Tuesday, December 16, 2014

New Notification System for Mahanoy City Residents

The Mahanoy City Police Dept. has launched a new Community Notification Service called “Nixle” this week to improve communication with people who live, work, and visit our area.

The system provides a quick, efficient, and secure way to get neighborhood-level information out to community members who subscribe to the system. Through www.nixle.com, the department will be able to send text message (SMS) and e-mail alerts to subscribers in a specific area, down to .25 miles.

Notifications might be considered in the following instances:
  • A young child or adult with Alzheimer’s disease walks away from their home. The alert can include a picture of the child or vulnerable adult with a map identifying the area at which they were last seen.
  • A public safety emergency requires people to stay in or remain away from their homes. A Nixle alert can let residents with a registered address in the affected neighborhood know what’s happening, allowing residents to take a proactive role in their own safety.
  • A serious injury or fatal crash in which traffic investigators close down the intersection for several hours during the morning commute. This situation might warrant a notification to subscribers who live or work in the area, encouraging them to select a different route to work.
  • Other uses: Large-scale public works projects, traffic safety implications around large fire scenes, community events such as parades, fireworks, picnics, etc., details about a case of H1N1 (“swine flu”) in the area, city council meeting information, utility outage advisories/boil orders
Through Nixle, we will deliver messages securely to citizens by e-mail and cell phone, supporting and expanding our community outreach efforts.

Obviously, the system will be most effective when we have large numbers of subscribers. Please spread the word about our use of the system and add this information to the bottom of your e-mail signature: “Up-to-the-minute updates from city agencies by e-mail and cell phone: www.nixle.com

Nixle is a secure communications service available to municipal, county, and state government agencies. The system is available at no cost to our citizens (standard text message rates apply for subscribers who do not have text plans with their cell phone providers).

If you have suggestions for potential Nixle publications that might interest citizens, please share them with Chief Kaczmarczyk. Residents can receive technical and non-technical assistance directly from Nixle sending email to support@nixle.com

Information posted from Mahanoy City Fire Department