Old Tappan — Officials heard a presentation last week about the emergency notification service offered by Citizen Communication Center, called C3. Currently the Borough has an arrangement with the county, which is switching to C3 from Swift Reach, the system it has been using, which officials said wasn’t working properly.
C3 is also available for use by individual municipalities, which is what officials were exploring at the meeting.
John Carrino of Xquizit Technologies, the vendor that manages and provides C3, showed the audience examples of how the software is employed in Nutley. C3 uses e-mail, text message or phone call notifications to be sent to registrants in the event of any type of emergency, ranging from hazardous spill warnings to national security alerts.
The cost for Old Tappan to use C3, said Carrino, would be $1,500 monthly or $18,000 a year. This would include a bulk amount of minutes and text messages as well as the ability for residents to register on the Borough’s Web site. Carrino said each department that uses C3, such as the Police Department, school, municipality or PTA, could create its own list of sub-groups to contact in the event of an emergency at no additional fee.
However, officials want to explore other options, saying $18,000 is too expensive considering they do not need all the extra services included in the package.
Councilwoman Anna Haverilla said that for now the Borough would likely stay with the county’s service since the fee is 3 cents a minute per call when the service is used.
Northern Valley Regional High School at Old Tappan Principal Fred Hessler agreed the expense of switching to C3 did not seem to be merited. The current cost for the emergency notification service through the county is $300 per month per school.
"It comes down to economics. We don’t need all the tools they have," said Hessler, citing road mapping, Web site design and text message alerts.
He said if all seven municipalities in the Northern Valley adopted the program and divided the cost, it "would help."
"Right now there are not a lot of shared services out there and this may be one," he said.
Haverilla said the Borough would explore Code Red, a system offered by a Florida based company.
The anticipated cost for that service is $7,500 per year that the Borough and school district would share. That cost would include a bulk amount of free minutes to be used by the elementary schools, PTA, Borough, high school and the Police Department.
Haverilla said a virtual presentation would have to be arranged since the company does not give on site presentations.
E-mail: wilde@northjersey.com or call 201-894-6706
