Jan. 22—Crawford County is starting a multi-year, multimillion-dollar upgrade of the emergency communications system within the county to be compliant with new technology.

The county is gearing up to be compliant with Project 25, a digital communications system so emergency radio communications equipment can communicate both across agencies and jurisdictions.

Project 25, or P25, standardizes how the different components of different land mobile radio (LMR) systems can connect to communicate with each other.

Project 25 is a partnership between the public safety communications community, standard development organizations and industry manufacturers, according to the Association of Public Safety Communication Officials.

The goal is to have standards so all LMR equipment and systems — no matter the manufacturer — have interoperability, meaning they can connect and communicate with each other.

However, it will come with a price tag in the millions — potentially in the range of $15 million to $20 million for Crawford County

“Encryption and interoperability — the ability to communicate — it’s the way of the world for public safety,” said Greg Beveridge, director of the Crawford County Department of Public Safety.

The P25 project first got on the county’s radar during the COVID-19 pandemic with an initial estimated cost of $12 million to $15 million, but the latest preliminary estimate is the cost is $18 million to $20 million, according to county officials.

“Kicking the can down the road — it’s just going to cost more and more and more,” Beveridge said. “It’s a hard pill to swallow, but it will be a necessity.

“It’s going to be a monumental task to do this not only in price, but the components that go into this,” he continued. “There are hundreds of radios to be replaced.”

There are 26 fire departments alone in Crawford County plus local ambulance services as well as local law enforcement agencies that will need radios replaced at their bases, in vehicles as well as for their personnel.

Plus, much of the radio equipment in the Crawford County 911 Center, which opened in 2017, will have to be replaced, Beveridge said. The new center opened in the summer of 2017.

“A good portion of what we have will have to be replaced with digital equipment,” he said.

There’s no federal mandate as yet regarding a deadline to switch over to a P25-ready system, but one is expected as counties across Pennsylvania and the country have been doing preparations or already meet P25 standards, according to Beveridge and county commissioners.

“There is no way around it — it is not an option,” Eric Henry, chairman of the commissioners, said last week. “It’s only a matter of when the federal government says you must do it. They’ll give you a five-year window.

“It requires us to replace all of our towers and hardware,” Henry said. “All of our digital console hardware at the actual public safety building. This is a huge process. It’s going to require some finesse from our finance department to find a way to finance this.”

One of the first steps the county is going to take is hire a consultant to do a needs assessment for the county.

Commissioners are expected to act on hiring MCM Consulting Group at their meeting this week. The needs assessment study is expected to take about six months to complete, Beveridge said, adding that the county’s completion of meeting the P25 standard isn’t expected until 2026 or 2027.

“The consultants will look at what we have and may work with P25,” Beveridge said. “Also, how we can leverage other systems in place like Erie County and Venango County that are working toward or already are P25 compliant.”

The county also will look to try to help area fire departments with equipment purchases.

“A lot of the fire departments we deal with have a tight budget,” Henry said of the county’s volunteer fire departments. “They have a hard time paying utility bills. So part of the project with P25 is to help them purchase mobile and portable radios for their own departments.”

Commissioner Scott Schell, who is fire chief of Cochranton Volunteer Fire Department, added the county will only to be able to assist each department so much financially.

It’s why commissioners have been stressing to local municipal governments to prepare financially as well.

“Whatever we do (as a county), we’ve got to be fair to everybody,” Schell said of potential county financial aid.

“It’s going to come to pain financially,” Henry said. “So when people talk about a concern about the budget and why we make the tough decisions, it’s because we have to come up with probably $20 million.

“It’s not necessarily something we want to do, but it’s something we have to do,” he added. “This board has decided it’s time to figure out what that cost is going to be and how we’re going to pay for it.”

Keith Gushard can be reached at (814) 724-6370 or by email at kgushard@meadvilletribune.com.