Town looking at feasibility of emergency warning siren

Jeff Helsdon, Editor

Tillsonburg is considering bringing back emergency warning sirens.

The town had an emergency siren, which many believed was an air-raid siren, but it was removed in the early 1990s.

Mayor Deb Gilvesy left the chair at the May 25 meeting to put forward a motion for town staff to look into the feasibility of establishing an emergency warning siren in town. The report would examine the cost, potential locations, available technology, and potential funding for such a siren.

Speaking to the motion, Gilvesy said this could be a future budget item to consider in the wake of a couple of recent weather events.

“A lot of communities are grappling with that there are no warning sirens anymore, and not everyone has a cell phone,” she said, adding cell phone warning technology isn’t 100 per cent. “My cell phone may have went off six times (with the recent tornado warning), but many people are also saying their cell phones weren’t going off - some weren’t going off at all.”

Coun. Kelly Spencer said she cares about safety, but most communities rely on digital alert systems.

“Sirens are mostly for people outside, and people weren’t outside,” she said of the storm.

Researching emergency sirens on AI, she said the cost was hundreds of thousands of dollars, and up to a million. In addition, she said no one had heard of a tornado hitting Tillsonburg. Her research only found a Woodstock tornado in 1893, one in London in the 1930s, and the 1970s Woodstock tornado.

Spencer asked more than 185 constituents, of whom 155 said no to a siren, with many saying it’s a “waste of money”.

“Many said this wasn’t a good way to spend money,” she said. “A report like this is a huge workload for staff for something many deem unnecessary.”

Coun. Bob Parsons, a former fire chief, recalled the federal government disbanding the emergency air raid sirens. He was also the community emergency management coordinator and recalled receiving funding through the Joint Emergency Preparedness Fund for an emergency generator. He suggested that maybe there was money available to fund a siren and that the fire chief could easily prepare a report with little work.

Before council voted on the motion, which passed, Gilvesy emphasized there was no funding attached to her motion, and it was a request for a report.