Communication provider FairPoint Communications recently won a five-year contract worth $32 million from the State of Maine, to provide the state's next-generation 9-1-1 system.

As per the contract, FairPoint will provide the system and support to serve Maine's 26 Public Safety Answering Points (PSAPs).

The PSAPs have the responsibility to answer all 9-1-1 calls in their local coverage area. Officials confirmed that every Maine community is matched with a local PSAP.

The Emergency Services Communication Bureau looks after both the implementation and operation of the statewide Enhanced 9-1-1 service, currently provided by FairPoint.

In a statement, Karen Romano, FairPoint's vice president – government, education and research, said, "The new Maine E9-1-1 system will use leading edge technology to handle current legacy and next-generation communication technologies such as voice, instant messaging, video and text messaging." "FairPoint will provide a fully integrated turnkey solution that will not only link voice, data and video elements to E9-1-1 call facilities, but will transfer data seamlessly, and it will provide the capability to read text messages and view video when the industry standards are developed."

The new Maine E9-1-1 system will help strengthen the state's leadership role in providing NG 9-1-1. It will also enable the state to support advanced communications services designed to help protect the lives and property of Maine's citizens.

Officials said that NG 9-1-1 provides a reliable and flexible solution that allows dynamic and robust call handling configurations to adapt to disasters and emergency events that create a high 9-1-1 call volume.

With the help of FairPoint, Maine will become one of first states in the nation to deploy a Next-Generation 9-1-1 system compliant with the National Emergency Number Association standards published in June 2011. 

In related TMC (News - Alert) news, FairPoint Communications was awarded a four-year contract worth more than $16 million to support the needs of the New England Telehealth Consortium.

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