Monaghan Alerts- tailored communication to the public inc. Council, weather and Garda alerts.

Description

The Community Text Alert service has been in operation in Monaghan since 2019. Monaghan was the first county to receive full coverage by the Community Text Alert system, thanks to an innovative partnership between the community sector, An Garda Síochána and Monaghan County Council. The initial service was provided by Komeer.

The service was established after a four year collaboration between the Joint Policing Committee, the Community Section of Monaghan County Council and An Garda Síochána on Ireland’s first all-county garda messaging service. The countywide ‘Monaghan Community Alerts’ initiative grew out of a collaboration between the community groups and the JPC and was designed to primarily support communities in addressing rural crime. The groups came together with the aim of supporting communities in addressing rural crime and to bring the existing thirty individual community alert groups into one combined system. This stand-alone system was amalgamated with Monaghan County Council’s messaging service in February 2023 to form a one-stop shop for all alerts, called ‘Monaghan Alerts’.

The county alert service benefits the local community alert groups, who no longer have to pay to send messages out – the Council covers all costs. They also don’t have to deal with data protection issues arising from subscriber data, as this is also done for them by the Council. An Garda Síochána also benefit, as they can now reach parts of the county that don’t have an active community alert group. The new system also makes it easy for any Garda to send alerts from any device, which had become increasingly important as Garda communication has become centralised. It is considered to be a very innovative scheme and is being replicated by other Council’s throughout Ireland. It is also complimented by another existing community safety initiative – the Property Marking Scheme which was initiated by the Joint Policing Committee in Monaghan and is now operating in 21 Local Authorities throughout Ireland.

The new Monaghan Alerts service was launched in February 2023. Citizens can receive alerts from An Garda Siochana on criminal activity in their area as well as community safety messages, in addition to messages from Monaghan County Council on road closures, Uisce Eireann on water outages, and Met Eireann on severe weather warnings. Local community alert groups can also send out notices through the system.

The service is available by text, email or on a handy app. Citizens can sign up online at http://alerts.monaghancoco.ie, by downloading the ‘Monaghan Alerts’ app, or by picking up a paper registration form from any Garda Station or Council public office.

To assist people in registering, Monaghan County Council has teamed up with local community alert groups, which are running sign-up events in their local areas. Local volunteers are attending senior citizens lunches and activity clubs to assist people to download the app or complete the registration form. Council staff are uploading the paper registration forms onto the Monaghan Alerts database, to help those who are not computer literate to subscribe.
Subscribers are asked to select one of thirty local areas to identify with when they sign up. This helps to target messages to sub-areas of the county, and avoids sending irrelevant messages out to parts of the county which are nowhere near the incident/ event concerned.

The cost of sending out messages is being covered by Monaghan County Council, which views it as an essential public service.

The Community Text Alert service has been very well received by the older demographic. Monaghan is a rural county with less than 30% of the population living in its urban areas. As part of Monaghan Age Friendly County consultation, two of the main issues experienced by older people in the county are:
• Safety and Security
• Isolation and loneliness
The Community Text Alert service places a huge emphasis on crime prevention and community safety which very positively impacts on our older population. Sending crime prevention information by text means that it can be disseminated rapidly to a large audience in a cost effective way. It gives older people a greater sense of security and peace of mind that the Gardai are active on the ground in the fight against crime. The fact that the scheme has “buy in” from the local Gardai is also reassuring. It also gives a sense that the community is working together in a concerted effort to reduce crime.
One of the greatest benefits of the Community Text Alert service is the increasingly positive relationship between An Garda Síochána and the local communities. There is also a benefit in terms of neighbourliness and self-reliance, which helps to build better communities.

There has been strong interest in the Community Text Alert Service and there are currently 891 subscribers to the system (June 2023). This number will continue to grow as individual citizens become aware of the benefits of the system.

Aim of Initiative

The primary aim of the initiative is to provide a community safety programme for rural areas in Monaghan, with an emphasis on older and vulnerable people. It works on the principle of shared responsibility for crime prevention and reduction.

Monaghan Alerts also works to provides alerts to the public on important Council issues such as road closures, floods, emergency information, boil water notices etc. Subscribers can also receive weather alerts. New services are regularly being added to the system.

The system significantly increases the quality of life for older and vulnerable people in Monaghan and addresses the challenge of living in such rural communities.

Who is it aimed at

Monaghan Alerts is aimed at all citizens of Monaghan who feel that they would benefit from the service. However, there is an emphasis on our older and most vulnerable people.

The system allows them to receive crime prevention alerts, as well as to allow them receive regular communication from Monaghan County Council. The addition of weather alerts has become increasingly important as there has been a rise in extreme weather events in Ireland, with five extreme weather events in 2022.

The initiative aims to make communities safer places in which to live and to increase neighbourliness and community cooperation.

3 Steps critical to success

1. The most critical step was the initiation of the partnership between the community sector, An Garda Síochána and Monaghan County Council. This was achieved via the Monaghan Joint Policing Committee. Monaghan has a long history of community cooperation and this partnership was already in place, with the Property Marking Scheme having already been initiated by the Joint Policing Committee in Monaghan.
2. The second critical step was the procurement of a suitable company who could fulfil the needs of the Community Text Alert service. Many initial problems were raised such as GDPR concerns, the user friendliness of the proposed service, connection difficulties and the cost of the service. However, Komeer were the successful company and over two months, they worked with all the stakeholders to provide a robust, secure and user friendly system.
3. The final critical step was to amalgamate the Monaghan Community Alerts service with the Garda Alerts service. This was achieved in 2023 with the introduction of the new Monaghan Alerts system. The new system is a one-stop-shop service where users can sign up to receive alerts from the Council about things like road closures, weather alerts and boil water notices, and now we’ve added GARDA ALERTS about criminal activity in each community. This replaces the stand-alone ‘Monaghan Community Alerts’ service which was in operation until end 2022.

3 Challenges in Planning / Delivery

1. The initial challenge was the initiation of the partnership between the community sector, An Garda Síochána and Monaghan County Council. However, this was achieved via the Monaghan Joint Policing Committee, as local stakeholder had already worked together on successful projects such as the Property Marking Scheme.
2. The second and, which is on going challenge, is buy in from our local communities. However, there were already a number of collaborations between the community groups and the Joint Policing Committee in Monaghan. As the scheme was designed to primarily support communities in addressing rural crime, buy in was easily achieved.
3. The final challenge the exit of Komeer from the marketplace at end 2022. Luckily we were able to secure an alternative service provider and lost just 6 weeks service while transferring the service between providers.

3 Outcomes / Benefits

1. Monaghan Alerts has played a huge role in crime prevention. It plays a huge role in communities feeling safer, particularly for older and more vulnerable citizens. The Garda have many examples of crimes intercepted thanks to citizen information received in response to an alert sent out on Monaghan Alerts.
2. A direct benefit has been increased communication between the stakeholders (Monaghan County Council, Gardai etc.) and the local community. It has helped to directly address rural isolation in Monaghan. During Covid, we used the service to offer users the opportunity to avail of a ‘cocooning activity pack’. All they had to do was press the ‘yes’ button on their app, and the Komeer dashboard gave us a report containing the details of the users who wanted the packs and the community alert group closest to them. We were able to deliver the required number of packs out to each group, along with a list of names, and the local group carried out wellbeing checks on their local subscribers and dropped off the packs.
3. It has also meant that there are better relations between the stakeholders (Monaghan County Council, Gardai etc.) and the local community. This has led to other community initiatives such as the recent Age Friendly Community Wellness Event which was held in a local hotel Monaghan in May.