I hope you are taking some time to enjoy this holiday season. One of the most important responsibilities at the Information Technology Agency (ITA) is to provide communications tools for LA City employees across our 469 square mile city. For this reason, our Winter 2023 spotlight shines on the ITA Communications Services Division in our Infrastructure Bureau.
The Communications Services Division (CSD) has been providing planning, engineering, and operational support for the radio and dispatch networks for City departments and public safety, such as LAPD and LAFD, for decades. One of the key Sections in CSD, providing this technical support, operates in Piper Tech Center (PTC) under the management of Mr. Tony Christensen. The Teams in PTC supports the radio and dispatch networks infrastructure as well as the field equipment; e.g. portable and mobile radios, these departments utilize.
Like many ITA divisions, the CSD PTC Team has experienced a significant staff loss, especially during COVID-19 and the SIP retirement opportunity. However, the Team has been faithfully delivering their services with a skeleton crew, during a pandemic in person, and at remote job sites, by streamlining processes at PTC (large numbers of new hires are currently in process!)
The PTC Team has also gone beyond the call of duty to assist the CSD Engineering Team in the design and build out of the new systems such as the recent LAPD simulcast trunked radio network in the 7/800 MHz band, on a timely manner, at the cost of $30M, in compliance with the federal laws, as well as the Telecom Facilities upgrades, at the cost $2.5M per year. The CSD PTC Team continues this technical support, as CSD prepares itself for the upgrade of the Simulcast Trunked Radio System (STRS) Core at $4M, and LAFD Simulcast Conventional Radio & Console System upgrade at $20M.
Simply put, ITA couldn’t have provided the critical services required by the City of Los Angeles without the support of this valuable Communication Services Division team!
CSD Field Services Team members include:
Mt. Lee Monitoring
Carlos Cornejo
Thomas Hoffman
George Magallon
Kelly Searl
Base Maintenance Voice Radio Section
Khai Dinh
Mikio Igarashi
Joe Kao
Roberto Acevedos
Savith Pouv
Eric Milholland
Joe Varela
Daniel Tabares
Claude Stewart
Jerry Porsha
Microwave/ Data Transport Section
Johnnie Gomez
Michael Garcia
JonPaul Palacio
Eduardo Nunez
Ravi Mazin
Johnathon Robinson
Ted Tran
Ceasar Castelo
Rioji Shido
Shop Services Section
Enrique Sanchez
Thu Ngo
Doug Wynn
Pricela Ramirez
Jamal Ezadpanah
Simon Truong
Michael Morales
Josh Macfarland
Lois Jackson
Melchor Ortiz
Eric Nguyen
Chris Roach
Lam Xa
Sonney Khaw
Yen An Hsu
Bona Phaindge
Quoc Le
Chito Pastor
Joseph Syed
Tanner Teebken
Sandi Good
Josh Macfarland
Storeroom
Yissel Mejia
Arlene Chavez