By: Rebecca Miller
In 2014, Alert 86 was activated in Williams County as a way to let county residents know about bad weather.
Apryl McClaine, WC EMA director, was not around when this first began, but explained that Alert 86 was just a name that the county chose for this phone system when they started it.
Over the past years they have switched to different companies, with the most recent one in 2021 being Hyper Reach.
Unfortunately, Hyper Reach did not offer the options that were wanted by the citizens or by the EMA office, according to WC Emergency management director, Apryl McClaine.
There were also some system issues with things that did not work. Now EMA is switching Alert 86 to a company named “Regroup”.
“They specifically chose to have everyone start fresh, because in the past whenever they transferred information from one company to another, they ran into problems. People who did not want to be called would get calls.”
“No information will be transferred from the old system, “to ensure the most up to date information is entered into the new system.”
As they start fresh, everyone who wants to receive notifications, needs to go to alert86.com and sign up. The Great News is that there are more options now.
While signing up to get alerts, the registrants can set quiet hours, choose specifically which notifications they want to receive and now even Snow Levels are an option. McClaine shared that the sign up is very user friendly.
So, the NEW mass notification system is up and ready. All residents wanting to receive alerts will need to sign up. Go to alert86.com and choose from community specific alerts, utility notifications, missing persons, peak alerts and community events.
Be sure to set your own quiet hours for each of the alerts you choose. If you determine you do not want to get a certain alert or wish to have another one, just login and make the changes.
Welcome back, Alert86.
Rebecca can be reached at rebecca@thevillagereporter.com