Unama’ki alert system ‘wildly successful’
More than 3,200 people registered for community-led service
SYDNEY – An emergency alert system being used by First Nations communities in Cape Breton — We'koqma'q, Wagmatcook, Eskasoni, Membertou and Potlotek — is allowing them to better communicate with their residents in critical situations.
The alert system was developed by Jennifer Jesty, the emergency management coordinator for the Union of Nova Scotia Mi'kmaq, using the customizable Everbridge public warning platform.
Since its launch on September 1, Jesty said 40 alerts have been sent out within four of the five Unama'ki First Nations communities for emergencies ranging from boil water orders to missing children to severe weather and road closures. Of the 40, 10 alerts were for missing young people and she said all 10 were reunited with their families within an hour of the alert going out.
“It has been wildly successful, extremely well received, and utilized almost to its full capacity,” Jesty said.
Messages are in both English and Mi'kmaq and can be sent by text, email and audio message to a mobile phone or landline. Jesty said over 3,200 people are currently registered for the service and that number is growing every day, especially after an alert is deployed in a community.
Jesty points to the example of the shooting incident in Eskasoni First Nation on Feb. 28 in which a 53-year-old man was injured. An alert went out that night informing residents of the public safety threat and encouraging them to stay inside. The investigation into that incident is still ongoing, but in the meantime, Jesty said within four hours of the alert being sent, 250 additional people registered for the system.
“It's exactly how I hoped it would happen because I knew word of mouth was going to be much stronger than any publicity I could do,” she said.
Jesty said she's been approached by other communities in Mi'kma'ki, and recently did a presentation for representatives of Lennox Island First Nation in Prince Edward Island and will be helping them set up their own similar alert system.
“In my perfect world, every community has this. It has the potential to save lives,” she said.
Each chief has the discretion to send out an alert to inform their community of an emergency and Jesty said that has been the key to the success of the system.
“Some things that are urgent to us may not seem urgent to outside agencies, so we needed to find a way to be able to communicate to our communities when something serious is happening and not rely on those outside agencies to do that,” she said.
Just weeks before the alert system went live in 2020, a 14-year-old girl went missing in We'koqma'q First Nation. The community's chief at the time, Rod Googoo, said he had pleaded with the RCMP to issue a missing child alert, which was eventually issued seven days after the teen was first reported missing. She was found two days after that.
“I'm so grateful that we're getting our own system, so we don't have to depend on outside sources because they tend to fail us,” said Googoo in August.
We'koqma'q's current chief, Annie Bernard-Daisley, who was elected in October, said the alert system has been a valuable resource in her community and she encourages more of her residents to sign up for the service.
“This system was built to protect our communities. I am very proud of the passion, hard work and commitment that the Union of Nova Scotia Mi'kmaq and the emergency management coordinator, Jennifer Jesty, have put into this system to ensure that it was built and launched for our communities,” she said.
The alert system is free for the five First Nations communities in Unama'ki and will stay that way thanks to new funding from Indigenous Services Canada, who contacted Jesty directly and offered to cover the Union of Nova Scotia Mi'kmaq's $7,000 yearly subscription to Everbright.
For Jesty, who worked for a decade in first response as a paramedic and firefighter before taking on this role, she couldn't be prouder of this system which, as she said, is “made by Mi'kmaq for Mi'kmaq.”
“I can't stop smiling because it's been so great and being able to provide a service like this to the communities and possibly save lives, I don't know that there's anything better.”