A call from the cops

10/11/2007

BY JORDAN FENSTER , Editor

Fairfield Police now have a new tool in their belt, enabling mass numbers of residents to be notified of an emergency.
And they're the first on the block to have one.
The tool, called "reverse 911," allows the police to "reach all of our citizens almost immediately," First Selectman Ken Flatto said during a press conference Tuesday at Police Headquarters.
"This is a very important moment for our town's emergency preparedness," he said.
Fairfield Police's Captain Gary MacNamara said mass notification is one of the department's main goals.
"We're all taught that 911 is the number you call when you need help," he said. "This is 911 calling you.
In the event of an emergency - be it an impending hurricane, hazardous waste spill, missing child or any severe police, fire or ambulance action - a computer uses mapping technology and a phone bank to send out a recorded message to all geographically concerned citizens.
Lieutenant Chris Lyddy of the Fairfield Police Department said the system is capable of calling up to 1,400 phones per hour.
The system is also able to take certain environmental factors - such as wind speed and direction - into account. If, for instance, a poisonous gas emission puts a certain community in harm's way, police can alert only those residents who are directly affected.
Both Flatto and MacNamara stressed that routine emergencies will not be considered extreme enough for use. Only those concerns which put a considerable number of residents in danger will be addressed through reverse 911.
Only the chiefs of the health, fire and police departments, as well as the first selectman, have authority to allow use of the reverse 911 feature.
"It will be used at a time when the town believes they should have this information," MacNamara said. "This is just another tool and another resource the town now has."
According to Lyddy, the $45,000 system was paid for "exclusively with Homeland Security money."
At present the system contains only published phone numbers and police are asking residents with non-published numbers to sign on. Log on to www.fpdct.com/reverse911 to sign up. The town's emergency responders also suggest that if a phone number is changed or if a number is dropped, that residents inform police so the information can be changed accordingly.