BC City Connection Podcast

Sirens, Safety And Smarter Alerts

• City of Battle Creek

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Battle Creek’s outdoor sirens are being modernized for targeted, reliable severe weather alerts. Also, learn why monthly tests are important. 

In this episode of BC City Connection, Bret White from the Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) explains upgrades, vendor support, and how residents can get fast phone alerts and even join CERT.

Episode Resources
Outdoor Warning Siren Activation Project
Safeguarding Tomorrow Revolving Loan Fund Program
Subscribe to Battle Creek City Alerts
Subscribe to Calhoun County Emergency Notifications

BC CIty Connection Podcast is produced by Livemic Communications.







Richard Piet:

I'm Richard Piet. Welcome to BC City Connection. It's the official podcast from City Hall, City of Battle Creek, Michigan. Glad to have you with us. We invite you to subscribe to this podcast where you get them. Just type in BC City Connection. You'll see that come up. And click that little subscribe button, and then you'll be alerted when we have a new episode for you. And there'll be more of them coming in the year of 2026. Looking forward to that. You are probably familiar with those emergency sirens, if only for the tests that they do regularly, and we hear them. But on occasion, they do what they're supposed to do, and they alert us to an emergency. Here to talk about that is Bret White, he oversees logistics at the Community Emergency Response Team. It's known as CERT. Hello, Bret. Hello. How are you doing today, Richard? Great. Thank you for this update. You know, I think this is one of those things that people always wonder about. You know, you hear those sirens tested, hopefully more tested than for real reasons, quote unquote real reasons, but we know they're there, but we don't really know a whole lot about them. Turns out there are several of them, are there not, around the county to make sure that we all hear them.

Bret White:

Yeah, that's correct. There's actually like uh there's 38 sirens around the county. The last count there in 10 within uh the city limits of uh Battle Creek. Yeah, those are the ones that we actually test those every single month, uh the first Saturday of every month at 1 p.m.

Richard Piet:

That's a a statewide protocol, isn't it? I remember living elsewhere as a kid and hearing it at the same time.

Bret White:

At least for Calhoun County and several other counties, there are a few counties in the state that maybe don't practice it or they do it not as frequently, but we Calhoun County practices that every month. And it's important to do so. Why? To uh test the functionality. You don't want to wait until there's something pressing or severe weather event not headed your way, and then find out that those sirens are failing. So if you find out ahead of time, you're able to take measures to remake repairs or replacements.

Richard Piet:

And that's when you know, is it true, that when there's an issue with them, it'll surface during those tests. Is that right? Exactly.

Bret White:

Yep. They're set off the exact same way, whether it's a test or whether it's a severe weather event. They get set off the same way. And then yeah, we we have uh amateur radio folks that are local, and then we send those out to each location throughout the city and county, and we pull each station after the sirens sound and you know take the results, and then we report those to the emergency management or the uh municipality where those sirens lie. Okay.

Richard Piet:

When we hear those, they seem to kind of go in and out, right? They're actually spinning on a post, isn't that right?

Bret White:

Yeah, that's correct. Uh most of them do rotate. There are some that are stationary, just depends on make and model and where they're at, but yeah, they do rotate.

Richard Piet:

Yeah, it's kind of interesting because uh sometimes if you're hearing one of those that spins and rotates, then it's kind of like somebody standing in front of you talking, but they're turning in circles. Right. So they're talking at you, so to speak, when they're facing you, but when they're not, then you hear the sound differently. And it seems to be that's how we hear a lot of those.

Bret White:

Yes. Depending on conditions outside, too, that can impact. Um, like if it's calm outside, uh, you might be able to, or which way the direction the wind's going, you might be able to hear one stronger than the other, or you might like, well, where's that coming from? It just depends, you know, that also plays a uh a role in it.

Richard Piet:

All right. Now, what we really want to make sure folks understand is that you're paying attention to the status of operations on those sirens, and there is such a thing as a project that's uh come together to maintain them, maybe even replace them if needed. What's that all about?

Bret White:

Yeah, so it's basically called the siren activation project. It's funded through uh Safeguarding Tomorrow, a revolving loan funding program. You know, there's an opportunity across the state. Um, it's also being utilized county and city in the city. So with the 10 sirens, we're using funds to repair or replace the ones that uh might have, you know, that we've been having issues with. You know, some of the ones like you know, I-94 Rest Stop and Washington School, some of these ones that uh we've continued to have issues with, those are being addressed. And you know, we work with the vendor um that helps out from the state and to get those fixed or repaired.

