Public Safety Officials Say Brill Article Not Helpful to Building FirstNet
An article last week in The Atlantic, which gave unwanted attention to FirstNet, has caused a public relations problem for the nascent network, industry observers said this week. The article said “the prize for the most wasteful post-9/11 initiative arguably should go to FirstNet.” The network is likely years from completion and may never be built at all, wrote author Steven Brill, founder of The American Lawyer and Court TV.
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The National Public Safety Telecommunications Council disputed the article (see 1608100057). APCO Executive Director Derek Poarch said the piece made “inflammatory claims” and was a “disservice” to the public and first responders. “It is obvious that The Atlantic has no fact checkers on its staff,” blogged public safety consultant Andrew Seybold. “The article purports to be about FirstNet but the only thing about the story that is correct is, in fact, that Mr. Brill spelled the word FirstNet correctly.” Brill didn't comment.
Industry officials said it's too early to say whether the article will have a lasting impact for FirstNet. Almost concurrent with the article, AT&T Chief Financial Officer John Stephens said the carrier is making winning the FirstNet contract a priority (see 1608090014).
“There’s so much bad information out there now in the mainstream press,” said Don Root, chairman of NPSTC’s Spectrum Management Committee. How the public will react is hard to predict, Root said. A second public safety official said the criticism was once valid that FirstNet was happening too slowly, but the authority is back on course. A former FCC spectrum official said the article articulated what many suspect, that FirstNet is "very busy building an Edsel."
“Whatever your stance on the wisdom of the whole FirstNet project to begin with, state-level buy-in and cooperation will be critical,” said Doug Brake, telecom policy analyst at the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation. “If similar articles see FirstNet turned into a political hot potato at a state or local level, that would be a real problem.”
Chief technology officers of Harris and Motorola Solutions defended FirstNet in interviews Tuesday at the APCO 2016 conference in Orlando. The article "hasn’t been helpful,” Harris CTO Dennis Martinez told us. “FirstNet has enough challenges as it is. What they don’t need now is to have misinformation.”
“That article really didn’t probably understand the full backdrop of FirstNet, and worse off yet not even the progress they’ve made since they were initially founded,” Martinez said. The law establishing FirstNet was passed in 2012, so it’s unfair to say nothing has happened in the 15 years since 9/11, he said: “We didn’t even start in earnest until just a few years ago.” The state consultation process has driven the schedule and FirstNet had to design and will have to conduct a request for proposal process to bring in private funding -- all of which takes time, he said: “They’re crossing these chasms one by one.”
What FirstNet is doing is complicated, so it’s not surprising someone would second guess it, said Motorola CTO Paul Steinberg. “I’m not going to second guess the government and the vagaries and the complexities there because I don’t understand them that well. I know what they’re trying to do is very important. … I think they’re doing the right things. I think they’re moving along very, very well and we’re there to support them and everything they’re trying to get done.”
“There is no doubt that FirstNet is late, but the least culpable party is FirstNet, despite it taking four years to go to bid,” said Roger Entner, analyst at Recon Analytics. What if FirstNet hurried and got things wrong? he asked. “FirstNet would have been crucified even more,” Entner said. “The good thing about FirstNet is that it solves both the needs of first responders, especially in places that are not New York, not Los Angeles, and not other large and comparatively well-funded jurisdictions, [while] making the spectrum available to consumers when there is no large-scale emergency.”
"FirstNet is an ambitious, but altogether important undertaking,” said Adonis Hoffman, chairman of Business in the Public Interest. “All criticisms aside, we should not lose sight of the rationale for the network, which is all about public safety and security under the worst possible conditions. I would think in a world that is decidedly less secure than ever before, we are better served by trying to find a way to get FirstNet deployed, sooner, rather than carping on its shortcomings.” Hoffman predicted FirstNet will see “notable progress” especially after an industry consortium is selected to build the network.