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Town of Vernon, Connecticut Selects MessageOne Solution for Emergency Notification;
New System Assists Emergency Responders to Better Manage Crisis Situations
VERNON, Conn. — The Town of Vernon, Connecticut, a fast-growing suburb of Hartford, recently evaluated options to improve its outdated call-tree system for emergency notification with a new solution to better meet the crisis and safety needs of the 30,000 plus citizens and its many visitors. After reviewing the technology options available, the Town of Vernon’s Office of Emergency Management selected MessageOne’s AlertFind solution for emergency notification and response.
Growing Town Seeks Top Notch Preparedness
Public safety officials in Vernon realized they must be prepared to respond to any number of potential emergencies. Due to its location off the state’s major interstate highway system, the Town of Vernon has a higher than average share of highway emergencies for a town its size. Additionally, the former mill town still has several working factories in town, including a chemical factory, which could be a cause of concern to community members in the adjacent neighborhoods.
The good news is that the Town of Vernon has a strong team when it comes to its emergency responders. The town boasts the largest volunteer fire department in the state and its Office of Emergency Management is led by an experienced emergency management director, Michael Purcaro.
Evaluating Technology to Replace Outdated Methodologies
In his role as a member of the state’s disaster medical assistance team (DMAT), Purcaro is linked through an automated system for emergency messaging notification. Impressed with the solution, Purcaro felt the Town of Vernon could benefit from a similar system designed for use by smaller, municipal emergency management teams.
“With our old system, when managing local emergency situations I had to waste precious time by manually calling each person on the emergency response team,” Purcaro explained, “and during the critical initial phases of a local crisis, I could be better utilized focused on handling the crisis at hand.”
Not only did he find the task to be time consuming, but he did not always reach people or know if messages or broadcasts were being received by key individuals on the team. Furthermore, Purcaro believed once the right emergency notification system was in place, that the Town of Vernon could use it for more than emergency communications -- he envisioned a system that could enhance operational communications across the town. For example, the Board of Education could inform school principals and staff of school closures due to inclement weather.
Purcaro began the evaluation process to select an emergency notification and response system that would meet the needs of a smaller municipality, but would still utilize the latest technology, provide flexibility and offer guaranteed reliability. His search began for a Wide Area Notification System (WANS) that would fit the bill. He knew that with his small team, he would also need a solution that was customer service-oriented, so that he could count on strong 24-7 customer support. After much researching, he came across Austin, Texas-based MessageOne and its AlertFind solution for emergency notification and response.
New System Proves Easy to Use and Reliable
“AlertFind is the perfect choice for the Town of Vernon. It is feature-rich, user friendly and offers us excellent customer service,” said Purcaro. “Equally as important, we did not have to worry about matching technologies and there was no hardware installation necessary. All we needed was an Internet connection to get going. MessageOne made the installation process easy and within a couple of days we were up and running.”
With AlertFind, Purcaro and his team can make one call to MessageOne to initiate a notification and then be immediately connected through simultaneous, two-way emergency communications between their Office of Emergency Management and key emergency responders. The ability to reach any user, anywhere, at any time was helpful for Purcaro as hours and schedules for the town’s responders are not always regular or similar. Additionally, having a range of devices available to reach employees provided flexibility and reassurance for him, as well as the unique two-way feature to ensure messages have actually been delivered and received.
The Town of Vernon’s Office of Emergency Management plans to extend its WANS through three phases of use. Initially Purcaro and his team have focused on creating the mission critical team of public safety responders -- police, fire and EMS. Next, they plan to create a network of officials, elected and appointed, and then they hope to develop a community network of emergency response volunteers. Beyond that, Purcaro believes the town may find many more uses other than emergencies for the easy-to-use communications system.
Emergency Management Leader
“Our first phase is in place, tested and ready to go. One of the key benefits I see already is the confirmation of delivery,” explained Purcaro. “Now we can be sure the right individuals have received and confirmed our emergency notifications. The flexibility of the system is also quite useful as I can issue an alert remotely without having to be on site at the town’s emergency operations center.”
The Town of Vernon is the first town in the state of Connecticut to utilize a WANS for automated emergency notification, setting an example for other municipalities in the state and even across the country. “We are taking local action to secure our community’s safety and be prepared for any potential disaster. The process has been valuable and we hope we can share our experiences and provide a model for other towns to follow,” added Purcaro.
About MessageOne
MessageOne (www.messageone.com), headquartered in Austin, Texas, is the fastest growing business continuity company. MessageOne’s suite of products includes Email Messaging Service (EMS)(TM), a highly scalable, extremely affordable standby email solution and OneSwitch(TM), the only solution to provide automated one button failover service for Windows applications. Founded by Adam Dell, MessageOne has thousands of customers including Motorola, T. Rowe Price, CIT, Young Broadcasting and MaxRe.