	Lakewood Police Department Policy and Procedure Emergency Notification System (Reverse 911 System)		Effective Date: 10/28/2020
	Policy Number: PP-7135

B. Procedure

Jeffcom uses the emergency notification system for immediate notification of individuals and organizations within a defined geographic area when emergency or critical incident conditions may affect them. Notifications are made via phone, text, email, telecommunications device for deaf (TDD) and smart device application. The 9-1-1 system is used to notify citizens using the 9-1-1 data base and citizen registered profile information provided by the citizen. CodeRED and Smart911 are current system registration applications.

1. Target Notification can provide emergency notification to Lakewood citizens via the 911 database. Pre-recorded messages can be automatically transmitted.

2. The activation of Target Notification is a discretionary decision depending on the situation. Examples of events that may require system activation are tornadoes, floods, dam failures, civil disturbances, hazmat incidents, hostage situations, robbery/burglary, lost children and other threat notifications. All Jeffcom supervisors and support personnel are required to know how to create or launch an emergency notification.

3. Authorized LPD personnel (Commander and above, Emergency Management Personnel) must determine the following before advising Jeffcom dispatch of the need to activate the system:

a. Message to be delivered to the citizens. Jeffcom may have a template for the situation message and/or specific event groups already established.

b. When creating a message:

1) Shorter messages are preferred.

2) Who is sending out the message (Lakewood PD).

3) Type of incident (hostage, lost child).

4) Sector, Beat

5) Notification area (radius from a physical address or a polygon).

6) If evacuation required (location of the temporary evacuation points and recommended routes).

7) If requesting help with spotting lost parties or suspects, phone number to call.

8) Do NOT use:

a) Law enforcement or fire terms the public may not know.

b) Abbreviations, spell out the full message (keep it short).

c. Advisory messages provide information to the public regarding an incident but do not require any specific action to be taken. Members of the public should be encouraged to monitor local and social media for additional information regarding the situation.

d. Message requiring ACTION by the public will generally be given one of three possible instructions.

ACTION:

1) SHELTER IN PLACE: An instruction to the public that they should remain inside or go indoors. They should NOT go outdoors or try and evacuate due to the hazard outside. This may be the most effective strategy for hazardous materials or law enforcement incidents (i.e. armed suspect in the area).

2) PRE-EVACUATION: An instruction to the public that there is a hazard in the area that may require an evacuation soon. No evacuation order has been issued, but everyone should be prepared to leave at any time. The public should be encouraged to leave rather than wait for an official evacuation order if they are concerned to or believe they are in danger. Those who need additional time or assistance to evacuate should consider leaving now and people with livestock, other large animals, or pets should consider removing their animals from the potential hazard area.

3) EVACUATION: An instruction to the public that there is a hazard in the area and the incident commander has ordered an evacuation. Individuals who cannot self-evacuate or who need assistance evacuating livestock, large animals, or pets should contact authorities immediately. The notification should include safe egress routes as well as the location(s) of temporary evacuation points.

1. Cancelling a Message:

Once a hazard has been mitigated or there is no longer a threat to the public the “ALL CLEAR” notification should be sent to release people from the previous instruction. This is for both advisory messages and messages that require ACTION. When the “ALL CLEAR” message has been sent out, a comment will be added to the CAD system by Jeffcom.

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