RCFMA Narrow Banding Project

WARNING
Any agency that is dispatched via the RCFMA State Dispatch Communications System MUST participate in this project.  Failure of an agency to participate in this project and convert their communications equipment according to the system plan will result in your agency not being able to communicate via our dispatch system effective October 1, 2012. 

Information posted Septmber 13, 2012

Programming Information for Rutland County Departments on State Dispatch and who use the dispatch frequency to contact State Dispatch and who may use the county tactical frequencies

Rutland County Fire Mutual Aid Narrowband and System Enhancements

CH-1 State Dispatch 154.250   PL 131.8 on TX & RX All Mobiles, Portables and Base Stations

CH-2 Department Operating  Your Frequency and Your PL

CH-3* COUNTY TAC A    154.010 PL 131.8 ON TX AND RX All Mobiles and Portables

CH-4 *COUNTY TAC B     154.265 PL 131.8 ON TX AND RX All Mobiles and Portables

*Note the placement of County TAC-A and TAC-B is recommended as CH 3 & 4, if this presents a problem to how your department operates they can be anywhere you decide, but should be in your portables and mobiles for mutual aid coordination. V-Call and V-Tac frequencies should also be programmed into your radios for interoperability in major emergencies.

We are also implementing an ALL CALL PAGE that should be programmed into your pagers on 154.250. This is an all call and would be used to alert you to a communications problem, weather warning or other urgent messages such as dispatch being evacuated without having to go through 40 tones.

The A Tone for the County All Call is 539.0 The B tone is 600.9   

Note: The 10 channel plan that we originally intended to implement was going to present a major cost to some departments to re-arrange frequencies within existing radio units. So the new plan is as outlined above.

Our goal is not to cost departments an excessive amount. The above plan will accomplish our primary goals including:

Narrow banding on the dispatch frequency 154.250 and making sure all mobiles and portables have PL 131.8 on the Transmit and Receive Sides.

Renaming the county fire ground frequencies County TAC-A 154.010 and County TAC-B 154.265. Both must have PL 131.8 on both the, transmit and receive sides.  We recommend they be located in channels 3 & 4 if at all possible but they can be anywhere in your frequency plan as long as you have them and know where they are.

VCALL and VTAC frequencies be installed in all mobile and portable units with frequencies and PL’s as required in the VCOMM plan.

That a county all call tone be installed in all pagers that can be so programmed to allow for quick notification.

That’s it.

NOTE: RCFMA will be narrow banding Boardman Hill Transmitter on Tuesday September 17, 2012 for testing. We will be testing with departments to identify how it works in the narrow band format with wide band equipment still in use in the field. Please assist in the testing and pardon the repeated tests but it is necessary to make sure we get this right.

We will get through this but there may be some rough spots. It is obviously not possible to switch everyone at once.

If you have any questions please contact C-1 by cell phone 802-342-0919 or e-mail schlacfire@aol.com. Thank you. 

Information posted March 2012
There will be a very important Rutland County Fire Mutual Aid Association meeting on Thursday, March 8, 2012 at 7:00 p.m. at the West Rutland Fire Station.  This meeting will primarily be about meeting the FCC narrow banding requirement that takes effect December 31, 2012.