GARNETT — An upgrade of communications systems for law enforcement personnel in Garnett and Anderson County should bring those agencies up to date, Anderson County Sheriff Vernon Valentine said. THERE IS NO such looming upgrade for Allen County personnel, noted Angela Murphy, 911 center director.
However, radio broadcasts from both the Anderson County Sheriff’s Department and Garnett Police Department will no longer be heard on most scanner radios, Valentine said.
That’s because the communications upgrades will include converting those radio systems from analog to digital, Valentine explained.
“We have been slowly upgrading to a newly mandated 911 communication center, better known as ‘New Gen’ over the past 2½ years,” Valentine said in a press release.
The plan was for the conversion to be complete sometime in 2016 or 2017. But after researching Anderson County’s antiquated equipment, the state encouraged the county to convert to the new system earlier.
“They bumped us to this year,” Valentine said.
The new system will greatly enhance the county’s ability to send and receive greater amounts of information, Valentine said.
But there’s a significant tradeoff for the general public.
While the new ACSD and GPD radios will broadcast from the same frequencies as in the past, the digital signal cannot be picked up properly from most scanner radios.
“There is no fix for this,” Valentine said. “I would recommend taking (channels) out of your scanner to do away with the annoying sound that comes when the sheriff or police are talking.”
Only digital scanner radios will pick up the new signal properly, Valentine told the Register, and those are expensive. Those cost in the $400 to $500 range.
Other Anderson County entities soon will switch over to the digital channels as well, including in Kincaid and Colony.
Valentine did not disclose the cost of the upgrades, but noted the funds are coming from the sheriff’s department’s reserve funds collected for housing out-of-county inmates in the Anderson County Jail.
“I will not be asking for any money now or later to complete this upgrade,” he said.
Valentine apologized to those unable to listen in on radio transmissions for deputies and police officers.
“Anderson County has been behind on our technology based on the cost of everything,” he said.
Allen County’s radios — which utilize analog signals — are about six years old, and are up to date with the rest of the county’s communications systems.
Converting to digital signals would be costly, Murphy said. She did not foresee any mandatory upgrades for Allen County.
“Our radios work just fine,” she said.
Dispatch radio upgrades leave listeners in the dark
