Managing the Financial and Operational Issues Associated with the Hickam AirForce Base Trunked Land Mobile Radio Project

摘要

The 15th Communications Squadron (15 CS), located on Hickam AFB, HI, currentlymanages 36 conventional VHF land mobile radio (LMR) networks for various units operating on the base. Due to a lack of interoperability between the networks, an absence of additional frequency space in their current spectrum, and a mandate by the federal government to move to narrowband technology, the 15 CS has initiated a project to convert the conventional networks to a UHF trunked LMR system. Many of the trunking equipment items will be shared among all users, whereas with the conventional system, each network operated with its own equipment, isolated from all other networks. There are several key financial and operational issues which the 15 CS must consider and resolve for the project to be successful. This study examined the management question: How can the 15 CS manage the installation and operation of the new trunked LMR system. The 15 CS needs to determine who should be responsible for paying for equipment purchases, and equipment operation and maintenance costs. The 15 CS also needs to determine how to manage the talkgroup and feature assignment process, which system activity reports are needed, and what will be done with the information in the reports.