City’s emergency notification system celebrates expansion

Notify NYC — the city’s free source for information about emergency events and crucial services — has expanded to offer notifications in 13 languages, as well as American Sign Language and audio formats, announced New York City Emergency Management Commissioner Joseph Esposito on Monday, May 2.

According to Esposito, in order to provide important information to even more New Yorkers, pre-scripted translations of Notify NYC messages are now available in Arabic, Bengali, Chinese, French, Haitian Creole, Italian, Korean, Polish, Russian, Spanish, Urdu and Yiddish.

“The best way to learn about emergencies – the city’s Notify NYC program – just got better with the ability to reach New Yorkers who speak languages other than English,” said Esposito. “In an emergency, getting up-to-date and accurate information to New Yorkers is critical. The new multilingual messages will help more New Yorkers to stay safe and informed.”

Notify NYC began as a pilot program in December, 2007 and, since its inception, has sent out more than 6,500 notifications about local emergencies. Today, more than 380,000 New Yorkers across the five boroughs are enrolled in Notify NYC.

Subscribers can receive alerts in seven ways: phone, email, SMS, fax, BlackBerry PIN, Instant Messenger, and Twitter.

For more information, or to enroll yourself, visit www.nyc.gov/notifynyc or call 311.

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