Residents in Magnolia could soon see more detailed, targeted emergency alerts after the City Council approved a new mass notification system aimed at improving how the city communicates during major incidents.
What we know
At its Feb. 10 meeting, council approved a master subscription agreement with Genasys Inc. for mass emergency notification software, aimed at improving how the city communicates during major incidents, with a first-year cost of $6,995 and a five-year total of $20,995, according to city documents.
City officials said the current system—described during the meeting as difficult to use and limited in how much information it can share—has led to confusion when alerts go out with too little context.
Police Chief Kyle Montgomery told council the existing platform requires staff to manually rewrite and post separate messages for email, text and phone notifications, as well as social media, and limits messages to 200 characters.
He said the new software will allow staff to write a longer message without the character limit once and push it out across multiple channels at the same time, so residents get clearer information in real time.
A closer look
In addition to longer alerts, the new platform will allow the city to “geo-fence” messages, meaning officials can target notifications to a specific area, such as a defined radius around a gas leak or other localized emergency, Montgomery said.
Montgomery said the new software costs about $800 more per year than the current system, but the added capabilities would provide a better return when emergencies happen.
The current subscription is set to end soon, and officials said the new system is expected to be set up in April and go live after one to two weeks of internal configuration.
