Agenda - 10-14-2014 - 5 - Laserfiche WebLink

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September 5, 2014 Attachment A 2 Orange County Emergency Services To: Bonnie Hammersley, County Manager From: Jim Groves, Emergency Services Director Re: BOCC Communications Capability Progress Ms. Hammersley, 510 Meadowlands Drive Hillsborough, NC 27278 919.245.6100 I met this morning with Colleen Bridger, Jim Northrup, Dave Hunt, Kirby Saunders (EM Coordinator), Leslie O'Connor (Public Health Preparedness Coordinator) to discuss the BOCC communications capability initiative. To establish a brief background, is my understanding from talking with Donna Baker that similar initiatives have taken place in the past, but they were never fully completed or implemented. It is my intent to change that outcome with this proposal, to include a presentation and feedback opportunity during an upcoming work session. In establishing a communications capability, the group felt that it would fall into two (2) categories: 1) robust communications capability between each commissioner and their constituents, the County Manager, the Emergency Coordination Center (ECC), and County staff (as needed), and 2) the capability to conduct public meetings, including public access, when the BOCC may not be able to gather in a single facility or under the same roof (due to any reason). With Category 1, the group felt that improving the BOCC's capability to use their personal devices (phones) and email would be the best option. By using their email addresses, OCES could push out Situation Reports on the Emergency or Disaster to keep them informed and able to answer questions by their constituents. OCES can also revise the elected official's disaster guideline to provide more detail on how and whom to communicate with during emergencies and disasters. To enable the BOCC to make calls, we propose that each Commissioner and County Manager's staff be registered with the Government Emergency Telecommunications Service (GETS), which provides a free priority mechanism to make landline calls. Basically this service routes calls by dialing dedicated telephone numbers followed by a passcode to process the call. We also propose that each Commissioner and County Manager's staff be registered with the Wireless Priority System (WPS), which is a fee based service (about $5 per device per month) that gives wireless phones priority access to cell towers. In addition, WPS and GETS can be used jointly if the need arises. More information can be found at http: / /www.dhs.gov/govemment- emergency - telecommunications - service -gets. Finally, Category I will be enhanced with our new mass notification system "Everbridge" which enables mobile devices to use various tools to communicate, including impromptu conferencing capability. We A Prej�ared, Coordinated, and Integrated Emergency Services System Twitter @ocncemergency