Richard Piet:

Yeah, and we have aging infrastructure with these things, don't we? They've been around a while.

Bret White:

Yeah, some of them are as old as they're from the 50s, 50s and 60s era. So, you know, if you do the math, you know, some of them are you know encroaching on like 70 years old. So um, you know, those electronics and those sirens are some of the components, they're just not made to last that long. So they need to be replaced and they're um they're pretty expensive for upkeep and replacement.

Richard Piet:

Wow, 70 years those sirens have been in operation. That's incredible. We presume that there's been some kind of maintenance to them over that stretch of time, or do they just keep on keeping on?

Bret White:

Yeah, they're uh they're really robust, right? So yes, there is uh there is maintenance. Again, that's you know why we go out and check those every month. And then, you know, if there is uh an issue with one, um, if it's not uh if it doesn't function for a month or two, again, you know, it's not like we're just letting it go by the wayside. Those activities for the sirens at each location, those do get reported. We you know, send them into emergency management and then also you get it reported to the vendor and get someone you know dispatched out to uh assess it and then hopefully repair it.

Richard Piet:

Yeah. So this is the a typical protocol. You have a third party who helps you sort these things out.

Bret White:

Yeah, that's correct. There's uh West Shore, they're the vendor for the sirens, um, believe most of the state, if not the whole state. So you can imagine, you know, it's a lot for them. So you have to work on you know getting the quotes and get the timing um of when they can come out type thing, but it's a lot. Yeah, okay.

Richard Piet:

Well, that takes some of the pressure off of the city and the county to have to deal with those all on their own. So this outdoor warning siren activation project, as you said, avails itself of low interest loans. Uh, I think that's a federal program, the Safeguarding Tomorrow Revolving Loan Fund program, to try and upgrade these. What do you expect to happen as a result of that? Are we replacing some or fixing some? What's the purview you have?

Bret White:

The answer to that question is yes. Some of some of the ones uh have been replaced over the years and they're deemed in good condition. You know, they'll come out and evaluate each site and then they'll update whether the electronics need to get uh updated. So that's that's the other side of it too. They're also planning on within through calendar year, you know, through next year, um, the plan is to upgrade the electronics in those siren sites so uh the Calhoun County Consolidated Dispatch, they would be able to, you know, trigger those sirens um and actually uh be able to do them in quadrants. So be able to, you know, if watching the weather, say there's a weather event on the northwest corner of the you know of the county, is there really a need to set those sirens off down, say in Homer or something like that? So uh it's uh it gives us more uh ability to uh react to what you know what's actually going on.

Richard Piet:

Yeah, and that makes a lot of sense. I mean, and currently, or at least the prior purview mode of operation would have been to sound an alarm across the whole county, even when maybe the storm is just clipping a certain section of the county.

Bret White:

Yeah, that that's right. Yep.

Richard Piet:

Well, better safe than sorry, I suppose. That uh purview is such that um if everybody took cover but not everybody was affected, that might be a good thing. But I think you work from the other side of that too, don't you? That someone who hears a siren takes cover but never has a a significant storm go by, then begins to wonder about the effectiveness of the siren, right? So this helps focus that in a better way, doesn't it?

Bret White:

Yeah, you know, it sure does. Yep. It just it makes the you know, for the public and people that are involved, it gives you a more of a sense that if it's going off, it's going off of where that storm's at. Like we were saying, like if it say if it went off in the uh the southeast corner down in Homer, for example, and the skies are blue, right? And there's nothing, nothing coming. People are like, you know, then they're questioning, ah, these are just going off for the heck of it again. So yeah.

Richard Piet:

Yeah, it's not 1 p.m. Saturday, so that means that means that it's not for the heck of it. It means something. But boy, this uh is terrific technology though, to be able to zero in and alert in a more targeted way. So you said emergency management will be able to to sort those out, sound them in the right places. That's not the way it works now, or does emergency management just flip the switch?

Bret White:

No, it's supposed to work like that, and then they get set off from Calhoun County Consolidated Dispatch, um, just to be clear. So, yeah, that's where it gets set off. They try like so. Right now there's a difference whether it's they're set off like VHF, more of an RF type triggering system to uh sound them off. It's gonna go to like a two-way, uh, more of a robust digital two-way. So that's one of the main updates to our current system. So that'll um it'll be a more robust way to set off those sections.

