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NATCHEZ — Unless someone takes the risk of climbing up a pole in the air to manually activate the county emergency sirens, there is no means of activating them during emergency weather events.

A siren test last week of the 18 sirens in Adams County found that none of them were able to operate remotely, said Tom McGehee, planning chief with Adams County Emergency Management Agency.

“In order to operate a siren manually, in most cases, you have to put a ladder up on a pole and climb up there to turn it on and see if it works. Which means we have a problem,” McGehee said.

McGehee added that the issue isn’t with the sirens themselves for the most part, but that they were not getting a radio signal for remote activation because the county’s radio system is outdated.

“There are other problems with other sirens, but the biggest problem is that they are not remote-control functional due to the radio system being out of date. … They’re functionally useless.”

Updating the radio system is estimated to cost $76,000 plus $8,000 for the labor to install it, he said. District 3 Supervisor Angela Hutchins noted there may be grant opportunities to update the county’s radio system.

District 1 Supervisor Wes Middleton said he feels working sirens are a necessary investment.

“There’s a trend to try to get away from (using sirens) and I’m not a fan of it,” Middleton said. “I think we need the sirens. I think there are kids out riding bikes or older gentlemen who might be out riding a tractor who may not get a phone call. We owe it to our citizens to do whatever we can to get these sirens.”

In the meantime, residents can stay updated on weather alerts and other county announcements by signing up for the county’s free Hyper-Reach phone alert system by calling 601-442-7021, by texting “alerts” to 601-308-8999 or by registering online by clicking here.