California PSAPs turn to Cassidian Communications for interoperability, efficiency solution
While the three PSAPs share the same phone system and the VESTA/Sentinel 4 solution for 911, Acosta’s PSAP and backup facility are on a different computer-aided dispatch (CAD)system, which limits the interoperable capability with the other PSAPs, Freeman said.
“If you’re an agency that wants to share your call load [with another agency], but you don’t have the same CAD systems, I wouldn’t suggest trying that,” she said. “In a timely manner, you can’t get the information to the agency that’s going to be dispatching [if the CAD systems are different].
“We can back them up 911 wise, but we don’t share the same CAD system.”
Meanwhile, the geo-diversity characteristics of the new system in San Bernadino could prove beneficial again in the near future, as there is a chance that Freeman’s PSAP facility will be the site of significant construction to transform it into a public-safety operations center for the area, she said.
“We may just build on our site—that’s a possibility,” Freeman said. “If so, then we may have to vacate our building for a year. Having this system, it’s going to be very easy, because we share the same computer-aided dispatch (CAD) system [as the Desert Control Center]. So, it would be a matter of uprooting our folks, driving up to the Desert center for a year and just logging in and just taking our calls.
“If we didn’t have this system, it would be a huge endeavor to transfer and move our equipment somewhere else, so that’s going to be a huge cost savings.”