When a tornado warning was issued for the Kewanee area earlier this month, the city’s emergency warning sirens were activated.
But a number of people on the east side of the city may not have heard the sirens, as two of them didn’t go off.
The siren on Railroad Avenue malfunctioned. And one on Emmons Avenue hasn’t worked for months.
The City Council has discussed the need for upgrading the system used to warn residents about approaching dangerous storms and other emergencies. And last night, the council heard a report from a representative of a company that services sirens like the ones Kewanee has.
Josh Schmirler of Sheboygan Warning Systems told the council that three of the city’s six emergency sirens work well. Two have issues that make them unreliable and one doesn’t work at all.
Schmirler said one problem is that the sirens are tied into the electrical grid, so they don’t work during a power failure. Newer sirens have batteries that enable them to operate if the power goes out, he said.
And all of the sirens, which were installed many years ago, have “older style electronics.”
Schmirler presented four options, ranging in cost from simply repairing the Emmons Avenue siren, for $4,805, to replacing four of the sirens and decommissioning sirens on West College Street and Third Street downtown, which would have a price tag of $99,746.50.
Fire Chief Stephen Welgat said he would recommend a “replace two, keep two” option, where the Railroad Avenue and Church Street sirens would be replaced with new battery backup units on taller poles, and the Emmons Avenue siren would be repaired and new radios would be installed in two sites. That would cost $69,534,50.
Welgat said there is a line item in his budget for maintenance of the sirens, but there isn’t nearly enough money in it for a major overhaul.
Councilman Chris Colomer said the council is about to go into budget planning sessions, and can focus on finding funds in the city budget for the siren upgrades.
