A new emergency notification system is soon coming to residents of the city.
Council’s Planning Committee has recommended to council they retain Everbridge for a system to alert residents of emergencies.
A representative from Everbridge, David Torsleff, appeared by live stream presentation at a Planning Committee Meeting May 21. Ten other communities currently use the Everbridge system.
The idea is for the system to send recorded messages to residents via telephones, cellphones, through email or text messages in the event of an emergency.
It could be activated for many different types of emergencies ranging from weather events such as tornadoes or severe thunderstorms to chemical spills from train derailments or even boil-water orders.
Councillor Ryan Bater indicated, though, he wants to see a use policy put together to clarify when and where the system would be used.
The recommendation was approved unanimously by the Planning Committee and now comes to council for final approval this week. The plan from administration would be to get the system up and running later this year.
Fire Chief Albert Headrick says the system is more of a personal notification system.
“It’s not a complex system. It provides a lot of opportunity where you can get direct notification through the telephone system of the landline, and vice versa you can go online and get access to your cellphone, iPad or iPhone. So there’s a lot of different applications you can use. And it’s user friendly and that’s the most important thing about technology today.”
This is seen as a complement to the provincial alert system coming in this year, which is on a wider scale on radio and television and other news media.
Instead of waiting for the provincial emergency alert, people can get a direct alert, said Headrick.
“Which is very good in an emergency because people want to know what is happening in their community, and if they don’t know, that’s when they get upset.”
Headrick pointed to situations in other communities which suffered through emergency situations in which the emergency communications had not been effective.
“Communication is the key to success. If you don’t have good communication, you will fail, and then basically you will suffer the consequences.”
