[EAS] Analysis of IPAWS EAS Test Webinar

[suzanne at mab.org]

Three points:
 
1.  At present, there is no mechanism to get all the involved parties - FEMA, FCC, NOAA/NWS, White House, NEMA, IAEM, broadcasters, cable, celphone, satcasters, etc. etc. - in a room together to identify and address issues.  And because of the Federal Advisory Committee Act, it's impossible to do that except via an outside agency (such as the NASBA-NAB EAS Summits of recent years) or to do it on a regular, ongoing basis.  This bill would address that gap.
 
2.  The dollar amount included in the bill is current-year funding for the IPAWS program.  Since this is an "authorizing" bill (remember that IPAWS was created by the Bush 2 Executive Order but has never been authorized in statute), the bill also authorizes the use of the money for IPAWS.  It's a technicality.
 
3.  FEMA has been working since early summer on the IPAWS-EAS training program (using existing funding).  It is my understanding that it will be rolled out fairly near-term.  It will be an online training, thus requiring no travel etc.  It will be necessary for state/local EMs to take the training in order to be certified to send messages through the IPAWS aggregator.  The Collins bill instructs FEMA to build it into the training for the National Incident Management System to ensure that it becomes part and parcel of the NIMS training that all the EMs take.
 
And a final point:  "new appropriation" is a total non-starter in the current Congress.  That's where we began with this initiative - trying to get funding to build out a nationwide CAP-enabled system, end to end - but if you've been reading the headlines, you know there's no new money for anything.  I share the frustration, but it's a political reality.  Politics is the art of the possible.  I'd rather focus my energy on what I know can get done.
 
Thanks,
--Suzanne Goucher
 

-----Original Message-----
From: "Don Heppelmann" <DHeppelmann at tpt.org>

Well at first I was thinking this bill is wonderful, and started to draft a support note to the Senator, but after a few minutes I got to thinking .... another bill being submitted to Congress to fund yet a new advisory board! As much as this seems like a good idea, it also seems to me the issues are well documented already. Does it really take X million dollars to fund more meetings? It would be interesting to see the project budget to know what is allocated for what, especially the training portion.

What about a new appropriation for non-internet EAS CAP protocol national distribution and local/regional wireless IP infrastructure?

Don Heppelmann
MN SECC

--------------
I saw that too and was encouraged. Now if the two sides can get together and not make this issue a political football, there is a chance it will come out of committee and onto the floor.

MM

>
> For me, the breaking news today came from Suzanne Goucher who told us about the bill that Sen. Collins will introduce.
>
> Richard Rudman

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