Budget may spur safety network

A missed opportunity to deliver a nationwide data network for police officers and firefighters by the 10th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks had Tom Ridge, the first secretary of Homeland Security, befuddled this week. "If the tragedy of 9/11, the specific recommendations of the 9/11 Commission and the sustained pleas of police, firemen and emergency service professionals cannot generate federal support for such a network,” Ridge told a congressional hearing, “then what will it take?"

A tragic anniversary and new terror threats may not be enough to compel Congress to deliver a public safety communications system fit for the digital age — but the federal deficit-reduction process just might. New communications airwaves and tools for public safety are part of the more-than $400-billion American Jobs Act unveiled this week by President Barack Obama, as the plan calls for paying for a new network by publicly auctioning off some of the nation’s wireless spectrum. The fiscal trade-off — selling airwaves to pay for a network that would help first responders better communicate data across departments and jurisdictions — may also appeal to the so-called congressional supercommittee, which faces the daunting task of securing more than $1.2 trillion to reduce the federal deficit before the year’s end.