The City of Dumas is working on putting into place it's Onsolve One Call Now program.
The online program is a system that can contact Dumas water customers by phone, SMS Text Messages, emails, internet connected devices, and the One Call Now mobile app with a click of a mouse. The plan includes unlimited use for one annual price with no per-call or long distance charges. The primary focus of the program is for water outages, but it can be used for alerting emergencies or community events. The city will be paying for the program out of the general fund.
Sheree Jackson, City of Dumas Resource Director, is working to input the numbers so the correct information will be put into the system. She asks water customers who have not provided their phone number or emails address or who have recently changed their information to provide their contact information to the city to update their accounts.
Customers can add or update their phone and email address to the system if they have changed their number or do not have a number on file by filling out the form mailed in their water bill or by picking up a form at the Dumas City Hall drive through window. Jackson said if a customer's water bill comes in an envelope, it is something important to send to them and to look at the contents of the envelope.
“It is best to do it on a form rather than a phone call because we can keep up with the form. We have something to look at and make sure we get the number correct,” Jackson said. “We need their numbers and their email addresses if they want to be notified.
The city has 2,900 water accounts with extra spaces available with some locations having multiple accounts. This provides them with extra spaces to put in contact information for first responders, street and sanitation employees and local businesses including local industries. Using this system they can fine tune the system and send messages to a specific group like city employees.
Jackson learned and researched the program by calling other municipalities and learning what programs they used to track accounts and contact city water clients. Jackson said the program is needed to improve how customers get information concerning water outages and would benefit both the city and the community.
“It would be beneficial to us and less time consuming if we had something like this in place, so if something happened with a click of a mouse we could let everybody know,” Jackson said.
