By KEITH STRANGE
Alltel customers awaiting digital cell service have a little more time to wait, but the end is in sight, company representatives said yesterday.
"Halifax County will be digital on July 31," central Virginia manager Carter Brown said yesterday.
Brown said that the date for the switch is pretty much set in stone.
"That's a firm date, we've been building the network as we moved along over the years," he added."The equipment has been ordered, it's just a matter of getting the antennas on the tower."
The digital network for Halifax County will tie into the existing networks that cover Lynchburg, Danville and Clarksville.
When cell phone use first became widespread, Brown said the network infrastructure was purely analog.
"Now we're having to create a network based on co-division multiple access (CDMA) technology, and that requires changing all the antennas to handle the digital signal," the Alltel manager said.
Users of cell phones generally don't have to worry about buying new phones, he added.
"Most of the phones that we've been selling in Halifax County are dual-mode phones that are capable of receiving signals from both digital and analog towers," Brown said.
"As soon as we turn (the digital service) on, the handsets will switch over," he added.
Digital service has several benefits not available to analog markets.
"Two of the major benefits are clearer calls and extended battery life," Brown said.
More secure calls is another benefit of cellular service.
"On a digital network, the user's voice is translated into a digital signal, and decyphered on the other end, so there's no voice traveling on the air," the manager said.
Although it hasn't been much of a problem in the last few years, Brown admitted that analog calls could be intercepted by scanning the radio frequencys.
"It's illegal, and I haven't heard of anyone doing it in years, but it is possible," he said.
"Most of the problems with scanning calls took place in the early days of cell phones, when you only had one site covering a large area," Brown said.
"Now phones are being covered by multiple sites, and home scanners can no longer pick up the frequencys that cell phones use," he added.

The Halifax County School Board will hold a public hearing Monday night on its proposed $47.73 million 2002-2003 county school budget.
The proposed budget represents a 9.9 percent increase over the current year's school budget.
Monday night's public hearing will be held at 7 p.m. at the Mary M. Bethune Office Complex in Halifax.
Following the public hearing the School Board will review the proposed budget package and adopt the budget.
The School Board will put the proposed budget package in front of the Halifax County Board of Supervisors Thursday night during a joint meeting of the two bodies.
That meeting is set for 6 p.m. and will be held at the county administrator's office in Halifax.
An average six percent pay hike for teachers and school system employees, a proposed $120 per month increase in the contribution to employee group health insurance benefits, four new personnel positions and the purchase of 10 new school buses are the major items in the proposed school budget package.
An appropriation of $12,968,593 from the Halifax County Board of Supervisors will be needed to support the proposed budget.
That is $1,020,206 less than the $13,988,799 that was appropriated by the county to fund the current year's $43.4 million school budget.
The figure represents a decrease of 7.29 percent decrease in local dollars for the proposed 2002-2003 budget.
Other than the public hearing and the adoption of the proposed 2002-2003 school budget, the agenda for Monday night's meeting of the Halifax County School Board appears to be pretty much routine.
Under the heading of new business, the School Board will be asked to consider giving the nod to officials at Halifax County Middle School to create a golf team at the school.
The golf team would compete against three other middle schools in the Southside Middle School Conference that offer golf as part of its athletic program.
Also, the School Board will be asked to consider adopting health care retiree credit for nonprofessional classified employees.
In addition, the School Board will be asked to consider a date on which to hold dedication ceremonies and Open House events for Sydnor Jennings, Clays Mill and Scottsburg Elementary Schools where renovations and additions to the school buildings are nearing completion.

"A lot of family history has been lost," Martha Conner said as she cast her eyes toward the pair of chimneys that stood amid the smoldering ruins of what had once been her parents' homeplace.
The two-story frame house and three outbuildings owned by Henry and Martha Conner were reduced to blackened smoke-filled piles on the after a fire broke out late Tuesday afternoon and destroyed them.
Danny Bomar, a spokesman for the Triangle Volunteer Fire Department, said everything was on the ground in ruins when firemen arrived.
In addition to extinguishing the ruins of the smoldering buildings, fire fighters had to work to contain the fire which had spread into an adjacent wooded area.
Firemen from the Triangle and Clover Volunteer Fire Departments were at the scene for the better part of three hours dousing the fire and the smoldering ruins.
The house, which Martha Conner estimated to be more than 65 years old, had been vacant for some time.
Electricity was available at the house, but it had been turned off at the house's primary electrical box.
Kim Conner, whose mother owned the house, said the cause of the fire had not been determined.
"Nothing is here forever," K. Conner said as he gazed at the blackened ground where the house, an old mule stable, an old cooking house and a smoke house once stood.
"I was just talking about fixing the place up and then it burns down. It was only about two weeks ago that I told mother I wanted to get a contractor out here to look at it and see what it would take to get the place fixed up.
"I didn't want it to fall down," he added.
"I wanted to keep the outside of it up and work on the inside of it a little bit at a time. This was a special place."

A reform in the regulations for Child Protective Services (CPS) will give the Halifax County office more flexibility when investigating allegations of abuse and neglect.
"Previously, when we received a complaint, the accused was automatically listed in a central registry for up to 18 years," said Darlene Carr, social work supervisor for Halifax County.
Carr said that beginning on May 1, when the new "Differential Response Program" is implemented, the department will have the option of assessing the allegations and, in certain instances, offer help to the families without such strict intervention.
"On the assessment response track, we will conduct a family assessment and identify whether the complaint presents an immediate concern for child safety," Carr said.
She said that in the instances when there is no immediate threat to the child's safety, local agencies, as needed, will be enlisted to help with any problems encountered.
"In those cases, no dispositions are made, and no names will be listed in the registry," the social worker said.
According to Carr, if no other problems develop, all documentation pertaining to the report can be destroyed.
"Our goal is to keep the child safely in the home as much as possible, and we need the community support to help make this program work," she added.
Carr said that the program depends on a network of community agencies and groups such as churches, teachers and neighborhood associations.
"The success of the program is dependent on the community being committed to improving the health and well-being of families and children affected by abuse and neglect," the social worker said.
Carr was quick to point out that certain cases will still require immediate intervention.
"Any cases of sexual abuse or serious physical or mental abuse or neglect will immediately go into the investigative program," she said.
In that program, serious cases can result in the child immediately being taken from the home.
"We think that this new program will give us the opportunity to work with families in a less-threatening manner," Carr said.
In Halifax County, there are about 200 reported cases of child abuse a year.
"About half of those are serious cases," the social worker added.
She also pointed out that "one or two children per month are taken out of homes."
If a child is taken out of a home, CPS is required to report the incident to the courts within 72 hours.
"Usually, we try to establish a safety plan that takes the abuser out of the home first," Carr said.
Carr said that CPS will be holding a community information session later this month.
"We haven't gotten the date set, but anyone wanting more information can call the Department of Social Services," she added.

Frank E. Lloyd

Frank E. Lloyd, 80, of Ashland, died April 2.
Survivors include his wife, Ellen M. Lloyd; one son, Randolph E. Lloyd of Ashland; a granddaughter, Deborah Lloyd of Chesapeake; one sister, Myrtle Ratliff of South Boston; and one brother, Lindy Lloyd of South Boston.
Mr. Lloyd was a member of Elmont Ruritan Club and Forest Grove United Methodist Church.
Funeral services will be held today, April 5 at 2 p.m. at Reid Funeral Home in Ashland. Burial will take place in Forest Grove United Methodist Church Cemetery.
Those wishing to give memorials are asked to consider Forest Grove UMC.