Civil Air Patrol

15 July 98

Vision: Our vision is to develop:

1. An effective and efficient communications capability accurately tailored to meet the needs of the organization
2. A communications capability utilizing the best resources available from current technology, both CAP-indigenous and out-sourced systems
3. A professional communications system compliant with all applicable regulatory guidance
4. A fully-funded means of acquisition and fielding necessary resources while continuously evaluating hardware and training upgrades for the future
5. A corps of communications managers who regularly evaluate the communications requirements of the organization and implement sound plans to meet the needs

Background: Today’s Situation

Where we are

1. The communications system in use by the organization is significantly out of date and in many cases does not adequately meet the needs of the organization. Many system components have greatly exceeded reasonable life expectancies and most fail to comply with current mandatory specifications IAW our frequency assignments.
2. In many cases our current management practices in the communications program have focused exclusively on justifying and maintaining an identified system rather than providing a constant evaluation of the changing communications needs of the organization. This has resulted in the stagnation of the communications program.

1. An incorrect interpretation of law and regulatory guidance which erroneously placed the governance of CAP communications in the civil arena rather than the federal. This resulted in the implementation of many rules, specifications, procedures and management practices which were, in fact, not applicable while displacing the correct AF and federal guidance.
3. A communications officer specialty training track which has emphasized technical knowledge of radio equipment rather than the management skills and techniques necessary to respond to the mission and provide leadership.
4. A lack of a validated national vision of an integrated communications network to support the CAP missions and to provide forward leadership and direction for the program.
5. A lack of adequate and consistent funding for the communications program. With no reliable funding CAP has relied principally on the members to provide one of the nations largest and most complex communications systems from their personal resources. This has led to a system composed of a patchwork of field-expedients with little systems engineering, decisive planning or management.

Goals: What we plan to do

1. Bring the CAP communications system into compliance with all applicable regulatory guidance.
2. Identify coming changes in the regulatory guidance and implement plans to upgrade the system as necessary.
3. Work with the communications managers to encourage a fresh evaluation of: the needs of the organization; the current status of our capabilities; and the planning necessary to get from where we are today to where we need to be.

In the past 50 years of organizational history, proactive management and strategic planning were practically impossible. Since most of the system was "privately owned," communications managers had very little ability to redistribute assets according to a plan so there was very little reason to spend the time and effort to document the needs and devise such a plan. As a result, management of the communications system became primarily a technician’s job of maintaining exiting systems. What was lost in the management nightmare was the mission.

However, in the last few years, several factors combined to focus our attention on the need to change the status quo and have worked to provide the possibility of moving the Civil Air Patrol Communications System forward. One factor is the NTIA mandated change of our VHF/FM system to new narrowband FM specifications by the year 2008. Since no equipment in our present inventory meets these new standards, the change to narrowband will eventually require a total replacement of our VHF system. With the costs of this state-of-the-art equipment being much higher than the equipment solutions we’ve relied on in the past, it will not be practical to rely on member funding of this upgrade.

Therefore it has become necessary to address long range planning that will require command to re-engage in the process and provide input and oversight. In essence, command must accept "ownership" of the program.

Our recent 1998 field survey reflects a stated need for equipment that meets the following organic national communications objectives:

• Wing Commander and their staff able to direct and supervise all mission deployed field activities in a timely manner.
• Mission Coordinators able to both direct the mission and report the status and location of all assets in the field in a timely manner.
• Timely communications between Mission Base, Wing Headquarters, Region Headquarters, National Operations Center, AF/RCC, AF/NSEP, and the State office of primary responsibility as well as any other allied agencies, such as FEMA, DEA, Coast Guard, etc.
• Corporate aircraft able to communicate timely information to the ground, in addition to normal cockpit management communications with air controllers.
• Corporate vehicles able to report timely information to the Mission Base as to their location, status, and any findings from anywhere in the field.
• All CAP units able to relay command direction as well as administrative messages in a timely manner.
• All involved agencies able to provide coordinated tactical liaison communications in the management of a mission activity.

