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Commissioners approve MOU to test Navy 911 routing and regional call handling
Summary
St. Mary's County approved an MOU Aug. 6 to participate in testing the Navy's 911 routing and management service, a move intended to let base telephones place 911 calls that will be routed through cloud‑based systems to the proper dispatch center.
St. Mary's County commissioners on Aug. 6 authorized the county Department of Emergency Services and Technology to sign a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with Naval District Washington (NDW) to participate in Phase 1 testing of the Navy's 911 Routing and Management Service (RMS).
The Navy is transitioning from base‑specific 10‑digit emergency numbers to an enterprise system that will allow uniform 911 dialing from base telephones and cloud‑based call routing to regional dispatch centers. "What we want is for all the folks really to dial the digits 911," George Lamb, the Navy project lead, told the commissioners. In the near term the Navy will forward existing base emergency numbers to a cloud routing service that can reroute calls to Navy regional dispatch centers; the longer‑term plan is to enable direct 911 dialing that interoperates with local PSAP selective routers.
Bob Kelly, director of the county Department of Emergency Services and Technology, said wireless 911 calls from the bases will continue to route to the county PSAPs and will not change under the initial phase; the present MOU covers coordination for testing call routing and for failover. Lamb said test schedules are aggressive: near‑term call‑forwarding tests were planned immediately and the Navy tentatively plans broader 911 dialing capability in 2014.
County and Navy staff discussed interim failover steps should the Navy's regional dispatch center become unavailable; the MOU establishes support roles so that local county dispatch may accept calls during a short interim period while the Navy activates its backup routing.
Commissioner Cynthia L. Jones moved to authorize the county commissioner president to sign the MOU; Commissioner Todd B. Morgan seconded. The board voted unanimously in favor.
County staff said the MOU also anticipates a separate addressing project to align base building and street addressing with county GIS so that PSAPs receive accurate location information when base calls arrive via county systems.
