Meridian, Miss., Looks to Launch Emergency Notification System

(TNS) — Meridian residents may soon be able to keep up to date with severe weather and emergency alerts from their phones as the city looks to launch its emergency notification system.

In a work session Tuesday, Public Safety Director Doug Stephens told council members the city had an opportunity to partner with Lauderdale County Emergency Management on an alert system that would serve both governments’ needs.

“We have money in our budget for this year and proposed money for next year to provide an emergency notification system that will allow us to send out emergency notifications to our citizens, both city and county, and coordinate between my department and LEMA to make this happen,” he said.

The cost for the system, which would be about $13,000 per year, would be split evenly between the county and city, Stephens said. This year, he said $10,000 was included in the Public Safety Department’s budget for the notification system, and some of the funds left over from the city’s half could go toward advertising to get residents signed up for the system.

“We will have administrative rights to send messages out through my department,” he said.

Stephens said the city could also weigh using the system for other notifications as well. Street closures due to festivals or reminders of city council meetings could also be sent out as alerts.

“It would reach out not only for emergencies, but, and I’m just representing, if we have a festival and we’re going to close streets downtown, we would be able to push that out,” he said.

LEMA Director Odie Barrett said the county currently has an emergency notification system that it uses to alert residents to severe weather. The city could use the notification system to push a variety of important information out to residents, he said, but he cautioned too many notifications could make residents unsubscribe from the alert system.

“We’ve got to be careful with some of this,” he said. “If every time you turn around and your phone is going off, you’re going to say, ‘I’ve had enough of this.'”

The emergency notification would automatically get sent to all residential landlines in Meridian , Stephens said, with residents able to opt in to email, text and cell phone alerts. The system would also allow public safety officials to send alerts to portions of the city in the event of a boil water notice or other localized event, he said.

“People have the ability to opt in on all other cell phones, commercial lines, all of those, emails, whichever social media platform you choose to use whether it be Twitter, Facebook, those type things,” he said. “You’d get those notifications through whatever means you register.”

The City of Meridian used to have an emergency notification system, Stephens said, but it was dropped due to funding issues. By partnering with the county to bring emergency notifications back, he said the city will have a quick, efficient way to communicate with residents and keep people safe.

©2022 The Meridian Star (Meridian, Miss.), Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.