosystem — the 911 community, law enforcement, prosecutors, the courts, and jails/prisons — to exchange data. Siloed systems are analogous to the rivers and streams in our metaphor.

9/11 Two Decades Later — Much Done, Much Still to Do

Saturday marks the 20^th anniversary of the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center in New York City and the Pentagon, as well as the hijacking of a third commercial airliner that day, United Airlines Flight 93, which crashed in a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania, after passengers confronted the terrorists. The attacks resulted in 2,977 fatalities and more than 25,000 injuries. It is the deadliest single incident for firefighters and police officers in the U.S., who respectively lost 340 and 72 members that day. It remains the deadliest terrorist attack our history.

Participate in the iCERT 2021 Data Integration Survey

Over the last 20 years, the public safety community increasingly has leveraged technological advances that enable better interoperability and data sharing. While decreased response times and increased situational awareness have resulted, there is still an opportunity for improvement. Many obstacles exist that prohibit complete end-to-end integration of data throughout the incident management lifecycle. Additionally, identifying the right data to be shared with the right person at the right time is essential to integrating data into the lifecycle. 

Next Week’s CAPS Explores Public-Safety Opportunities & Challenges

Having attended dozens of educational conferences over the decade that I served as editor-in-chief of Urgent Communications and Fire Chief magazines, I know an excellent one when I see it—and I can report without fear of contradiction that the second-annual Conference for Advancing Public Safety (CAPS)—being presented by Mission Critical Partners (MCP) on June 15-16—is shaping up to be an excellent educational event.