Tallahassee, Fla. “ Today, the Florida Division of Emergency Management announced the selection of Everbridge as the service provider for the development and implementation of AlertFlorida, a landmark initiative which will provide statewide emergency alert and notification services to all Florida residents, businesses and visitors. Ensuring the safety of all Floridians is the Division's top priority, said FDEM Director Bryan W. Koon. The selection of Everbridge as the AlertFlorida vendor marks a milestone toward providing the State's Emergency Managers with a standardized system to communicate critical emergency information to every resident, business and visitor in Florida.
AlertFlorida services are currently being implemented in several counties during an initial phase, with additional deployment phases continuing throughout 2016. Each participating jurisdiction will be able to customize the categories of alerts available in their community through a local opt-in portal. The system also provides automated notifications of flash floods, tornadoes, and other watches & warnings issued by the National Weather Service.
AlertFlorida will be the most comprehensive and coordinated statewide emergency notification program in the country. Users will select their preferred language and methods for receiving alerts, including SMS text messaging, e-mail, voice calls, TDD/TTY messaging, and mobile device apps for AndroidTM, Apple®, and Windows® mobile devices. The system will also post alerts to social media channels and will interface directly with existing broadcast-based alerting systems.
The state of Florida continues to demonstrate strong leadership in emergency management, and this statewide critical communications program will improve Florida's overall preparedness and resiliency during severe weather disasters and manmade emergencies, said Jaime Ellertson, CEO of Everbridge. We applaud the state of Florida for this initiative and we are delighted to partner with FDEM to help ensure that all individuals and organizations in the state are safe and informed.
Everbridge provides critical communication services to over 2,700 global customers. Everbridge's large public sector clients include eight of the ten largest cities and all but one of the top 25 airports in the U.S. Everbridge's communications platform can deliver billions of messages each year across multiple languages and device types.
For additional information about the Florida Division of Emergency Management, visit Floridadisaster.org. FDEM also features an extensive social media presence. Follow FDEM on Twitter at @FLGetAPlan, Instagram@FLGetAPlan, and Facebook at Facebook.com/FloridaDivisionofEmergencyManagement and Facebook.com/KidsGetAPlan.
