MMTC Raises Concerns on FCC Approach on Wireless Emergency Alerts
The Multicultural Media, Telecom and Internet Council raised concerns after FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel sent letters to the nation’s nine largest providers of wireless emergency alerts last week seeking information on how alerts can start to support languages beyond English…
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and Spanish (see 2302140059). MMTC reminded the FCC it sought changes to the emergency alert system in 2005, in a petition never addressed by regulators. Reports are that the commission’s focus on the issue of multilingual emergency alerts has shifted from the emergency alert “Designated Hitter” system proposed by MMTC to a model based on WEA, said a filing posted Tuesday in docket 06-119. “If true, this shift represents an unfortunate step backward from the Commission’s goal of ensuring that people from a variety of language backgrounds are armed with critical information during and in the immediate wake of a life-threatening emergency,” MMTC said: “Although wireless providers generally do a good job of relaying multilingual emergency information in advance of anticipated disasters, cell towers and other systems making up wireless infrastructure are often compromised or taken entirely offline when disaster actually strikes, leaving radio stations with back-up generators among the few sources of mass communications still operating during such events.” The group asked the FCC to focus instead on its designated hitter proposal.