BAPERN
SYSTEM
GBPC
has developed and maintained the Boston Area Police Emergency
Radio Network (BAPERN) system since the early 1970’s. This
radio system was designed and built after a series of large
scale incidents occurred in and around the Boston area,
highlighting the inability of the interdepartmental police
officers from communicating with each other on scene. These
events led to a series of planning sessions and policy meetings
in which it was determined that a new radio system was needed to
improve interdepartmental police services.
There
are currently 74 full BAPERN member agencies in the Greater
Boston Police Council, Inc. A full BAPERN member has access at
all times to the BAPERN system. Agencies such as the
Massachusetts Dept. of State Police, Boston Police Dept., FBI
and US Marshall's office also support and/or monitor the BAPERN
system. These agencies have their own non-BAPERN radio
systems. However, they use Bapern 3 & 4 for general broadcasts
and inter-agency police business. The many universities that
participate as BAPERN members are certified as police
departments under Massachusetts General Laws.
BAPERN members communicate through two wide area channels (BAPERN
3 & 4), and three District channels (North District, West
District, Central District & South District). All of these
channels utilize voting receivers that terminate at Boston
Police Headquarters via leased telephone & microwave facilities.
The
majority of equipment used by agencies on the BAPERN system is
Motorola equipment. General Electric, Bendix King, and other
manufacturer's equipment are used as well. One requirement of
all radio equipment used on the BAPERN system is that it
contains an identifier that automatically sends a unique
numerical ID each time the radio transmits. This numerical ID
is automatically logged along with voice transmissions to
provide a permanent record of activity on the BAPERN channels.
An
additional membership class, BAPERN Contributing Membership was
established to allow a member agency to use BAPERN Channel 3 and
4 in the event of an emergency. This membership class would
authorize an agency to communicate with 105 agencies including
the Department of State Police and the Boston Police Department
by radio. It is an ideal way to have limited, but very
important use of the BAPERN Radio System. Presently, there are
31 BAPERN Contributing Members.
COLLECTIVE PURCHASING
In addition
to operating the BAPERN radio system, the Greater Boston Police
Council, Inc. administrates a cooperative purchasing program for
items such as police cruisers, medium and heavy duty trucks,
motorcycles, police patrol bicycles, radio maintenance, radio
commodities, and numerous other industry specific commodities.
BAPERN Members, BAPERN Contributing Members and Associate
Members are entitled to purchase equipment from the Council
Cooperative bid program. Associate membership is open to any
police agency that is not in the BAPERN system. There are
currently 203 associate members.
As of May 1,
2004, the Metropolitan Area Planning Council (MAPC) has taken
over as purchasing agent and will issue and re-issue all
contracts and bids on behalf of the Greater Boston Police
Council, Inc. Agencies must be a member of the Greater Boston
Police Council, Inc. to purchase from MAPC’s cooperative
contracts. Information relative to the GBPC/MAPC bids and
contracts will be made available at
www.gbpc.org and at
www.mapc.org.
LAW
ENFORCEMENT INCIDENT COMMAND SYSTEM TRAINING
GBPC
provides National Incident Management System (NIMS) based
Incident Command System (ICS) training to law enforcement, fire,
emergency medical services and other personnel through its
specially trained and seasoned team of instructors. This
program is a combination of classroom instruction and practical
hands-on scenarios utilizing simulation exercises conducted on a
96 square foot “Model City Simulator”©. Participants who
complete this course will be able to list the seven critical
tasks to be accomplished during the initial phase of an
incident; utilize the critical tasks for incident resolution in
various simulated exercise scenarios; determine and describe who
is the key decision maker or “Incident Commander” at any given
type of incident; describe and practice in a simulated
environment the shifting of the command structure as an incident
progresses; describe the agency response, desired outcomes and
termination activities to be performed given varying incident
characteristics; utilize the ICS structure as a tool for
pre-planning events; and assess the strengths and weaknesses of
a department’s capability to respond to critical incidents.
ICS
training may be scheduled at the request of both member and
non-member departments and organizations. Additional
information about the fee structure is available upon request.
DUES
Full
BAPERN members
are assessed 2 1/2 cents per capita for dues. Boston Police,
State Police, federal agencies, authorities, universities,
hospitals, district attorney's offices and sheriff's offices are
assessed $2,500.00 a year for BAPERN membership dues.
Dues
for BAPERN Contributing members are currently set at a
flat fee of $756.00 per year.
Associate members
are assessed a flat fee of $256.00 per year for dues; all out of
state associate members are assessed a fee of $306.00 per year.
To
discuss fees for ICS training, please contact the
Council.
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