July 23, 2014 at 2:10 p.m.

Reverse 911 pitch heard (01/16/06)

Jay County Commissioners

By By MARY ANN LEWIS-

In the event of a tornado or other local catastrophic event, with a reverse 911 emergency system in place, hundreds of local residents could be notified at one time of the imminent danger.

Eric Sutliff, director of sales for Twenty First Century Communications, Columbus, Ohio, told Jay County Commissioners this morning his company has the capacity to notify thousands of residents at once with a computer-generated phone call.

The commissioners said late this morning they expect to hear presentations from several other companies before making a decision.

The presentation by Sutliff and Alison Johnson, public safety sales representative, was sought two weeks ago by commissioners Milo Miller Jr., Gary Theurer, and Faron Parr to see how such a plan could compliment the county’s current 911 system.

Bill Baldwin, Jay County’s 911 coordinator, along with Sutliff, and Johnson, explained how a call initiated from the Jay County Sheriff’s Department would be channeled to the Columbus, Ohio-based communications system, and within 30 seconds, simultaneous calls would be made by Twenty First Century’s 24-hour on-call service to those residents in danger.

A pre-programmed message would be automatically sent to anyone in danger, he explained.

Not only would the system work for weather-related emergencies, but could also be used in the event of a missing child or an elderly resident who may have wandered away.

Sutliff said the company has 15,000 outbound ports and 30,000 inbound ports, providing the ability to transmit and receive calls.

Commissioner’s attorney, Brad Burkett, expressed concern at the possibility of the system being hacked into and the security feature threatened.

Sutliff reassured Burkett, noting “security is always in the forefront with us,” and explained measures put in place to insure protection.

While the system is not guaranteed to reach everyone in a threatened area, Miller agreed it was better to “have something in place than nothing.”

“There’s no way to ever have 100 percent coverage,” Sutliff explained. “You’re never, ever going to call everyone out there. There’s all kinds of things that happen.”

Sutliff further explained that if the county would choose to go with his company’s plan, a comprehensive training program would be put.

“That Evansville thing got us thinking about this,” Miller said about the tornadoes that ripped through the southern counties in late December.[[In-content Ad]]
PORTLAND WEATHER

Events

November

SU
MO
TU
WE
TH
FR
SA
27
28
29
30
31
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
SUN
MON
TUE
WED
THU
FRI
SAT
SUN MON TUE WED THU FRI SAT
27 28 29 30 31 1 2
3 4 5 6 7 8 9
10 11 12 13 14 15 16
17 18 19 20 21 22 23
24 25 26 27 28 29 30

To Submit an Event Sign in first

Today's Events

No calendar events have been scheduled for today.

250 X 250 AD