[EAS] CA Fires/EAS Activation

[Ed Czarnecki]

Paul - 

Different states, different contexts, but there are some commonalities.
California counties have autonomy to select their own tools and approaches -
some have both EAS and IPAWS tools.  Some only have EAS. Operationally, some
prefer to use private SMS notification, even though they have an IPAWS/EAS
tool.

And this situation is a bit like Virginia.  Even though Virginia is not a
"home rule" state (we follow the "Dillon rule"), local areas have some
autonomy over public mass notification either as a power that is
"necessarily or fairly implied from a specific grant of authority" or a
power that is "essential to the purposes of government -- not simply
convenient but indispensable".  Statewide activations (and Amber) is
reserved by the state, and counties have discretion to utilize EAS (per the
state plan annexes) or not.

Other states do not grant local areas this kind of autonomy, and EAS is a
state-level function, even for local events (MD, NJ)...

But I think your saying something that I'd been considering as well - there
is not a lot of feedback at the local level on how ... or even if ... EAS
would be used in various scenarios.   In your part of Virginia - good
question - I am unclear myself on how your local EOC approaches EAS.  Do
Virginia Beach, Chesapeake, Norfolk have EMnet terminals?  If yes, then they
may activate as does VDEM.   Virginia Beach has Everbridge (which would send
out SMS text and email notifications, though it also has an IPAWS
interface).  They also have a conventional EAS encoder, if I recall
correctly, but I'm not sure about the link between the EOC and the LP
station (which is yours, right?).  

My understanding up here in Northern VA is that the county EOCs (Fairfax,
Arlington, Alexandria) are not very strong users of EAS - their first
preference appears to be towards SMS service, WEA and social media.  

- Ed

-----Original Message-----
From: EAS [mailto:eas-bounces at radiolists.net] On Behalf Of Paul Campbell

Regarding the decision of the Santa Rosa officials to "not activate EAS" for
the fires, I'm a little curious just how that would've been done had their
decision gone the other way.

I'm literally an entire country away on the other coast, and I'm trying to
play this whole thing out had all of this devastation happened here and