Commissioners hire new consulting firm for radio study

The Lorain County Board of Commissioners voted March 25 to hire a new consulting firm to figure out what the county needs when selecting a new public safety radio system.

Friday’s move entered the county into a contract with MCM Consulting Group of State College, Pennsylvania, at a cost of not more than $90,000 to do a propagation study assessing infrastructure needs for an updated public safety radio communications system.

Radio propagation is how radio waves behave. A propagation study is “a computer-generated study estimating the signal emanating, and prediction of coverage, from antennas or repeaters sited on a specific tower or structure,” according to LawInsider. com, a resource for legal contract language.

MCM has worked with Summit County to upgrade its 911 dispatch systems, according to media reports and the company’s website.

Following a four-year study, from 2018 to 2022, by the consulting firm Mission Critical Partners, Commissioners Matt Lundy and Michelle Hung voted in December to select Cleveland Communications Inc.’s L3 Harris radio system. The plan cost nearly $8 million in American Rescue Plan Act funds and would have replaced obsolete public safety radios for county sheriff’s deputies and other interested emergency first-response agencies by providing grant funding. CCI’s was the lone complete bid.

Commissioners David Moore and Jeff Riddell axed the deal in January, claiming without providing any evidence that the bid process was unfair. They have since said they intend to redo the process fairly.

The rescinding of the contract angered sheriff’s deputies, Sheriff Phil Stammitti, local fire chiefs, mayors, elected officials and their supporters who saw the L3 Harris system as their preferred technological upgrade.

MCP wrote a letter to the county in February saying it had fulfilled its contract and owed the county no more work on its current issue. Also, a breach-of-contract lawsuit was filed by CCI against the county in Common Pleas Court, and a health and safety grievance filed by the Lorain County Deputies Association is likely to go to arbitration.

Reading from Friday’s proposed motion before it passed, Moore said Lorain County “does not contemplate that this study will discuss or advise as to the relative benefits of one radio system or another.”

“The study should assess cember by commissioners Michelle Hung and Matt Lundy.

Riddell called the CCI contract politically motivated, “a bad contract done badly,” “unethical,” “potentially illegal” and said it “followed a poor process” on Jan. 8. CCI, he said, got the contract “without having to earn it by competing fairly for public money.”

Of the $8 million in the contract with CCI, $4 million was to pay for radios and equipment to benefit the sheriff’s office, Lorain County EMA and Lorain County 911 needs. The other nearly $4 million would have provided grants to municipalities that wanted the radios and would pay subscriber fees.

CCI sued and county sheriff’s deputies filed a grievance after the contract was rescinded.

Schneider: Trust the experts

Wellington Mayor Hans Schneider brought the matter up again at his State of the Village address on March 24, more than a month after Wellington Village Council passed a resolution Feb. 20 backing the L3 Harris radio system.

Wellington Fire District

Chief Mike Wetherbee is a vocal supporter of the L3 Harris system for his firefighters. The South Lorain County Ambulance District and Wellington Police Department also want the upgrade, Schneider said Thursday.

L3 Harris radios “provide improved communication capacity within facilities, they operate without supplemental tower systems, unlike alternative options,” he said.

“I don’t claim to be an expert on much of anything,” Schneider said, “but I do know how to listen.

I do think it’s the most important characteristic an elected official has, is to listen and to listen to people I think are experts.”

He said he trusts the experts in the emergency services.

“If they say this is what we need to keep you safe, gives us a better chance to keep people safe, that’s all I need to hear. I trust them like I trust a member of my family. I think it’s important. It’s unfortunate it’s become politicized, it’s really not a Democrat, Republican, Black, white, male, female (issue), it’s nothing. It’s public safety, it’s the most important that we are tasked with as