A community-wide alert system will be coming to the Alberni Valley.
The Alberni-Clayoquot Regional District (ACRD) has been trialing the Connect Rocket Emergency Notification System in order to send messages to senior managers and staff. The ACRD received a grant last fall, which will go towards expanding this into a mass notification system for Alberni Valley residents.
“One of the components of that grant was having a community notification system,” explained ACRD CAO Doug Holmes on Wednesday, Dec. 12. “We looked around and noted that Victoria and a few others used this exact system to notify the public.”
The system sends out important alerts via text messages and voice call on a subscription basis. The notifications are intended to update or inform the public about major incidents that are threatening or impacting the community, such as severe weather, power outages and tsunamis.
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“It’s a subscription-based system, so how much it costs depends on how many subscriptions we get and how many times we use it,” explained Holmes.
The ACRD’s goal is 10,000 users, which would cost approximately $9,616.80 annually. The funding will come from the Emergency Program budget.
At this point, there is no estimated roll-out date for the new system.