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Frustrated over lack of access to 700 MHz spectrum now under the control of the First Responder Network Authority (FirstNet), Mississippi's Wireless Communications Commission froze construction on its $56 million LTE network for public safety, a project that was nearly 80 percent complete.
"We cannot operate the system without spectrum," Vicki Helfrich, the wireless commission's executive officer, told the Sun Herald.
Motorola Solutions is supplying Mississippi's public-safety broadband network. The vendor has recently been accused of trying to derail FirstNet through a concerted lobbying campaign.
The Executive Office of the State of Mississippi was one of seven Broadband Technology Opportunities Program (BTOP) grant recipients whose funding was halted last year by the Commerce Department's National Telecommunications and Information Administration due to concerns the BTOP public-safety projects might be incompatible with the nationwide public safety broadband network being crafted by FirstNet.
To restart funding, the BTOPs must finalize lease agreements with FirstNet to use its 700 MHz spectrum and win approval for their individual projects from NTIA, which oversees FirstNet.
The latest spectrum-lease negotiation deadline expired July 12, with only the Los Angeles Regional Interoperable...