Carlton Ray

About Carlton Ray

Seasoned public safety technology leader with 14+ years architecting mission-critical infrastructure that delivers life-saving reliability.On February 22, 2024, a nationwide AT & T wireless outage caused by a carrier configuration error during routine maintenance that lasted over 12 hours, blocked more than 92 million voice calls, and prevented over emergency 911 attempts from reaching dispatchers across the U.S. While many jurisdictions lost PSAP functionality, I led Shelby County 911 District to zero core failures and verified uptime through multi-vendor SD-WAN rerouting, private cloud intelligence layers, and mature Text-to-911 capabilities. We coordinated public guidance across CBS, NBC, and ABC affiliates and served as primary liaison to AT & T/FirstNet for prioritized emergency routing restoration.As Senior Director of Network Systems, I oversee high-availability infrastructure for 8 PSAPs, 70 dispatch positions, and 1M+ annual calls.Key achievements:• Pioneered Tennessee’s first Text-to-911 via Over-the-Top path, years ahead of regional ESInet.• Directed full NG911 migration from legacy CAMA trunks to NENA i3-compliant nationwide ESInet, enabling geospatial routing and multimedia with zero unplanned downtime.• Executed five generations of zero-downtime Vesta platform upgrades.• Architected Juniper SSR SD-WAN with 4-path redundancy, reducing bandwidth overhead 30–50%.• Deployed EVPN-VXLAN fabric and Nutanix HCI private cloud hosting ArcGIS Enterprise and critical services delivering sub-second performance during carrier disruptions.Strengthened cybersecurity through Zero Trust (Okta SSO, Microsoft Entra ID), Microsoft 365 migration, and PKI enhancements while securing funding via NIST 800-53 audits.Passionate about advancing mission-critical systems leadership. Open to connecting with peers and innovators shaping resilient enterprise infrastructure.

Experience

1. Senior Director of Network Systems

   Shelby County 911 District

   Jul 2021 — Present

   Led crisis response during the 2024 nationwide AT & T outage (12+ hours, 92M+ blocked calls, failed 911 attempts nationally), achieving zero core PSAP failures and verified uptime across 8 PSAPs through multi-vendor SD-WAN rerouting and private cloud continuity.• Served as primary technical liaison to AT & T and FirstNet Authority, securing prioritized restoration of emergency routing while orchestrating unified public guidance across CBS, NBC, and ABC affiliates.• Pioneered Tennessee’s first Text-to-911 implementation via Over-the-Top internet path, delivering a resilient secondary emergency channel years ahead of regional ESInet readiness.• Directed multi-generational NG911 migration from legacy CAMA trunks to full NENA i3-compliant nationwide ESInet, enabling geospatial routing, multimedia ingestion, and policy-based call handling with zero unplanned downtime.• Architected Juniper Session Smart Router (SSR) SD-WAN fabric with 4-path redundancy (DIA, MPLS, Cable, LTE), reducing bandwidth overhead 30–50% and enhancing real-time voice/video performance for mission-critical communications.• Deployed modern EVPN-VXLAN leaf-spine data center fabric and 3-node Nutanix HCI private cloud, hosting ArcGIS Enterprise and critical services to deliver sub-second mapping and data integrity during carrier disruptions.• Strengthened cybersecurity posture through Zero Trust architecture, including Okta SSO expansions, Microsoft Entra ID with Cloud Kerberos trust, Microsoft 365 migration, and PKI governance enhancements.• Managed lean 2-person technical team supporting high-availability infrastructure for 1M+ annual emergency calls and 70 dispatch positions, leveraging NIST 800-53 audits and automation to secure sustained funding and reclaim staff capacity.• Executed five generations of zero-downtime Vesta platform upgrades and multiple infrastructure modernization projects through parallel testing, rigorous change management, and proactive risk mitigation.

Education

• The University of Memphis

  Bachelor’s Degree

Skills

• Project Management
• Network Administration
• Php
• Access
• Customer Service
• Arcgis
• Strategic Planning
• Java
• Data Conversion
• Sharepoint
• Databases
• Microsoft Access
• Active Directory
• Windows Server
• Spatial Databases
• Servers
• System Administration
• Team Leadership
• Visual Basic
• Dns
• Integration
• Python
• Microsoft Office
• Troubleshooting
• Leadership
• Disaster Recovery
• Arcgis Server
• Program Management
• Microsoft Exchange
• Networking
• Microsoft Sql Server
• Team Building
• Management
• Sql
• Office 365
• Software Installation