Kenora Rainy-River MPP, Minister of Energy, Northern Development and Mines and Minister of Indigenous Affairs – Greg Rickford – is investing in the safety of emergency responders across the province.
At the Longbow Lake Fire Hall yesterday, Rickford announced that roughly 8,500 emergency responders in the region – including police, paramedics, firefighters, hospital staff and more – will see a modernization of Ontario’s Public Safety Radio Network in the north.
“This modernization project is critical for Northern Ontario,” said Rickford. “A state-of-the-art network and supporting infrastructure are essential tools our forest firefighters and emergency responders in the North need to do their jobs effectively and keep Ontarians safe.”
The project will rebuild the Public Safety Radio Network’s aging infrastructure, provide state-of-the-art radio equipment to emergency responders, and provide maintenance services for 15 years. Rickford says that the network currently sees daily service outages, which can compromise emergency responders’ ability to react to emergencies.
The new network is expected to be fully-operational by 2023, with new service phased in by 2021. A risk-mitigation strategy has also been developed to maintain the current network until the new network is operational.
Link to original article in Kenora Online: Rickford invests in emergency responders