The path to improving Westbrook’s two-way radio communications network has been anything but smooth, with officials and the ad hoc committee tasked with the project facing questions about timing, procedure, communication, and even motivation. The most recent meeting on the subject continued the controversy, though steps are now being taken to move the project ahead.

The two-way radio infrastructure project, which has a proposed budget of just more than $1 million, would build a network of radio towers that would better serve the town, from fire and police to public works personnel, according to Emergency Management Director Don Izzo.

Currently, the fire department has one antenna located on the State Police Troop F headquarters tower in Westbrook, Izzo explained. That leaves a number of “dead spots” in which personnel can’t reach other responders. In some areas of town, Fire Chief Michael Jenkins reported having to use his cell phone to communicate with the dispatch center because he wasn’t able to get through on his radio.

Working with Jenkins and the Board of Fire Commissioners, Izzo created a proposal to build a “town-owned infrastructure of radio towers strategically placed throughout the town so the firemen can communicate with themselves as well as back to the dispatch center,” he said earlier this year.

The project would also “acquire a newly licensed radio channel equal to what we currently have so we continue our mutual aid radio response with our surrounding towns” while improving the network for the town’s firefighters, said Izzo.

While that proposal has found broad support, the progress the town has made in pursuing the proposal has been less broadly accepted, with concerns ranging from missing meetings and miscommunications to differing expectations for the pace of the project.

Defining the Issue

There are differing accounts of events. Some, such as former Westbrook selectman Chris Ehlert, say that First Selectman Noel Bishop is intentionally “delaying this project to come forward for a formal vote and funding with stall tactics of considering a consultant to most recently the formation of this ad hoc committee.”

Bishop’s position is that a big-ticket item—the proposed project will come in at more than $1 million—requires careful deliberation.

According to Bishop, a qualified volunteer came forward at the end of last year, offering to review Izzo’s proposal at no cost to the town. Izzo, Bishop said, didn’t get the requested information completed in time and the volunteer informed them, in late December/early January, that he was no longer available. Izzo refuted submitting the information later than expected.

Last February, the BOS approved $9,000 to hire a consultant. The town received three proposals and interviews were conducted, according to Bishop. But before a decision was made, representatives from state agencies contacted the town and appeared at a special April 4 BOS meeting to discuss the state’s emergency communications systems and how Westbrook might use that, instead of a separate network. The ad hoc committee was formed by the BOS at the end of that meeting.

At the ad hoc committee’s first meeting on April 26, the discussion was somewhat disjointed, with each member addressing separate, occasionally overlapping, concerns. A major issue is what are generally termed dead zones: areas in town where radio communications do not work at all. These are hazardous for residents, workers, and first responders.

While alarm is warranted, the dead zones apparently are not new. According to Bishop’s administrative assistant, Suzanne Helchowski, these areas have “always been that way. It’s not like they had coverage before and now they don’t. They haven’t been covered in the past 60, 70, 80 years.”

Bishop has acknowledged some difficult group dynamics in the ad hoc committee.

Board of Fire Commissioners Chair Bob “Hagemeister wants to proceed at a different pace. Mr. Izzo says, ‘Why can’t you take my project and proceed?’” Bishop said.

According to Bishop, Westbrook Ambulance Chief of Operations and President Gregg Prevost didn’t receive a copy of the proposal until a month ago, causing additional delays.

An oft-cited reason for expediting the project has been the October 2019 expiration of one or more Federal Communication Commission (FCC) licenses. For example, according to the Feb. 21 Board of Selectmen (BOS) meeting minutes, “Mr. Izzo reported that the FCC license for the project expires in Oct. 2019 and an extension may not be allowed. Without the license, the project cannot move forward.”

A check by a telecommunications engineer at the Connecticut Department of Emergency Service and Public Protection, however, revealed that none of the town’s six FCC licenses are due to expire this year; the earliest expiration date is Aug. 21, 2021. When Bishop provided this information at the April 26 ad hoc committee meeting, Hagemeister said, according to the meeting minutes, that “Westbrook risks losing FCC channels, not licenses, due to expiration dates.”

Bishop requested clarification on the difference between licenses and channels.

Misunderstandings about meeting dates have also contributed to the tension. Ehlert stated that a meeting was scheduled for May 10, and that although “all members of the [ad hoc committee] and those in the public, including myself, showed up,” the meeting was canceled without notice.

Bishop said that the informal scheduling of the meeting was never formally adopted.

“At the first meeting, we agreed that if any member of the committee could not come, we would not have a meeting,” Bishop said. “It was one of the ground rules: Every member had to be there.”

The meeting minutes do not document this agreement.

“At the end of the first meeting” on April 26, “one of the individuals indicated that they could not make the next meeting,” Bishop continued. “That meeting date was May 10.”

Thus, he said, the meeting was not posted on the website 24 hours in advance.

“If you don’t post the meeting, you don’t have the meeting,” he said.

Bishop acknowledged that not everyone understood.

“We had people showing up,” he said.

At its most recent meeting on May 24, friction was high between some of the members, and Ehlert, who attended the meeting, was unhappy with a notice on the agenda that stated the public could speak only after the ad hoc committee finished deliberations as the last item on the agenda and limited comments to five minutes.

Despite all of this, Bishop is hopeful about the ad hoc committee’s work, and says there is an “emerging consensus.”

In a recent phone call, Bishop said the proposed scope of work for the consultant will be presented to the BOS at a special meeting on June 4 (after press time). Bishop believes the cost of the consultant’s work will exceed the previously approved $9,000, and he anticipates that the BOS will not yet approve a specific amount of money for the project.

“We want to see, like any bidding process, what do you think your costs will be depending on the scope of work?”

The RFP will be “far more specific now than what was originally posted,” he said, noting that the three consultants who were interviewed in the last round are welcome to reapply.

Interviews, he said, will be conducted by the ad hoc committee.

“Certainly the safety, health, and well being of our residents is very, very important. We hoped we would be at this point sooner,” Bishop said.