National 911 Program Awards Three Projects

Assessments of the 911 community’s use of computer-aided dispatch, GIS, and the next phase of the 911 DataPath Project are included in the latest round of awards

In line with the National 911 Program’s mission to provide federal leadership and coordination in support of optimal 911 services, the Program awarded three new projects in September. The goals of these projects are to clarify the current state of computer-aided dispatch (CAD); to assess the status of geographic information systems (GIS) across the country; and to conduct a pilot study to deploy the 911 DataPath Administrative Data Set for Decision-Making. To support the National 911 Program in these three efforts, the Program selected Mission Critical Partners (MCP) following a full and open solicitation and comprehensive evaluation of all proposals. Below are brief descriptions of each project and its goals:

Nationwide CAD Assessment Project:

This project will produce a document detailing the current status of CAD utilized by all stakeholders within the national 911 community. It will include information about benefits of and challenges to national CAD uniformity and 911 CAD data-sharing and identify necessary resources and recommended strategies for executing a plan to achieve truly interoperable CAD data-sharing across the U.S.

Nationwide GIS Assessment Project:

This contract will share findings about the current state of GIS used by all stakeholders within the national 911 community. As with the CAD assessment project, it will include information on the benefits of and challenges to national GIS uniformity and the sharing of GIS data among 911 professionals, identify the resources necessary to achieve interoperable GIS data nationwide, and recommend strategies for executing a plan to do so.

911 DataPath Project

The contractor for this project will be responsible for working with the Program, other federal agencies, and the public and private sectors of the 911 stakeholder community to conduct a pilot project that builds and tests the 911 DataPath Administrative Data Set for Decision-Making. The contractor will also identify and assess both the benefits and challenges associated with the deployment and operation of the data set.

The 911 DataPath is a comprehensive approach to achieving consistent 911 data nationwide. The Program is working with the 911 community on achieving aspects of the first strategic goal: data uniformity. Overall, MCP and stakeholders will work together to produce a standards-based data exchange model the community can use to share such data and make decisions on how to best operate 911 systems. From there, the 911 community can continue to move toward the vision of secure, automated data sharing by addressing data uniformity for other forms of 911 data (e.g., 911 call data, 911 agency financial data).

As results from each project are ready for release, you can find more at 911.gov.