The Navajo Nation’s Mobile Network Operations Center has gone online, and by Thanksgiving, 250 Navajo police vehicles will navigational, database searching and Internet communication capabilities.
The Navajo Nation, based in Arizona, is using Alvarion equipment installed by OnSat Native American Services
Within the next 90 days, all Navajo police vehicles will have “ruggedized” laptop computers installed, and police dispatchers in all seven Navajo police districts will be able to see their locations on large-screen monitors in real time.
“It’s going to leapfrog everybody,” says Samson Cowboy, executive director of Navajo Division of Public Safety. “We’re taking a lead role in technology.”
Within the last two years, the Navajo Nation has built one of the largest wireless/satellite communication networks in the world. That occurred when Navajo Nation President Joe Shirley Jr. expanded the existing system at each of the 110 chapters, or communities, with computers and wireless satellite technology.
With more than 350 wireless hotspots sites around Navajo land, Navajo police will now take advantage of that connectivity.
“The officers can do all their paperwork in their vehicles near any hotspot,” says Dave Stephens, CEO of OnSat Native American Services. “When a call comes in from an officer in the field, a GPS can identify the source of the call. The officer will know where he needs to go for the police call.”
The system is interoperable with the National Crime Information Center, INLETS, ACGIS Arizona, Amber Alerts or any information system within a city, county or state government or other information system.
“We’ll be able to share information with any agency we want to,” Cowboy says. “There’s so much that we can now do with it. This is the first time that the Navajo Nation will be able to communicate online in real time with other police agencies and homeland security organizations.”
All of the equipment for the Mobile Network Operations Center was purchased through tribal resource grants from the U.S. Department of Justice, known as Community Oriented Policing System, or COPS.
