GCC Foundation

Wabash Valley Communique and Gibson County Communique are proud to announce our newest public safety service, Wabash Valley Weather Alerts .
With this week being the National Severe Weather week, what better time to launch our Weather Alerts Facebook Page.   Head over to www.facebook.com/wxalerts  and like our new WX Alerts page to instantly be notified when the National Weather Service issues a watch or warning for our areas.
We believe everyone should have multiple ways of being notified of severe weather, and this is just one more way to get Weather Alerts. Stay tuned, as we have more stuff up our sleeves. -Keith

Earlier today, I delivered these 3 refurbished fire department pagers to the Buckskin/Barton Township Fire Department in Gibson County. Like many of the smaller departments, they operate on a limited budget and to purchase 3 new pagers would likely cost in the range of $1200-1500. Fortunately, with a background in repairing the older style of these pagers, and YOUR generous donations, I was able to obtain these used pagers online and get them cleaned up, new batteries and reprogrammed to work for their department. With your donations, we purchased the pagers, new batteries, crystals and alerting filters for around $75.00. My labor was free. So, the next time you see a Buckskin Firefighter, they may be wearing the pagers that YOU ALL helped fund.

I know some people are reserved about making a donation to our organization because of not knowing where your money goes. I can assure you (and I have the financial records to back it up) ALL of your donations go back to your local communities. We are all volunteers here and NONE of your donations go to any overhead. We do everything out of our own homes and donate all our hours, office supplies and other ancillary items needed to ensure your donations benefit your friends and neighbors. And, believe it or not, these pagers were purchased with the small $1-10 dollar donations. I know it doesn’t seem like a $5.00 donation doesn’t seem like much but, when over 8000 members are making small donations……they add up! I want to thank each and every one of you that helped to make this fire department donation possible. God Bless you all! – Charlie

http://www.14news.com/story/20291779/lack-of-donations-may-have-some-families-going-without-this-christmas

GIBSON CO., IN (WFIE) -Families in need may have to go without this year because of a lack of donations in Gibson County.Organizers with Gibson County Communiquè say they’ve been approached by several families needing assistance this year.

When the needs are small things, the organization can usually make accommodations, but at the holidays the Gibson County Communiquè Foundation does something called Secret Santa.

Last year they ‘adopted’ between eight and ten families and gave them a Christmas to remember.

Scott Hartley, with Gibson County Communiquè said, ”Our donations have been kind of low, we really like to pick anywhere from five to ten families that we can help out and we really like to provide for everyone in the family, mom, dad, the children, provide everybody some clothing, some food for them, provide some toys for the kids especially.If we get those donations, we can do that,” he said.

Organizers say they haven’t made a big push for donations yet because they so many people are just trying to provide for their own families and just don’t have anything left to give. He says if donations don’t start coming in, this Secret Santa, will have to take the year off.

During the week of October 7-13th, the United States will recognize National Fire Prevention Week 2012. Over the month of September and the first week of October, we invite you to have your kids color one of the 3 pictures we’ve included here. After they have colored them, you can scan them and return them to gibsoncounty411@gmail.com or mail them to Gibson County Communique’ Foundation at PO Box 77 Patoka, IN. 47666. We will change our Cover Picture, on each of our Communique’ pages each day, over the next month, and display all the kids’ drawings. We will also put each picture into an album that we’ll let folks vote on. The picture with the most votes wins a $25.00 gift card. Please include your child’s name, age, and an email or phone number (so we can contact you if your child wins the gift car) when returning the pictures to us. Click on any or all of the image links below to display and print out the picture(s) you would like to see your children color. Please keep this to ages 0-12 so our youngsters can actually win something instead of adults overwhelming the contest.

FIRE PREVENTION WEEK COLORING PICTURE I

FIRE PREVENTION WEEK COLORING PICTURE II

FIRE PREVENTION WEEK COLORING PICTURE III

The Knox County Emergency management Agency has instituted a new rapid emergency notification service called CodeRED®. The new system will distribute emergency messages via telephone, to targeted areas or the entire county at a rate of 1,000 calls per minute. CodeRED® employs a one-of-a-kind Internet mapping capability for geographic targeting of calls, coupled with a high speed telephone calling system capable of delivering customized pre-recorded emergency messages directly to homes and businesses, live individuals and answering machines.

By registering, you’ll be added to the emergency call list, and also be notified during Tornado and Severe Thunderstorm Warnings.

This service can be used in case of fires, chemical spills, evacuations, lock downs, downed power lines, lost individuals, natural disasters, abductions, water system problems, bomb threats, or other emergencies. Calls can be geographically targeted for localized messaging. If widespread, the entire community could be called within a few minutes. The system also reports who did not get a call so that they may be contacted by other means.

Knox County residents are welcome and encouraged to enter their contact information for home, business, and mobile phones so they may be contacted by the system in the event of an emergency. It is important for city residents and businesses customers to register, especially if they use unlisted numbers, cell phones, or VOIP. Those who do not register their address and phone number may not be notified with CodeRED in the case of an emergency. Registration is confidential, free, and easy.

To sign up, go to:
https://cne.coderedweb.com/Default.aspx?groupid=zViD8IibykhTbU0cC34A4A%3D%3D

Knox County Emergency Management Agency will be hosting the annual 2012 National Weather Service Severe Storm Spotter Training Course on Thursday, March 15 from 6:30pm to 8:30pm at the Workforce Development Building at 1500 Chestnut St in Vincennes. The class is free of charge and registration is not required. Everyone is welcome to attend.

This is a great opportunity to learn about severe weather and severe weather safety. This also helps as a refresher for some that have not been to a spotter course for a while to keep up to date on changes.

The National Weather Service in Paducah KY will be conducting 10 Spotter Training Webinars in preparation for the upcoming severe weather season. These free webinars are open to anyone and will have all the content of our basic spotter class.

For a list of dates and times, or to register, visit our web page at:

http://www.crh.noaa.gov/pah/?n=2012spottertraining

Classes last about 2 1/2 hours, and a computer and phone is required for the presentation.