Specifically, the 1998 survey reflects the following field needs:

From these reported survey numbers and our inferred-data norms, we can characterize the communications network function both in its primary role as support to command and in its performance of the assigned mission activity. These system norms must be validated and underwritten by field communications managers and commanders in the form of a communications plan. This plan is already required from each subordinate level of command and must detail and support the general principles stated in the communications plan of the next higher headquarters. Each plan will be unique, showing the particular requirements, assets, and deployments for each headquarters in its performance and supervision of CAP mission activity. Each of these plans (including this plan) must be reviewed and revalidated annually.

The figures above form a baseline which will be used as a basic building block of the overall communications requirements. This baseline will be used to determine a Communications Standard of Issue (SOI) for each of the named activities.

The SOI gives commanders and communications managers a starting point from which to validate their specific communications requirements. In this step, NHQ and the regions will evaluate each wings survey response against the SOI. Each wing is slightly unique so, in this step we will justify the necessary exceptions to the SOI. The wing commander will be an integral part of this process. Once agreement is reached a formal document will be produced showing the exact communications requirements of that wing.

The resulting document will be known as the wing’s Communications Requirement Document (CRD). The CRD is the communications supply source document of the future. All future funding efforts, acquisition plans and equipment distribution will be based on the CRD. This source document will go on permanent record and the communications portion of the CAP logistics system will be changed to reflect the data from the CRD. In order to maintain it’s validity, the CRD will be reviewed by command and communications management on a periodic basis.

At wing discretion CRD’s may be generated for subordinate units. This could be a useful tool for delegating part of the workload of managing the communications system as well as justifying and validating the wings overall CRD. If the wing elects to use subordinate CRD’s they will be maintained at wing level and below.

Acquisition Planning

Using the data indicated from the Requirements Survey we can project some system-wide totals. These figures give us indications about the size of the system we are endeavoring to replace and support but, remember, these figures are merely projections. As explained above, the final totals will only be firm after the CRD’s are generated and validated for each wing. But for planning purposes in the interim, the data indicates the following averages for a typical wing and region.

VHF/FM Base 53 3

VHF/FM Mobile 93 7

VHF/FM Handheld 88 5

HF Fixed 23 5

HF Mobile 6 1

VHF/AM Base 9 2

VHF/AM Handheld 13 1

At the present time the potential for funding of the CAP Communications System is uncertain. Efforts are underway at several levels to secure the funding necessary to upgrade and maintain the system based on the documented requirements, but the success of those efforts cannot be guaranteed. For this reason, we have developed two levels of acquisition planning: Funded and Under-Funded. Since we are currently under-funded let’s cover that plan presently in use.

Many have asked whether this change means replacing every member’s radio with a corporate asset. The answer to this question is no. What we must replace is the mission-critical capability. Through this transition our goal must be to find a way to provide the equipment resources necessary to maintain our ability to perform the CAP mission. That may mean more radios are needed than we currently have or it could mean less. And the distribution of these assets must be governed by the needs of the mission, not by who presently happens to have a radio.

Under-Funded Acquisition

By way of clarification, when we say "under-funded" we refer to the current state of inadequate funding, i.e., a level of funding which is not sufficient to meet the needs of the program. We do have some limited funding which has traditionally been used primarily to attempt some supply of the infrastructure needs. The repeater and HF purchases of the early nineties were part of this.

If we are unsuccessful in securing full funding of our communications system all hope is not lost. Several federal agencies with fully funded communications systems are willing to provide their excess equipment to CAP. Most of these agencies replace at least one tenth of their system each year in a constant renewing cycle which keeps their system close to state of the art.

We recognize, however, this is a temporary solution to the eventual NTIA requirement. Significant is that a process has been set in motion in which CAP will employ professional, serviceable equipment and only such equipment will be purchased or employed in the future. Fortunately, our experience in the rehab effort shows that the move of many agencies to trunking and digital communications has already resulted in some narrowband compliant equipment becoming available in the surplus channels; a full ten years ahead of the mandated change.

In the meantime our intentions are to utilize our limited communications funding primarily for the purchase of HF equipment. It is no secret that much of our HF "fleet" is composed of equipment which entered service almost three decades ago and has been incapable of meeting frequency tolerance specifications for more than 15 years. This is rapidly becoming unacceptable not only from a regulatory compliance standpoint but from an operational one.

