As part of an initiative through the University of Oregon Safety and Risk Security department, UO’s emergency alert system will be going through multiple changes in the coming months. 

The changes will include updated security words and the removal of about a dozen emergency phone towers on and near campus.

UO Alert System

In an effort to adopt a more universal and clear way of giving action instructions in the case of an emergency, the SRS has decided to revise some of the language, according to Krista Dillon, chief of staff and senior director of operations for SRS. 

“It’s not a huge change. It’s just that you’re going to see some standardized language come out,” Dillon said. 

According to Dillon, in the past, there has been some confusion surrounding the language used in emergency alerts. This confusion then results in the following safety actions to not be taken accordingly. 

Emergency situations often require immediate response, and the SRS acknowledged that by previously having unclear language, it is “difficult” for students to respond appropriately.  

UO Spokesperson Eric Howald said a standard vocabulary is necessary to avoid future confusion. 

“We (the SRS) are developing a standard vocabulary that will be used in the alerts to convey the actions (that need to be taken). We need a common vocabulary to avoid confusion,” Howald said.

According to Dillon, the SRS worked closely with UO Police Department Chief of Police Jason Wade, who is the original author of the new language. 

Wade said their team spoke with community members and even deans of other schools about this standardized language that will be adopted into the UO alert system. 

 “We started talking to campus partners, business managers, building managers, deans of different schools… So that wasn’t just, ‘Oh, this is what I think is best; it’s getting buy-in from others on what’s the best thing,’” Wade said. 

According to Dillon, the SRS team also derived methods from the “I Love U Guys Foundation” which focuses on training programs for standardized protocols in emergency situations and from other peer universities in the Big 10 network. 

Additionally, Dillon said that the SRS considered feedback from the Associated Students of the University of Oregon until they tentatively landed on six key phrases that will be adopted into the UO alert messaging:

• Be aware – Become/stay alert of your surroundings 
• Evacuate – If you’re in a building, you need to go outside
• Shelter – If you’re outside, you need to go inside
• Avoid (the area) – Something is going on in the area and either it’s unsafe for people to be around, or officials need to respond and need people to stay away from that space
• Run/Fight/Hide – (for active threat situations) Each person’s response will depend on their scenario
• Lockdown – (mostly used in an active threat situation) find a secure location to remain in until the threat has been diffused

UO Emergency Phone Towers

The SRS and UOPD plan to remove about two dozen emergency towers “probably by summer of 2026,” Dillon said, due to maintenance costs and lack of use. 

These emergency phone towers offer 24/7 access to emergency services dispatched to UOPD. 

According to Dillon, the towers have been on campus for nearly 30 years.  

Dillon also said there were initially 63 of these emergency towers across campus until the summer of 2024 when the SRS took out about a dozen, bringing that number down to 53. 

Now, because many of the towers are “dying,” the SRS will be cutting the total amount down to 28 “in key locations.”

“We (SRS) are starting to see those older phones kind of come to the end of their lives, and unfortunately, there was never any maintenance budget (for them),” Dillon said. “The worst thing that we could do is have one (emergency tower) out that doesn’t work, right?”

She explained that when these emergency towers were initially installed, “people didn’t have cell phones with them” and the towers were the only option in terms of access to emergency services.

“Flash forward, 25 years. Now, most of us, right, have our cell phones with us all of the time,” Dillon said. 

Wade said that oftentimes these towers are misused, or that sometimes, “someone pushes the button to see what it does, or someone’s, you know, having a little fun at our expense.” 

Since July 18, 2024, the UOPD’s Computer Aided Dispatch system recorded 238 “accidental” emergency phone activations – “persons trying to make a regular phone call,” and 23 “misuse” activations involving “persons activating (phones) as pranks or known to not need help.” 

“Anecdotally, I’ve been on campus for about 10 and a half, 11 years. I know of only one activation in that time frame that actually resulted in a life-saving incident, and that one specifically wasn’t even on campus,” Wade said. 

The SRS is working diligently with ASUO to formulate an outreach campaign for the changes to both the alert system and the emergency tower reductions.  

“The next step for us is to do an outreach campaign in which we are engaging ASUO to help us make sure everyone understands the language and… know(s) about this (emergency tower removal), because they’re used to seeing them, and we don’t want people to be surprised if they start to go away,”  Dillon said.