by Margie Doyle and Lin McNulty
County Council member Rick Hughes in teleconference on Friday by landline and cell phone. Photo: Margie Doyle
Just before noon today, the County Council passed a resolution to declare a state of emergency for San Juan County.
Present in the teleconference meeting in Friday Harbor were County Auditor Milene Henley, County Manager Mike Thomas, Sheriff Rob Nou, Prosecutor Randy Gaylord, and Council Member Bob Jarman, along with county staff. Attendees by phone were Department of Emergency Manager Brandon Cowan. On the phone from Orcas was Council Membere Rick Hughes and Dave Halloran from Department of Emergency Management. Council Member Jamie Stephens participated by phone from Seattle.
Hughes emphasizes that this decision “allows us to seek potential Federal assistance.” While this is not an environmental disaster, it is a way to get the process started to “make sure we get the fastest recovery possible. This the best way for the county to react.”
Hughes explicitly downplays the emergency aspects of this declaration. It’s just standard operating procedure on how to solve the immediate problem.
The Resolution to Declare a State of Emergency Within San Juan County, Washington passed unanimously, and is available HERE for viewing.
How were they able to make conference call if all of our phone lines were down?
The Orcas Island Library’s Internet and WiFi connections have not been effected. People who are still without access to the web may use one of the Library’s public access computers.
The Library’s phone lines are in the same operating condition as everyone else’s in town.
As difficult as this problem is–affecting businesses and individuals–thank you, OI Fire Department, Emergency officials, Orcas Issues, Orcas Chamber and ALL volunteers and officials who are working so hard to mitigate the problem with phones and internet and to keep us in the loop. Of note, is the quick response by emergency fire department volunteers and officials, opalco & others to resolve this issue.
Jennifer, the conference call was completed via an enterprising group of county employees, utilizing a combination of landline and cell phones and an attempt to arrange an online conference call. All phone lines are not currently down. That’s why you see the photo of Rick Hughes with a phone at each ear. Cell phone to Jamie Stephens in Seattle and landline to the Courthouse. Human ingenuity at its best.
Well, apparently County Councilman Rick Hughes does not use AT&T for his cellular advisor. Everyone I KNOW who does, including myself have not been able to use their cell phones since Tuesday morning as NO CALLS are being completed. I have asked multiple people including employee at the Orcas Island Opalco office who also has AT&T for her cellular provider and someone at Orcas Online….WHY would I not be able to complete calls with my AT&T cell phone and NO ONE has a clue what the connection to the failed fiber optic underwater cable would have to cellular customers of AT&T. Of course I can’t CALL AT&T to ask them. Does anyone out in the island universe know the techy answer to why everyone I know who does use AT&T are down and Verizon apparently isn’t affected. And please don’t slam AT&T because I love them usually. Just NOT at the moment!! ;-0)
Perhaps this is time to also drop a high speed internet cable to the islands?
Suzanne,
I am not a techie, but here’s what I’ve been told:
As I understand it, AT&T ( my provider as well), routes their calls from the tower and then off island via the fiber optic line using leased capacity from Centurytel.
Verizon does the same, but they maintain a redundant microwave transmission point that they can use as well. AT&T has not kept their transmission point, so they don’t have an active redundant system. In fact it seems that AT&T is the only service provider that lacks a back-up.
Thus, those of us with AT&T are in the abyss that is 1985 where we just walked around jealous of our friends who had cell phones!
On a brighter note, our home phone just rang with a call from off-island. It was, of course, a telemarketer that was the first call to come through!
Suzanne and Justin:
I’m a mile north of Doe Bay. My AT&T Cell, and my Rockisland email have each been working perfectly since this debacle commenced. Why me? Anyone wishing to use my Cell, grab some vino and come on out.
Thanks to Justin for making sense of the failed AT&T cellular service. I just tried calling 411 (a quick attempt and hang up before the operator came on) as a test to see if I have long distance ability. Yipppppeeeeee, I believe I do. I’ll try it out for sure tomorrow as I miss talking (phone) with a couple of friends. Of course I use internet for quick communication but prefer actually hearing their voice. My friends on the outside are pretty amazed that this happened and even more amazed that it went on for 5 days!! They realize we live on an island but when I moved here I tried to say stuff like…”Oh, don’t you worry, we are as connected as any of you”. Egg on my face for a few days for sure!! ;-0) I tried to send a text about 4 hours ago and it got hung up with a BIG red exclamation point to the right of my words. I tried about an hour ago to make a cell call and it was still totally dead air space! :0( At least my internet w/Centurylink has never failed during all of this! Thanks so much and MAJOR KUDOS TO OPALCO for their care and concern for all of us. I heard a sad thing earlier this evening at the Napa store on Orcas which was that unfortunately sometime this week a person was having either a heart attack or stroke and had Medic Alert but when they pushed the button for help…the signal didn’t go through. I was told that the person didn’t survive. So if I am not speaking out of turn, lets all say a prayer for the person to show we ARE a community who grieves when things like this fail.