A weekend attempted armed robbery at this Williamstown business prompted a text alert from Williams College to its community, but the town has no equivalent system.

WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — A little more than an hour after Saturday night's attempted armed robbery on Cole Avenue, a text alert from Williams College warned members of its community, but the town does not have a reverse 911 system to alert townspeople about similar incidents.

On Sunday, Police Chief Kyle Johnson said the idea of instituting reverse 911 has been discussed in town in the past, and those discussions continue.

"It has come up, both with [former Town Manager Peter Fohlin] and now with Jason [Hoch]," Johnson wrote in an email replying to questions from iBerkshires.com. "We are discussing options with the college as we serve the same clientele and see no need to reinvent the wheel.

"We are confident that we can partner to provide one service to all without duplicating efforts and  messages."

Later in the week, Hoch confirmed that he is in discussions about implementing reverse 911 and is having conversations with the college about how the town can work with the school.

Reverse 911 is a system that allows authorities to send the equivalent of an email blast to telephone numbers in a targeted geographic area.

According to National Emergency Number Association, reverse 911 started to gain popularity in the 1990s.

"Emergency Telephone Notification Systems are fast becoming a necessary tool for public safety agencies nationwide," according to the NENA website. "Large metropolitan areas and communities of all sizes have installed these systems to provide essential emergency information to their citizens. The National Emergency Number Association believes acquisition and deployment of these emergency notification systems will only increase with today's homeland security and domestic protection concerns."

North Adams instituted a reverse-911 system around 2002, but that system was difficult to operate. The city updated to CodeRED in 2012, which allows for calls and texts to alert citizens in minutes, and costs several thousand dollars a year. It has been used for weather alerts, government announcements and road closings.

Johnson said there are several companies that provide reverse 911 services, and he is not sure what costs might be involved.

And he declined to speculate about whether the system would have come in handy during Saturday night's incident.

The Williamstown Police Department does have a Facebook page, and Johnson indicated that avenue could be used in the future to alert residents to situations.

"Social media is a very important tool and we hope to use it more as time goes on. Information will be provided in a timely manner on a case by case basis," Johnson said. " ‘Timely manner' is the best I can do for a procedure."

• Most Read

• Most Comments

• All News

• Events at Williams

• Photos