Randall, county work together to provide broadband here

By Gail Peckler-Dziki

Correspondent

The Randall Plan Commission and town board sent a unanimous favorable recommendation to the Kenosha County Land Use Commission seeking a conditional use permit to allow the co-placement of an antenna set and supporting electronic enclosures at two locations in

Randall at the Sept. 22 regular Randall town board meeting.

Supervisor Rose Nolan was absent for the meeting.

According to Marty Lacock, Kenosha County Internet technician, the equipment located in Randall is part of a broadband system that will serve the needs of public safety throughout the county providing broadband data and video communications for sheriff’s deputy squad cars and various municipal police, fire an emergency vehicles.

The system is an addition to the current voice communication and allows data such as mug shots to be transmitted almost instantly.

Modems located in squad cars would provide communication between police and towers and between the squads even in a disaster.

HierComm, Inc., from Waukesha Wisconsin is the vendor.

One tower is located at 388700 87th Street and the owner is the American Tower Corp. The second location is 31315 93rd Street and is owned by TowerCo. Assets LLC.

This is the third phase of a Kenosha County plan to provide better data transmission service to public safety personnel in the county. The first phase was a single tower to test vehicle to tower communication ability. Second was three towers, an urban tower in the city of Kenosha, a suburban tower in the town of Somers and a rural tower in the Village of Bristol to test transmission between towers.

The tests were done in all environments and according to HierComm Co. representative Ken Schlager, the equipment performed well.

Lacock explained that there are a possible seven antenna sets to be placed west of I-94. In addition to the two in Randall, two are slated for Salem, two for Bristol, one for Brighton and possibly two in Twin Lakes. He said installation and implementation are expected to be complete by the first quarter of 2012.

At that time, HierComm will be the Internet Service Provider (ISP) for private residences in the county for areas without service. HierComm will work with local municipalities to market the service. Lacock said that the county has capped expenses the county will pay. In addition, as the customer base increases, so will the amount paid to the county by HeirComm, further defraying county resident costs.

“HierComm already successfully provides this same type of service for Washington County,” Lacock said, “so it’s natural to take advantage of that type of experience in Kenosha County.”


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