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First responders in Muscatine County have a new radio system

Officials said the new Iowa Statewide Interoperable Communications System lets them communicate across the entire state.

MUSCATINE, Iowa — Right now, Muscatine County dispatchers are using a new radio system to talk to first responders.

For two years, the Muscatine County Emergency Management Agency has been working to connect its existing radio system to Iowa's state system. Now, first responders can talk to dispatchers from anywhere in the state.

Chris Jasper, director of emergency management and 911 for Muscatine County, has put a lot of work into switching to the new system.

"We then had to reprogram all of our radios within the county," Jasper said. "So we had just shy of 600 radios that needed to be reprogrammed, so coordinating all of that was a huge effort."

After all seven towers were either retrofitted or built and the administrative work was taken care of, the county flipped the switch on the new system two weeks ago.

"Everything’s been going smoothly, just a couple little tweaks we’ve had to make, minor changes here and there," Jasper said.

He said a big reason to switch to the state system was the ambulance trips EMS personnel usually take. Ambulances will often take patients to Davenport or Iowa City to get to a hospital. Using the Iowa system, those paramedics can talk to dispatchers wherever they go.

It's also helping first responders inside the county. 

"We had some areas kind of along the Mississippi River below the bluff where we had some coverage issues, those have improved," Jasper said.

The voice quality is better on the new system, too. Jasper said that's especially important in high-stress situations.

"If officers or ambulance crew are out in a tricky situation, they get kind of escalated and excited, sometimes it can be hard to understand what they need help with," Jasper said. "So this just makes that voice clearer and more effective for the dispatchers to hear their needs out in the field."

Jasper said the system is also helpful for bigger incidents. Muscatine dispatchers have already used it to call fire departments from outside the county during a large fire.

Right now, 79 of Iowa's 99 counties are connected to the statewide radio system. That includes Scott, Clinton and Louisa counties.

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