The Marin County Office of Emergency Services (OES), a division of the Marin County Sheriff’s Office, is urging local residents to register cell phones or Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) devices to receive emergency alerts sent by phone call, text or email on the County’s upgraded notification service. Such alerts could save the lives of you and your family.

Marin OES has phased out its Telephone Emergency Notification System, or TENS, and recently sent out prompts about the upgrade to more than 13,000 Alert Marin subscribers who were registered on TENS. Anyone previously registered on TENS needs to update profile and contact information on the new system – and it only takes about one minute on www.alertmarin.org.

The new system has benefits that were not available previously, such as:

• The ability to have up to five locations per contact (addresses for home, school, work, etc.)

• Mobile applications to manage contact information and receive notifications

• An easy-to-use portal that works with all web browsers

Listed and unlisted/blocked Marin County landline phone numbers are already included in OES’ emergency notification system, but cell phone and VoIP numbers are not included and require registration.

Emergency officials use the AlertMarin system to deliver incident-specific information or potentially life-saving instruction to the precise geographic area affected by a natural disaster, a public safety incident or post-disaster information about shelters, transportation and supplies.

Remember: It’s free! Don’t hesitate to sign up to receive emergency alerts. Learn more about emergency preparedness at www.readymarin.org.