FirstNet Launches National Search for New General Manager
The FirstNet board formally launched a search for a new general manager to replace Bill D'Agostino, who left the nascent public safety network after only a year. FirstNet’s Governance and Personnel Committee agreed Monday to hire a head-hunting firm to do a nationwide search, and the full board was briefed on those plans Tuesday. Tuesday’s board meeting was the last with former Chairman Sam Ginn, who’s leaving the board, and the first to be chaired by telecom executive Sue Swenson.
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"We are moving quickly to recruit, identify, and select a leader who brings the right blend of executive experience and leadership skills,” Swenson said in a news release (http://bit.ly/1nL7Xro). After D'Agostino announced he was leaving, public safety officials said that the position would be difficult to fill, since the GM earns a government salary but faces huge demands (CD April 16 p1).
TJ Kennedy, acting GM, noted in a presentation that FirstNet views itself as akin to an Internet startup and staffers work “early morning hours and late nights.” Staffers also have to work with “the added complexity” of “a government environment,” with regulations FirstNet has to follow, Kennedy said. “It’s very different than some of the standard government positions,” he said. A selling point is that the job is rewarding, he said. “Providing public safety with the tools to do their job more safely is something that almost everyone in the country wants to be a part of,” he said.
Ali Afrashteh, FirstNet’s new chief technical officer, said much of FirstNet’s focus is on a comprehensive request for proposals. “It’s all hands on deck,” he said. Afrashteh spoke to FirstNet’s Technology Committee Monday. The RFP is aimed at helping FirstNet develop relationships with carriers and others as it builds out a network, FirstNet officials said. Afrashteh joined FirstNet in late April.
FirstNet staff is also working through the technical needs, sorting through more than 1,000 proposed requirements by National Public Safety Telecommunications Council and other groups. Another top focus is working with the Broadband Technology Opportunities Program grant recipients that are already building out early versions of FirstNet, he said. With lots of work to do, FirstNet is hiring, he said. “We are looking for a lot of people with expertise in wireless,” he said.
FirstNet board member Kevin McGinnis questioned during the Technology Committee meeting whether some vendors are trying to establish a mission-critical-voice standard through the Open Mobile Alliance (OMA) instead of working through 3GPP, which develops global standards for LTE. “To me that seems like it would be tremendously distracting,” he said. That “upsets me as a public safety professional.” McGinnis heads North East Mobile Health Services, the largest paramedic service in Maine.
Afrashteh said he had similar concerns. FirstNet is asking vendors to “push for accelerating these types of features and functionality in 3GPP rather than moving it to some other organization,” he said.
The board took two other actions at its meeting Tuesday. It approved a charter for the Public Safety Advisory Committee, made up of public safety officials who provide subject matter expertise to FirstNet. The board also approved a policy for addressing environmental and historical preservation impacts associated with the buildout of its network, which are governed by the National Environmental Policy Act.