July 2009 by Will Bullington
You Called 911 but They Can’t Find You
Its four o’clock in the morning and a 911 call goes out for a person needing help with excessive bleeding. The fire rescue and ambulance are dispatched to an address in Lake Shastina. The units drive onto the street looking for the address in the dark. Volunteer fire fighters and medical personnel using spotlights can’t find the address. Finally, someone sees a porch light come on and a door open. As everyone runs up to the home you can now see the house numbers next to the garage doors. A brown house with lighter tan house numbers, which match the trim. Looks nice in the day time but you can’t see them in low light.
Living in a community with no street lights, homes with earth tone paint colors, long driveways, and lots of trees, compounds the problem with finding addresses. The County requires the house numbers are posted prior to an occupancy permit being issued, and many cities have ordinances requiring house numbers be “visible” from the street. Drive past your own home some night and look and see if a stranger not knowing where the numbers are posted, could find your home. Now think about a loved one needing a rapid response by emergency services. You know a heart attack or someone trying to kick in your back door to rob your family. Think how much adrenaline is pumping through a emergency responders body driving fast with lights and sirens on. Compounding the issue is the fact our addresses are so long: 15118, etc. “What was that address again? Was that 1511? Was it 15119. All I can see is a white reflective sign on the side of the road for a neighbor: 15116. Should be next door, but there is no numbers on the house.” The clock is ticking and those first critical minutes in a heart attack are gone. The chances of survival are destroyed by an aesthetically pleasing color scheme for house numbers.
Mellow dramatic? Talk to your local police officers and ambulance crews. Happens ALL THE TIME. “We can’t help you if we can’t find you.” The local fire department is so motivated to fix this problem that they make the white signs with reflective letters on them. They cost $12.00 and they install them for free. Do they look as nice as an earth tone wood sign? No, but who cares, it might save you or someone you loves life. All you have to do is call 938-2226, leave a message and someone will call you back to order the sign. You can also find illuminated house numbers on line or at home improvement stores. Some run on batteries, solar or low voltage.
On a lighter note, get out there and enjoy the new park during the safety day event on August 1st, jump house, games, fire engines, helicopter, bicycle safety events, etc.
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