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FCC Approves Michigan State EAS Plan

Six months since the July 2022 deadline, the commission continues its review process

Michigan is now one of six states to have their updated Emergency Alert System plan approved by the FCC under the new requirements.

State EAS plans, which govern EAS operations and activation procedures in their respective states, are designed by State Emergency Communications Committees (SECC) and filed annually. They must receive FCC approval.

Michigan’s EAS plan was put together by Michigan SECC Chair Gary Blievernicht, Vice-Chair Dan Kelley and MSP [Michigan State Police] Emergency Communications Specialist Jaclyn Barcroft, according to a press release from the Michigan Association of Broadcasters.

Kelley said in the press release the plan was approved after the Michigan SECC added redundant sources for receiving national alerts.

“The FCC appeared to be very concerned that each local primary station have redundant paths for receiving and relaying national alerts,” Kelly said in the press release. “As a result, we’ve asked some public radio stations to add the capability of receiving national alerts through National Public Radio’s NPR-1 channel.” 

[Related: “Not All SECCs Have Submitted State EAS Plans“]

Kelly continued: “Additionally, we have identified other local primary stations and will ask them to install Sirius/XM radios as part of their EAS monitoring chain. The satellite provider also relays the national level alerts.  We will be in contact with these stations in the coming weeks.”

An updated list published by the FCC shows Illinois was the first state to have their updated EAS plan approved on June 8, 2022. Other states with approved plans include Nevada, Alabama, Minnesota Alaska and, now, Michigan.

The FCC required states to file EAS state plans via the new Alert Reporting System (ARS) by July 5, 2022, but not all did by the deadline. The FCC declined to say if all states have now completed the process.  

The ARS is an in-house online filing system adopted by the FCC in 2018 to modernize State EAS Plan filing and create uniformity. Radio World previously reported that at least one SECC chair found using the new ARS system tedious.

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