Sponsors (4)
The bill would provide targeted, potentially life-saving shark-attack alerts that improve local emergency notification, but risks degrading broader alert effectiveness and causing economic and implementation costs if used frequently or too broadly.
Beachgoers, coastal residents, and local officials would get fast, standardized Wireless Emergency Alerts about nearby shark attacks, enabling people to evacuate or avoid the water and improving emergency response coordination.
All residents who receive emergency alerts could become less responsive to future warnings if shark alerts are issued too frequently or contain false alarms, undermining overall public-safety alert effectiveness.
Beachfront businesses and local tourism could suffer lost customers, heightened anxiety, and economic disruption if alerts about rare shark incidents are issued broadly.
Implementing and managing a new localized shark-alert protocol could impose costs on the FCC, carriers, and ultimately taxpayers or related institutions to update systems and processes.
Based on analysis of 2 sections of legislative text.
Requires the Federal Communications Commission to issue an order within 180 days designating a shark attack as an event type that may trigger an "Alert Message" via the Wireless Emergency Alerts (WEA) system. Also formally establishes a short title for the Act. The change directs the FCC to update WEA policy so that authorized alerting authorities can transmit mobile alert messages about shark attacks, subject to FCC rules and technical requirements.
Introduced March 11, 2025 by Gary James Palmer · Last progress March 11, 2025