Richard Piet:

Yeah, think of it as the difference between uh communications of yesterday and communications of today. This is uh a huge difference. I suppose it also is related to mention that the county and the city both oversees this, or at least uh is involved in it to some extent, will send an alert to you. Talk about advanced and modern communications. If you sign up for alerts, you can get them directly to your phone, isn't that right?

Bret White:

Yeah, yeah, that is right. You can get county ones, city ones, they'll send you uh weather alerts. I mean, there's it's amazing, you know, as to the technology. So you can get traffic alerts and weather and just you know, missing folks, you know, stuff like that. Uh just the technologies there. They're able to put the information in and text it out to like the sh folks that subscribe to it, and it just blasts it out there um along with social media. So it gets the word out there fast.

Richard Piet:

Yeah, that's a marvelous point. So you can sign up for those text alerts if you want them. They'll come across your phone when they're sent, or I've done this too, or I've signed up by email, and I see exactly what you're talking about. I see all the traffic alerts and uh law enforcement alerts and and other things that uh the county and city would like to impart to folks. And it's terrific. It comes right to you when you need to know it, and uh, that's a terrific thing. And all you have to do is sign up for that. So we'll put the links to those things in the show notes for this episode so you can click through and sign up if that's what you'd like to do. And uh all of these things, it's just a terrific technology that's emerging. And and here we are talking about uh 70-year-old sirens to texts to your phone. So this is a huge gamut of technology that we're talking about. And it sounds, uh Bret, as though these uh siren situations are really going to start moving in the direction of technology, and we'll have some some big updates.

Bret White:

Yes, that's exactly right. Uh, you know, the one thing too, the outdoor warning sirens are you know meant to be just that, right? They're not meant to wake you out of uh a dead sleep in the middle of the night. They're meant for people that are outdoors that it's an outdoor warning siren. So just you know, you need to have other things available to you. You know, if you're in your home, you know, weather radios, those are uh real key, or have uh alerts set up again on your phones and just situational awareness. You know, pay attention, look at the weather forecaster. Um there, you know, the forecastings come a long way, and you can see like uh the storm prediction center, they can give you a pretty good uh heads up a couple days, two or three days out that they're pretty good at predicting that when we're gonna get severe weather.

Richard Piet:

Yeah, we do learn about these things a lot sooner, most of the time, at least. And then um these other kinds of alerts are uh great ways to stay in touch. And that's a great point that I didn't think about. The sirens that we're talking about, if you're inside with the TV on or the radio on or some such thing, you may not hear those.

Bret White:

Yeah, that's right. That's not their intent. They've always been meant to give people outside a heads up. Something's going on, take cover or get to where you need to go, basically to take cover. There's something imminent coming.

Richard Piet:

All right. You know, before we go, Bret, just talk a little bit about what the community emergency response team cert is meant to do.

Bret White:

So for Kellen County, we have one cert for the entire county. We always support uh Marshall, or not Marshall, yeah, but Marshall and Battle Creek uh around the county. But uh we help out at all the public events, the air show, the breakfast table, 5K's. Um we help out with uh just help people, we help the police with traffic.

Richard Piet:

So it's not always about emergencies.

Bret White:

No, it's not. It's to support, you know, we're here to support uh public service. Basically, it's a it's a 20-hour uh hands-on textbook course that um it's a FEMA recognized course. So we do that a you know one to two times a year and we go through that and get people involved. So we have like 12 to 15 uh dedicated uh folks right now. Kind of goes up and down, but that's usually our core group, and then we're able to uh help out.

Richard Piet:

Wow. So if someone wanted to join that force and be a part of that, they could apply.

Bret White:

Yes, it's open to anybody. Um, it'll get put out on social media, city will put out an announcements, but we'll usually we'll have one in the spring, and it's usually local, you know, we'll hold it at like the Department of Public Works building or somewhere along those lines. Yeah, it's uh anyone can get involved. We'll put it out, you know, a month ahead of time, usually get up you know up to like 20 to 30 people. Wow.

Richard Piet:

Okay. So another uh communications uh vehicle is social media. Of course, if you follow the Calvin County social media platforms, City of Battle Creek, yes, you'll see these alerts as well as opportunities like joining the CERT team. Bret, this has been really interesting. Appreciate the update. Thank you. All right, thank you, Richard. Bret White, overseas logistics for CERT, the community emergency response team in Battle Creek and Calhoun County. Thanks for joining us on the BC City Connection.