DRIVING THE EAS CADILLAC:

NBA SPONSORS CRITICAL PROGRAM

From the FCC's first announcement about Common Alerting Protocol and their mandate for upgraded equipment, broadcasters have been concerned that no one would be in the driver's seat of this Cadillac version of EAS. Without the participation of state and local emergency managers, stations would be left a government-mandated, expensive white elephant that would never be used. While FEMA does not have the authority to require state and local emergency managers to add CAP servers, Jamie Barnett, head of the FCC's Public Safety and Homeland Security Bureau, is on record that it's up to broadcasters and EAS Chairs to educate their state and local officials about the advantages and benefits CAP and the next generation of EAS equipment.

As part of that education process, the Nevada Broadcasters Association put together a program for state and local emergency managers, public safety and law enforcement officials. Kelli Baratti, the Operations Manager of the State Emergency Operations Center in Carson City, specifically requested information about the role of the state in CAP EAS and the new equipment available for state and local officials.

Working within the guidelines for a state purchase, NBA brought in IPAWS Program Manager Manny Centeno from FEMA who detailed the advantages of CAP, described some of the changes from legacy EAS and discussed the upcoming National EAS Test. His session provided the groundwork for the vendor presentations that followed.

Manny explained that CAP provides the kind of interoperability that allows for both EAS and non-EAS messages including Silver Alerts, staff call-outs, pages and private, personnel communications. He described how CAP messages can go to telephones, emails, Traveler's 511 systems, telephone notification networks, web sites, social media and even community loudspeakers and sirens. He went through the process that emergency managers would follow to issue CAP messages including an EAS activation.

There were questions and discussions on the role of broadcasters in public warning. One Emergency Manager commented that he didn't understand the reasons that some broadcasters carried EAS activations, while others would mention it in a newscasts and others would not carry it at all. He found this disconcerting because a lot of thought goes into issuing an EAS activation and there is a need for the public to get a consistent message, rather than an interpretation by a reporter or anchor or meteorologist.

Manny also brought up FEMA’s role in conformance testing of CAP equipment and while his demonstration utilized several specific products, he didn’t point the group toward any one product or vendor. By the time he wrapped up his discussion, the city and county representatives all supported the concept of the state acquiring a CAP servers that everyone could utilize. As frequent originators of AMBER Alerts, the NHP staff was particularly interested in the way CAP streamlines the EAS activation process.

More than 30 people attended Friday's day-long event in person at the DEM in Carson City and via two video conference connections. Broadcasters attending the event included engineer Steve Weber from Americom/Reno;  Paul Gardner and Danny Urriola from KELK/KLKO in Elko. Emergency managers from Washoe, Clark, Storey, Douglas, Elko and Lyon Counties and Carson City and Sparks attended along with representatives of the National Weather Service.

Following Manny's session, five vendors representing seven companies made presentations to the EOC staff who will ultimately decide what products the state will purchase. Operations Manager Kelli Baratti expressed her pleasure with the entire event and added that she appreciated the work that went into setting up all the presentations. She asked that NBA continue to be part of the decision process for the state purchase. 

The bottom line is that the state and local emergency management, public safety and law enforcement personnel will have access to CAP equipment. Nevada's broadcasters can rest assured that there will be someone in the driver's seat of our new, upgraded  EAS equipment. Even more, the state and local officials will have the opportunity to use the network for more than just EAS activations which will give them a familiarity with the product that will result in better activations when an EAS activation is needed.

The suggestion was made that while our engineers and now our emergency officials have a good understanding of CAP, our station managers may not. As a result, NBA is willing to consider another EAS CAP demonstration event. Manny Centeno is willing to return to Nevada to explain the advantages of CAP to station owners and managers so everyone understands that the new equipment is more than just another government mandate, it's something that will actually make your lives easier.

Please contact Adrienne Abbott or Adam Sandler if you are interested in a CAP EAS demonstration.