First responders outfitted with high-tech radios

by Nick Delgado

Guam - Emergency responders, law enforcement, the Department of Public Health, and island mayors are now equipped with better communication.  More than 200 handheld radios were turned over to response agencies this afternoon at the Emergency Operations Center in Agana Heights.

Homeland Security communications leader Brad Fokanson says the radios have a long life expectancy, saying, "These radios are both analog, which are current system is, and digital cable.  So when were able to come up with the money update our backbone, the stuff that actually makes it work, these radios won't go away, they'll just be reprogrammed again and operate on the new digital system."

The radios were purchased with more than a half-million dollars in federal funding from a Fiscal Year 2005 U.S. Homeland Security Grant Program award.