Department: Purchasing
Department Head/Elected Official: DeWight Dopslauf
Regular or Supplemental RCA: Regular RCA
Type of Request: Financial Authorization
Project ID (if applicable): N/A
Vendor/Entity Legal Name (if applicable): Motorola Solutions, Inc.
MWDBE Contracted Goal (if applicable): N/A
MWDBE Current Participation (if applicable): N/A
Justification for 0% MWDBE Participation Goal: Exempt - Sole Source
Request Summary (Agenda Caption):
title
Request for approval of a sole source exemption from the competitive bid requirements and the second of four (4) renewal options with Motorola Solutions, Inc. in the amount of $2,138,801 for system enhancement and upgrade for the Texas Wide Area Radio Network (TxWARN) Astro P25 System for Universal Services through November 9, 2023, MWDBE Participation Goal: Exempt - Sole Source.
end
Background and Discussion:
The Texas Wide Area Radio Network (TxWARN) (P25) trunked radio system is being built out to parallel and expand the trunked radio system (see definition 1 below).
This system has sites in many counties in southeast Texas: Brazoria County, Chambers County, Fort Bend County, Galveston County, Harris County, Liberty County, Montgomery County, Walker County, Waller County.
This system is a large public safety system that services over 100 agencies in the Houston, Harris County, Texas area. It serves as the primary communications system for county agencies in Harris County, Fort Bend County, Galveston County, Chambers County and Brazoria County. Several of the communities within the bounds of these counties use this system, although Houston Police Department and Fire Department do not. Harris County started this system in the late 1980s and Fort Bend, Galveston, Chambers and Brazoria counties have combined their systems into this system in recent years. In addition, the remaining independent trunked radio systems in the area, including City of Houston have coordinated all talk group and radio IDs so that complete interoperability is possible for these systems utilizing SmartZone technology.
A site at 1201 Franklin was designed to provide in-building coverage for the Criminal Justice Center (CJC) building at that address in downtown Houston. The site utilized a special antenna system, which was designed to provide coverage through the building by antennas strategically located throughout the elevator shafts, basement and on every other floor. This site was previously identified as site 8 but more recently the Conroe site has been confirmed identifying as site 8 and this site appears to no longer exist.
Definition 1: Trunked radio system - a two-way radio system that uses a control channel to automatically assign frequency channels to groups of user radios. In a traditional half-duplex land mobile radio system a group of users (a talkgroup) with mobile and portable two-way radios communicate over a single shared radio channel, with one user at a time talking. These systems typically have access to multiple channels, up to 40-60, so multiple groups in the same area can communicate simultaneously. The primary purpose of this type of system is efficiency; many people can carry many conversations over only a few distinct frequencies. Trunking is used by many government entities to provide two-way communication for fire departments, police and other municipal services, who all share spectrum allocated to a city, county, or other entity. A secondary benefit of a trunking radio system is the ease with which it can accommodate radio interoperability and with proper planning, add authorized user agencies to the system post-implementation.
Expected Impact:
Renewal of this contract will allow the awarded supplier to upgrade software.
Alternative Options:
Alternative option would be not to approve the renewal and therefore impact the software upgrades.
Alignment with Goal(s):
X Justice and Safety
_ Economic Opportunity
_ Housing
X Public Health
_ Transportation
_ Flooding
_ Environment
_ Governance and Customer Service
Prior Court Action (if any):
|
Date |
Agenda Item # |
Action Taken |
|
11/30/21 |
231 |
Sole Source Exemption/Renewal |
Location: N/A
Address (if applicable): N/A
Precinct(s): Choose an item.
|
Fiscal and Personnel Summary |
|
Service Name |
|
|
|
FY 23 |
FY 24 |
Next 3 FYs |
|
Incremental Expenditures (do NOT write values in thousands or millions) |
|
Labor Expenditures |
$ |
$ |
$ |
|
Non-Labor Expenditures |
$ |
$ |
$ |
|
Total Incremental Expenditures |
$ |
$ |
$ |
|
Funding Sources (do NOT write values in thousands or millions) |
|
Existing Budget |
|
Other |
$2,139,000 |
$2,139,000 |
$ |
|
Choose an item. |
$ |
$ |
$ |
|
Choose an item. |
$ |
$ |
$ |
|
Total Current Budget |
$2,139,000 |
$2,139,000 |
$ |
|
Additional Budget Requested |
|
Choose an item. |
$ |
$ |
$ |
|
Choose an item. |
$ |
$ |
$ |
|
Choose an item. |
$ |
$ |
$ |
|
Total Additional Budget Requested |
$ |
$ |
$ |
|
Total Funding Sources |
$2,139,000 |
$2,139,000 |
$ |
|
Personnel (Fill out section only if requesting new PCNs) |
|
Current Position Count for Service |
- |
- |
- |
|
Additional Positions Requested |
- |
- |
- |
|
Total Personnel |
- |
- |
- |
Anticipated Court Date: November 15, 2022
Anticipated Implementation Date (if different from Court date):
Emergency/Disaster Recovery Note: Not an emergency, disaster, or COVID-19 related item
Contact(s) name, title, department: Robert Howard, Sr. Manager of Radio Services; Diandra Singleton, Senior Buyer, Purchasing
Attachments (if applicable): Letter