FCC Tells Sprint to Speed Rerouting From Public-Safety Airwaves

For the past two years, Sprint Nextel has been trying to reroute its cellphone signals to avoid causing static on emergency radios used at Baltimore-Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport. The wireless carrier and Maryland officials dispute who should pay for some of the costs.

Manassas public-school leaders have asked Sprint to pick up a $30,000 tab for costs associated with fixing 79 radios so messages between school bus drivers would not become garbled. A year and a half later, the parties are still haggling.

Such negotiations around the country continue to delay Sprint's efforts to untangle its wireless signals from those used by public-safety workers to eliminate interference. After two years of missed deadlines and slow progress, the Federal Communications Commission yesterday told the company that it must pick up the pace.

Sprint must meet new, more frequent deadlines marking steadier progress or it could face fines, the commission said. The FCC also said it would be reluctant to grant Sprint extensions.

Sprint, based in Reston, inherited the public-safety static after it merged in August 2005 with Nextel Communications, which used slivers of airwaves intertwined with those used for emergency communications. As Nextel's network grew, so did interference on walkie-talkies and radios used by police and firefighters, causing dropped calls and spotty connections. The problem has not led to any documented deaths.

Six months before the merger, Nextel agreed to pay at least $4.8 billion to move its service to a separate swath of airwaves within three years. The company also agreed to pay the expenses for moving about 2,100 public-safety agencies to new airwaves. In exchange, the FCC granted Nextel an additional piece of airwaves now used by television broadcasters.

Nextel agreed to fund the relocation of those broadcasters, who have fallen behind in their transitions. Last week, Sprint and the broadcasters asked for a two-year extension for the move.

Rebecca Arbogast, an analyst with Stifel Nicolaus, said Sprint's efforts to reconfigure the airwaves as cheaply as possible are often at odds with public-safety agencies' attempts to have Sprint to pay for as many of the changes as possible.

FCC commissioners are "struggling to eliminate incentives that allow both Sprint and public safety agencies to drag their feet," Arbogast said, adding that it was unlikely the commission would take spectrum away from Sprint if the company shows it is making a good-faith effort to complete the process.

By the end of June, Sprint had moved about 80 percent of its signals from the public-safety spectrum, according to its quarterly report. But relocating hundreds of overlapping public safety-networks while ensuring the equipment works properly has proven "harder and more contentious than anyone initially thought," said Larry Krevor, Sprint's senior vice president of government affairs.

Thirty-five public-safety agencies, or about 3 percent, have completed the transition, he said. Sprint has contributed about $2.8 billion worth of airwaves, he said, along with nearly $900 million in expenses. Delays have resulted from some disputes over which public safety expenses Sprint is required to pay, according to FCC filings.

"There's lots of blame to go around," said Harlin R. McEwen, chairman of the technology committee for the International Association of Chiefs of Police, who also struck a conciliatory tone. "The three-year timeline to get this done probably was not realistic. . . . We don't want the commission to be punitive" to Sprint.

Negotiating contracts with hundreds of municipalities and community leaders continues to be a lengthy process, and Sprint does not expect to complete the transition by the deadline in June.

Public-safety agencies in the Washington area have said it could take as long as five years to reconfigure its airwaves. And Fairfax County officials have asked the FCC to extend the deadline to 2010.

"Much of this is out of our control," Krevor said. "We defer to the public agencies in terms of how long this will take."

Public-safety communications is a high priority for the FCC.

In a separate measure, the commission yesterday also imposed stricter guidelines for wireless companies to locate people who place emergency 911 calls from their phones. The new rules come two weeks after the FCC fined three cellphone companies, including Sprint, $1.3 million each for failing to equip enough phones with the technology.