Schools

Orinda Police Apologize for Glitchy Phone Alert System

An automated telephone alert system designed to give residents advance warning of an emergency in their neighborhoods went a little haywire Thursday and Orinda city officials want to know what went wrong.

It is known as the Telephone Emergency Notification System (TENS) and it is designed to alert residents in a given area of emergency situations in their neighborhood.  On Thursday, it went a little crazy when Orinda police issued an advisory about a missing - and injured - boy.

"Glad they found the boy, but the Orinda phone system needs to be corrected," wrote a Patch reader who identified herself only as Jennifer.  "I have received 5 automated calls from the Orinda police department about the missing boy between 7 and 7 :45 this morning."

And she wasn't alone.  Orinda police say dozens of other residents in the Lost Valley neighborhood started getting the calls early Thursday as the warning system unrelentingly started ringing up residents on land lines both listed and unlisted – and then repeated the calls.

Find out what's happening in Lamorindawith free, real-time updates from Patch.

"This same type of activation was used just recently in Orinda on May 10th for a missing elderly gentleman with much success," police and city officials said in a release Friday.  "Unfortunately, (the) July 8th activation caused most residents to receive the phone call up to as many as five times on each line listed for their residence."

The boy in question was located early Thursday morning.  But the calls, residents fumed, kept coming.

Find out what's happening in Lamorindawith free, real-time updates from Patch.

"This result is obviously not according to design, and CWS (County Community Warning System) staff is working diligently with the vendor, Honeywell, to determine the exact cause," the statement went on, pointing out that the notification system had performed perfectly in May when it was called upon to alert residents of an elderly man who had gone missing.

For now, Orinda's civic and police officials say Honeywell has already made some programming changes based on possible causes, but that the root cause for Thursday's glitch remains undetermined.

"Orinda Police would like to apologize for any inconvenience this has caused to the residents of Orinda," they wrote.


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