California residents shouldn’t opt out of getting AMBER...
California residents shouldn’t opt out of getting AMBER alerts on their cellphones, said Bob Hoever, National Center for Missing and Exploited Children special programs director, in an interview Wednesday. Officials sent out an AMBER alert through cellphones for the first…
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time Aug. 5 (CD Aug 8 p12). When the customers got multiple messages, late messages, messages which later disappeared from their phones or alerts lacking specific information, people wanted to opt out of the service, said Hoever. “Unfortunately, people did not understand what these messages meant and their purpose,” he said. “It’s critically important the public does understand, and we get their eyes and ears if there’s a dangerous situation to help find and rescue that child.” The AMBER alert program relies heavily on public participation, with 676 children rescued to date from the program, said Hoever. Opting out of the system could mean opting out of all emergency alerts for some carriers, which “could be a matter of life or death,” said California Assembly Speaker John Perez during a news conference Monday (http://bit.ly/14EHVKU). The Assembly is in discussions to start an educational campaign with the California Emergency Management Agency to allow the Assembly to fund outreach efforts through savings in its operating budget, said Perez. The Assembly will hold a special hearing this fall to examine additional ways the wireless alert system can “work better in California” and ways the Legislature can “facilitate that happening,” said Perez.