[EAS] FEMA and SiriusXM Expand Relationship to Enhance, Delivery, of Emergency Alerts

[Rod Zeigler]

Kelly,
Sirius/XM is a PEP, and should there ever be an actual EAN requiring 
nationwide activation (which is what the FCC assumes) they will be 
providing the exact same information that all other PEP's will be 
broadcasting.
I was the SECC Chairman for Nebraska and was attempting to finally get 
Nebraska an FCC approved State Plan. After a number of rejections, and 
knowing that Sirius/XM was a PEP, I contacted my PEP counterpart at 
Sirius/XM and he had no problem with Sirius/XM being used as a 
nationwide PEP. I then submitted the plan using Sirius/XM as a national 
EAN source to the FCC and after numerous questions and answers to both 
myself and Sirius/XM this plan was approved by the FCC. I then started 
telling other SECC's about it and as you have seen on here many States 
are starting to use it as well.
Actually by Sirius/XM's inclusion in the Washington D.C. operational 
area  it makes it simple for those outside of there to program their EAS 
boxes to ignore and log the RWT's for proof of performance each week 
with no chance of an RWT, RMT, or other alerts being broadcast outside 
of the D. C. area.
Telling on myself now...I had just hooked up our Sirius/XM receiver to 
our DASDEC at KRVN and was getting ready to reprogram it to work with 
Sirius/XM and sure enough they sent an RMT, which went out over the air 
here. A bit of excitement for a few people here, but it definitely was 
Proof of Concept!!!!!!

Rod. SECC Chair and NPWS program participant (Ret.)