The Santa Clara County Board of Supervisors has approved a contract with Blackboard Connect Inc. to begin the implementation of a regional emergency notification system.
In the event of a disaster, the county and local cities may need to communicate evacuation areas, shelter locations or other life-saving information to approximately 1.8 million residents and 565,000 households in the county.
The emergency notification system can be used for a variety of emergency and community service notifications such as fires, crime incidents, hazmat incidents, infectious disease information, contaminated food warnings, road/school closures, and contacting disaster service workers.
"We're building our capacity to alert residents during disasters," said County Executive Pete Kutras, who serves as the Director of Emergency Services in a disaster.
While no one knows exactly when or where a disaster will strike, it's more than likely to cross city boundaries and encompass several cities in a wide geographic area. The county is spearheading the purchase and implementation of the county regional public and internal notification system that will be used by the county and 15 cities in the county. The system does not replace first responders' communications systems.
During large scale disasters affecting more than one city, the county becomes the coordinator of emergency response to provide resources, identify the need for mutual aid in support of local cities, and coordinate with state and federal authorities.The system will use databases for 911 and 411, and other databases.
Permissive burn periods open
The Bay Area Air Quality Management District has announced that the open burning seasons for crop replacement and flood debris fires will begin Wednesday.
A crop replacement fire is an agricultural fire set for the purpose of establishing an agricultural crop in a location that formally contained another crop or is on previously uncultivated land. The permissive burn period for these fires lasts from Oct. 1 through April 30.
Open burning is regulated because of its potential impact on air quality.
Details: Call 1-800-HELP AIR, or visit www.baaqmd.gov, follow the link to "Open Burn Status" under "Air Status/Technical Data."
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