9-1-1 in reverse?

Joe Benedict/Staff Writer

In times of disaster it would be nice if there were some way to let everyone know what is going on. A few seconds could save lives in events of tornadoes or toxic spills. How about letting everyone know a child is missing or a prisoner has escaped?

The 911 board met on Wednesday and discussed one way that this would be possible: a reverse 911 system. There are several companies who offer such a service. CodeRED was one such system investigated by the board.

The system would be able to deliver 18,000 phone calls in an hour. A message would be recorded and then put into the system and calls would begin. The system can pinpoint a certain neighborhood, all the way up to calling everyone in the county.

David Murray of the board said the cost would be $15,000 a year for the system. With that, the county would get 50,000 minutes for messages. The board agreed it couldn't see how there would ever be enough situations to use that many minutes.

Murray gave examples from other counties where the system has been used. He said it worked in a recent missing child case and an escaped prisoner case. The prisoner changed clothes and a message went out and within a few hours the escapee was caught.

Another feature of the CodeRED system is that it can be accessed from anywhere; it isn't necessary to rush to a central hub. It also will show who received the message, which ones were left on answering machines and which people did not pick up the phone. This could save time if police needed to go into an area to alert the people who did not get the message.

In other business, the county's master address guide is going to get some updates. It is going to be a long process, but the county will switch to the post office standards for addresses. For example, currently an address on 270th Avenue comes up  AV” on the screen for emergency personnel. That will be changed to th Ave.” The change is being made to unify all the address guides in the state.