Organized August 20, 2004
The Mutual Aid Box Alarm System (known as MABAS) Senate Bill SB 642 was approved by the Wisconsin State Legislature and signed by Governor Jim Doyle in April 5th, 2006. MABAS is a mutual aid measure that may be used for deploying fire, rescue and emergency medical services personnel in a multi-jurisdictional and/or multi-agency response.
Participation in the mutual aid program is voluntary. Equipment, personnel or services provided under MABAS are at no charge between municipalities. Expenses recovered from the responsible parties are equitably distributed. In addition, emergency personnel that respond to the emergency remain employees of their initial department or agency.
MABAS is broken into divisions rather than regions.
The MABAS divisions basically follow county lines. The only exception is the City of Milwaukee which has established its own MABAS division due to size and number of agencies potentially involved.
Currently, ten counties have formally established MABAS divisions and an additional 20 counties are in the process of adopting the program.
Wisconsin Emergency Management has conducted 12 outreach meetings throughout the state to explain the mutual aid measure. It takes 12-18 months for a MABAS division to become fully functional and the most conservative estimate is that it takes a full 5 years before full implementation.
Getting Started and Going Live with MABAS Wisconsin
To better serve its members, MABAS-Wisconsin offers the following services upon request:
1. Presentations
2. Startup Assistance
3. Training Programs on MABAS Procedures
4. Training Programs for Dispatcher Centers
5. Resource Library
To become a MABAS Division or participating /agency, all that is required is a resolution or ordinance being enacted by the governing body and signing of the MABAS contract. As a MABAS member agency, every community has the same written agreement as the 550 plus communities throughout the Midwest. This standardized agreement allows everyone to send predetermined resources to assist a stricken community. Standardized terminology, standardized equipment, and standardized personnel.
At any time if local resources do not support the deployment of apparatus and personnel to a MABAS stricken community the Fire Chief or his designee always has the option to pass up the request.
MABAS Wisconsin provides a number of documents to assist in your efforts to organize a MABAS Division within your county. Use these links to access those documents which are in both Adobe PDF and Microsoft Word format. Go to MABAS WI Documents Link to your Left
MABAS Wisconsin - New and Approved Contract Language with Addendums
At the December 13th MABAS-Wisconsin business meeting, the MABAS Agreement (contract) was approved for the State of Wisconsin. After a lengthy revision and review process, dating back to December 2006, the work of producing an agreement addressing the concerns and statutes of the State is complete. The documents attached to this email are the following:
- MABAS Contract-Main Document 121307 – This is the main body of the contract. It includes the proper State Statutes, reference to the WEM 8 Administrative Rules, Liability, Indemnification language, etc., for our State. Except for the signature page, this document must remain unmodified.
- MABAS Contract Signature Page 121307 – This is the last page of the contract used for the official signatures of the municipality. This page may be modified to fit the needs of the municipality and attached in place of the last page of the Main Document.
- MABAS Contract-Addendum A 121307 – This is provided for municipalities that require non-discriminatory language for any contractual agreement.
- MABAS Contract-Addendum B 121307 – This is a sample resolution for municipalities that are provided with coverage by private EMS and fire district companies. This resolution authorizes the top elected official and the municipal clerk to sign the contract, and the private company(s) to participate in the MABAS through the municipality.
- MABAS Contract-Addendum C 121307 – This is a sample resolution for municipalities that provide municipal fire and EMS coverage. The resolution authorizes the top elected official and the municipal clerk to sign the MABAS contract.
Each municipality is required to at least submit a contract with signature page and a signed resolution (either Addendum B and/or C). Each would-be division will be required to submit additional information prior to applying for division status. A policy on the submission for division status will be forthcoming in a future email.
MABAS-Wisconsin is advising all existing divisions and municipalities, with signed contracts, to have the new contract approved and signed by your municipality. The new contract provides the proper language and protection not in the current contract. For most municipalities, this contract will replace the existing one (see next paragraph for the exception). Also sent out in a future email will be a bullet point synopsis of the changes from the existing to the new contract for your review.
There are existing divisions and municipalities, with signed contracts, providing daily mutual aid across the State line at less than the MABAS Box level. For those municipalities, MABAS-Wisconsin advises keeping the existing contract and approving the new contract as a companion document.
A copy of the newly signed MABAS contract must be submitted to the Secretary-Treasurer of MABAS-Wisconsin. The contracts can be sent to:
Mark Pierce
Secretary-Treasurer
MABAS-Wisconsin
6200 Durand Avenue
Mount Pleasant, WI 53406
A special thank you goes to members of the MABAS-Wisconsin Contract Committee, the attorneys for the City of Madison, Wisconsin Emergency Management, Cities and Villages Mutual Insurance Company, and all the others that have provided the input to produce the final contract. Without your assistance, we would not have completed this worthy agreement. The State of Wisconsin will greatly benefit from it.
Happy Holidays,
Brian M. Satula
President MABAS-Wisconsin
Fire Chief
Oak Creek Fire Department
MABAS Wisconsin 800 MHz Radio Communications and Interoperability
The Region 45 and 54 regional planning committees have approved (as of yesterday December 15th) a license application for 6 800 MHz frequencies for statewide tactical communications. The next steps are to coordinate with adjacent states, apply for a license, and confirm the channel naming.
The frequencies - tones - channel names are:
Present - Rebanded - Tone - Possible Name
866.450 - 851.450 - 156.7 - RED800
866.950 - 851.950 - 156.7 - WHITE800
867.450 - 852.450 - 156.7 - BLUE800
867.950 - 852.950 - 156.7 - GOLD800
868.450 - 853.450 - 156.7 - BLACK800
868.950 - 853.950 - 156.7 - GRAY800
I hope to have the WI MABAS Communications Committee meet to discuss the channel naming but I think we are close as there is a desire to parallel the 6 VHF colors, we just need sufficiently differenciate them from the VHF names, make them more "public safety generic", and consider how to designate direct vs. repeater capability.
Licensing is a big question. We can probably get a Special Temporary Authority license for the existing (866-868) freqs but I am thinking that it doesn't make much sense to program those freqs in radios, especially those that are being rebanded. My thought at this point is to attempt to license rebanded (851-853) freqs if possible, or when possible. I would propose that radios be programmed for the rebanded freqs but the channels not be used until we are able to license them, which may not be until rebanding is completed (worst case).
