Change Agents Reinventing 911 Emergency Systems
April 26, 2006
A reader recently sent us an article about how enhancements to a 911 emergency system can provide a ray of hope in times of danger, and drastically improve the pace and effectiveness of the relief effort. As the article so aptly put it, many of the current emergency systems don’t always alert the widest possible populations. Some of these systems are used so rarely that they "can’t handle the stress" of disaster, or they cause hesitation in the people they reach, wasting precious time.
In the article, Carl Simpson, the director of emergency communications for the city of Portland, and Charles Jennings, an entrepreneur, exemplify "dogged conceptualizer" type change agents. Together, they transformed Portland’s standard 911 system into one that is more flexible, heavily networked, with improved reliability, and available to the wide range of people needing to distribute and receive danger or disaster warnings. One most amazing aspects of the change these two men made was how they were able to spread their innovative system from 911 call center, to the entire city of Portland, and now to nine other Oregon counties. To read the full article, look here.
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