Officials discuss replacing warning sirens with new technology in Marshall County
Some communities say tornado warning sirens are a thing of the past.
New technology means you have better, more efficent ways to get the warnings.
Waay 31's grace campbell shares with us how areas in marshall county are still changing how they'll notify you about severe weather.
Bob joslin, mayor of arab: "they're 30 plus years old.
That's old technology, and so, we need to be in the 21st century and move forward."
The mayor of arab, bob joslin, is proposing to city council on monday to remove their weather sirens.
4 out of the 14 weather sirens do not work.
And joslin says it would cost about 90 thousand dollars to repair them.
He says theyre about 30 years old and the way people get weather notifications has changed.
But he says they will have plans in place to help people if his proposal gets approved.
Bob joslin, mayor of arab: "for those people that don't have any other means of notification like a cellphone, or they're not watching tv or they're not listening to the radio, or whatever, that we furnish them a weather radio, and it'd be much better than the weather sirens."
Arab is hoping to follow albertville's lead on removing the weather sirens.
The director of the marshall county e-m-a says they're planning to keep their weather sirens for the time being but they're encouraging people to not rely on the outdoor sirens.
"what we're trying to do is get people to think about going to different ways to receiving their notifications and not rely on outdoor warning sirens, and so i think you're going to see across the nation and this state, certainly in this county as well, a fazing out of those sirens."
Waay 31's grace cambell reporting... the mayor of arab also said they're hoping to receive a grant to
WAAY-31's Grace Campbell discusses a new proposal to get rid of Tornado Sirens due to advances in technology.