The FCC’s Public Safety and Homeland Security and Consumer and Governmental Affairs bureaus plan to hold a workshop Aug. 27 on promoting the wider use of the Emergency Alert System. The workshop is scheduled for 1-4:30 p.m. in the Commission’s meeting room.

“As part of the FCC’s continuing commitment to ensure that emergency alert and warning systems are effective and available to all Americans, the workshop will explore two key issues: (1) how to improve the usefulness of the EAS for emergency managers at the state and local levels (e.g., Emergency Operation Centers, Public Safety Answering Points, Police, Fire and Emergency Medical Services), and (2) how to improve the accessibility of alerts to people with disabilities,” according to a public notice.

“In particular, the workshop will discuss methods to empower and encourage state and local emergency managers to utilize the EAS and Wireless Emergency Alert (WEA) systems more widely for localized alerts and exercises. The workshop will also address the accessibility of EAS visual messages, including the technical feasibility of improving the synchronicity of EAS audio with the EAS visual crawl and the readiness of Text-to-Speech (TTS) technology for increased usage in national and local alerting.”