WASHINGTON-Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) and Conrad Burns (R-Mont.), co-chairs of the E911 Congressional Caucus, introduced a bill on Thursday that will provide for state grants to deploy wireless enhanced 911 and will withhold those funds from states that divert money collected from E911 charges on telecommunications bills for other purposes.
“State legislators cannot divert those funds for other purposes,” said Burns. “If we can provide the funds and give the flexibility to the states for this purpose, we will find there is a lot of imagination out there.”
To ensure states that are diverting funds cannot apply for the E911 grants, states must certify twice each year to the Federal Communications Commission that funds are not being diverted.
Clinton said she is not worried about local governments diverting funds because it has been the local public-safety agencies that have been clamoring for these funds.
The bill would also create a federal task force led by the National Telecommunications and Information Administration. Members of the task force would include the departments of Justice, Homeland Security, Defense, Interior, and Transportation, the FCC, state and local first responders, and telecommunications industry representatives.
While a core component of the E911 Emergency Communications Act of 2003 is the matching grants for E911 implementation, the bill will only authorize the money. The money must then be appropriated-or included-in the federal budget.
Also appearing at the press conference were the mothers of two of the four New York teenagers who died in January after their boat sank in Long Island Sound. The local public-safety answering point did not respond to their frantic call to 911 because it could not locate the phone and therefore the boat. The boys’ bodies were recovered last month.
Following the Capitol Hill event, another E911 press event was held so industry and public-safety leaders could tell of their efforts of deploying E911.
