Sheriff Roy Klinger hopes he never has to use the Madison County (Idaho) AMBER Alert system, but should the occasion arise, Klinger is glad the county has the system.
AMBER (America’s Missing Broadcast Emergency Response) alert systems are emergency systems designed to let the media and public know when a child has been abducted.
Currently, there is no national alert system for child abduction, but 27 states and 10 counties have plans. There are also nine regional plans. The plans in Washoe County (Reno), Nev., Tuscarawas County, Ohio and Lane County, Ore. are the only AMBER plans in their respective states.
President George W. Bush recently announced that the Departments of Justice (DOJ) and Transportation will provide $10 million in grants to develop and upgrade AMBER alert systems. At the same time, the president also announced the establishment of an AMBER alert coordinating office at DOJ that will create recommended nationwide standards for alert systems.
Madison County attempted to put an AMBER plan into place over a year ago but the plan was not met with much enthusiasm by local media. After the high-profile cases of the spring and summer this year, Klinger said his office had no problem getting the buy-in of others.
“With all that happened this year, we really felt that we had to take any measures possible to protect the children,” Klinger said. “So we pushed really hard and this time they jumped on it with us.”
The systems in Madison County and Stokes County, N.C. employ a similar process. When the Sheriff’s office receives credible and usable information (description of child, description of car, description of abductor) someone in the sheriff’s department sends a fax to all local media and other law enforcement jurisdictions, and they then broadcast that information.
“We’ve also contacted our local fire departments and requested that we be able to punch out their EAS [Emergency Alert System] tones,” explained Detective Danny Bottoms. “This way, we get an alert out into more homes in Stokes County.”
None of the counties contacted had electronic street signs to notify drivers of alerts, but many were working with state agencies to get possible alerts onto other signs throughout the area.
The largest expenditure so far for counties to set up the plans seems to be time. The responsibility of researching the plan, setting up the meetings, coordinating the media and other law enforcement officials often falls to one staff member.
“At this point, it has not required any additional funds,” Klingler said. “It has required additional phone and footwork, and the detective in charge worked really hard, but fortunately it did not cost any additional dollars.”