CAP has historically relied heavily on HF to fill the gaps in coverage in our VHF/FM infrastructure. But, as the HF fleet has grown older and too fragile for mobile use that operational application has diminished. It is our intention to provide the assets necessary to return HF to operational use in a tactical/mobile environment in the CAP. With the likelihood that the rehab effort will be able to supply our VHF needs we plan to concentrate our appropriated funding on new HF equipment until those requirements are met. With the limited requirement data we currently have, we project that continued purchasing at our present funding level, will require approximately 10 years to fill the system requirements.

Therefore, our current minimum acquisition plan is as follows:

VHF-FM 400 radios (base/mobile/hand held) National Technology Center

Repeaters As needed to replace current system National Technology Center

Misc. As needed National Technology Center

When available, end of year fallout money or other additional funds above current levels will be used to cover equipment shortfalls from any category above.

Distribution

Distribution will be in accordance with a formula based on the wings geographical area, number of members, number of units, and number of missions. The total number of radios for the year will be entered and the formula will breakdown the numbers per wing. The regions will be provided the numbers and allowed to make adjustments.

Equipment pulled from distribution for exceptions will be re-assigned within the region if possible.

Funded Acquisition

In the event we are successful in securing full funding of the CAP Communications System our acquisition plan will require only minor modification. This is due to the fact that fielding of equipment in either scenario will be based on the CRD documents. The logistics system will be used to track the date each piece of equipment entered service and its replacement priority.

Redirection of Communications Management

As described above, communications managers have struggled to succeed in a very difficult situation. It is our desire, through this planning process, to provide communications managers better tools with which to approach the job of managing the CAP communications system.

Objectives: How we plan to do it

Based on the previous discussion we have distilled our actions down to a series of objectives we intend to pursue to meet the goals listed above. The Objectives are:

1. Communicate the vision of tomorrow’s CAP communications system to the communications "community". This will be accomplished through venues such as CAP News, Internet talk-group forums, the CAP Web Page, and communications seminars at national board.
2. Create Standards of Issue as a guide for communications equipment acquisition and distribution. Incorporate these standards into the logistics system and communications regulations.
3. Bring the VHF/FM system into compliance with current specifications by providing compliant equipment to meet the documented needs.
4. Bring the HF system into compliance with current specifications. We will continue to concentrate available acquisition funding to this effort. At the current funding level, we estimate this could require a ten year program.
5. Work with wings to identify equipment in-use assets which do not comply with mandated specifications. Establish procedures and accountability to ensure non-compliant equipment is removed from service when replaced with compliant assets.
6. Continue registration of CAP frequency usage into the Government Master File. This effort began in 1993 with a mass registration of frequency allocations in support of the VHF repeater system. After five years of effort, including 2.5 of those years by a full-time frequency manager, we are approximately 50% complete with this effort.
7. Continue efforts to secure AF funding for our VHF system upgrade to the mandated narrow-band standards by the 2008 deadline.
8. Pursue continued AF funding of the CAP communications system at 10% annually. This level of funding is consistent with industry standards and would allow the introduction of normal life-cycle management of our equipment resources.

We understand that the wide spread changes described in this document are far reaching and ambitious. But the time is right for these changes and the communications managers are up to the challenge. Their abilities to hold the system together in the austere days of the past makes them uniquely qualified to manage a system in which tools are provided to assist them.

However, the methods of managing the communications system of the past will not work in the future. The primary challenge for communications managers will be the transition from technician to manager. The technician simply takes care of the system he is charged to maintain. The manager constantly evaluates whether that system is doing the job it is designed to do. Whereas in the past we may have spent much of our time and energies polishing radio procedures and keeping the equipment working; in the future we will be charged to continuously judge whether those radios and nets are providing the communications capability the organization needs. The difference in these two points of view are mostly a difference of perspective but that difference of perspective is significant and it will be a challenge. Working together we will be able to guide the CAP Communications Program through these troubled waters and into the 21^st century.