Alerting CCCOG

The Carbon County Council of Governments (CCCOG) met via Zoom on January 13.

The board usually meets every two months on the third Wednesday, but this meeting was scheduled a week early.

All municipalities of CCCOG were in attendance with the exception of Medicine Bow and Sinclair.

In September 2020, Baggs mayor Anna Marie Waldron had asked if any municipality knew of a grant writer. Former Platte Valley Chamber of Commerce CEO Stacy Crimmins’ name was mentioned as a possibility. Crimmins has started consulting on grant writing.

Crimmins was present for the CCCOG meeting to introduce herself to the representatives, give a presentation of what she could do and answer questions.

Crimmins gave examples of grants she wrote over the years and, at the end of her presentation, asked if she was needed by the CCCOG organization or by specific towns.

Chairman Morgan Irene, mayor of Elk Mountain, asked if she was willing to be available to do both. Crimmins said either way was acceptable.

Carbon County Commissioner Travis Moore, secretary/treasurer of CCCOG, said he would get Crimmins’ presentation and rate schedule to the members the following week.

The next order of business for CCCOG was to decide where the next meetings over the year would be held.

Hanna will host the March meeting; Saratoga the May meeting; Baggs the July meeting; Elk Mountain the September meeting and Rawlins the September schedule.

Amy Bach, Rawlins City Attorney, was asked by Moore to give an overview of when she attended the Wyoming Legislative Revenue Committee meeting on December 17 and 18. She said a proposed wind tax was voted down.

Moore and Irene thanked her for attending the meeting, both indicating it helps when residents and officials of the county show up to put forth views opposing the wind tax.

The last person to speak was Lenny Layman, Carbon County Emergency Manager, who told CCCOG the county was moving from Code Red to AlertSense.

Layman explained the reasons for the switch.

“The reasons we replaced it are multiple, but the bigger ones are functionality, collaboration and cost,” Layman said. “The cost for Code Red was costing the county over $12,000 a year and we were able to secure AlertSense for less than $5,000 a year. With the decrease in cost, we were able to increase functionality.”

Layman said AlertSense had three major functionalities.

“It is IPAWS (Integrated Public Alert Warning Systems) compliant, which means our dispatch centers are able to send IPAWS notifications–which are the highest level, the imminent threat to life and property and they do not require opt in–so we can send these messages to someone that is passing through the area,” Layman said. “Then there is public messaging, that does require an opt in. That is the big push that is happening and we want to let CCCOG know of its importance. We need our communities to opt in, so we need to educate residents on how and why to do it. Once they opt in, we have the ability to send them notifications in a polygon area that is being effected.”

Layman used the Mullen Fire as an example.

“Ryan Park residents, during the Mullen Fire, who had been opted into our system; we could have basically drawn a circle around the community and notifications just to those addresses saying ‘we have a fire going on and we are not in imminent threat, but if certain trigger points are met or exceeded, evacuation may be ordered,” said Layman.

He said these messages can be customized, stating some people want to know about high wind warnings and others don’t.

Another feature available is to opt in for multiple addresses.

“If someone lives in Rawlins but has an elderly relative in Saratoga and a business in Hanna, they can actually opt in for all three addresses so they are not locked into one address; all free of charge,” Layman explained.

He said AlertSense’s third option allows internal communication for the county.

“For instance we can have internal messages that are the ones that towns and county are going to use, for example; search and rescue, sheriff department, town councils where we can build message groups and send out notifications just for those internal groups,” Layman said.

He said the collaboration between all the dispatch stations is a plus.

“All three dispatch stations have their dispatchers being trained to the AlertSense system and they will be able to launch those IPAWS messages, those public messages, and internal messages,” Layman said. “A mass mailing describing all this information will be going out on February 2.”

He said the flyers will go to approximately 7,800 addresses.

“It will be going to every residence and business in Carbon County,” Layman said. “About a month later, the city of Rawlins will be doing a mailer in every resident’s water bill.”

Layman said he will be going to town councils to promote AlertSense.

“I hope, by the end of summer, we will have somewhere between 90 percent of all county residents opted in,” Layman said. “I know it is a lofty goal, but it would put us in a good position as we go into the fire season.”

CCCOG thanked Layman for his information.

The next regularly scheduled meeting is at 6:30 p.m. on March 17 in Hanna.