Richmond’s emergency alert notifications off by default: How to be sure you’re connected

RICHMOND, Va. (WRIC) — Concerns over citywide emergency alerts remain as some residents say they never received notice from "Richmond Ready Alerts" about the city's ongoing boil water advisory.

On Tuesday, May 27, a boil water advisory was issued for many Richmond neighborhoods. The city told 8News that emergency alerts about said advisory were issued through its "Richmond Ready Alerts" system -- however, many residents claimed they didn't get them.

8News asked city officials about the matter Tuesday afternoon during a virtual press conference.

“If a resident didn’t get it, they need to sign up for Richmond Ready so they can get those notifications,” said Scott Morris, director of the Richmond Department of Public Utilities (DPU). “Go into the account, make sure you’re set up and then adjust your settings for those notifications.”

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Of the nearly 230,000 residents living in the city, only 5,710 are currently subscribed to the alert system, per officials. Mayor Danny Avula told 8News that about 3,800 of those subscribers received the first boil water advisory alert, while about 5,000 received the second one.

8News followed up with public safety crisis and communications consultant Gabe Lugo, who took a look at the sign-up process for the Ready Alert system and found what could be causing these issues: when a user signs up for Ready Alerts, they are automatically opted out of receiving notifications.

"It's a little bit less intuitive than that because you do need to go in and manually opt-in [to notifications,]" Lugo said. "When you create an account, you then need to log into the platform and manually add your contact information, select your preferences for alerts and then go through and check boxes for all the different types of alerts."

Lugo explained that issuing Wireless Emergency Alerts (WEA) may have been more effective.

"It's a tool that allows alerting officials to very quickly disseminate lifesaving information to every mobile phone within a defined area," Lugo said. "Those people don't need to sign up for alerts—they don't need to check a website or do anything else."

8News reached out to city officials and asked why WEAs are not used in place of the Ready Alert system. We received a statement that read, in part:

"WEA is essential for instant, mass alerts to the public without signup, especially for imminent life-threatening emergencies and the city does have WEA capabilities. But platforms like Everbridge [Richmond Ready Alerts] give the city more flexibility, control and communication depth, making it a critical tool for more nuanced, sustained, or localized public safety messaging." Mira Signer, Office of Mayor Danny Avula

8News is currently waiting on further answers from city officials, such as how many alert systems are used within the city of Richmond and why.

Those who have questions or are experiencing issues with the Ready Alert system can contact AskEmergencyMgmt@rva.gov.