The BEACON Story

In recent years the proliferation of new media platforms has created the unintended consequence of making it much more challenging for the government agencies charged with the health and safety of the American people to actually reach those in need with critically important information in a timely manner.

Building on a nationally-recognized and award-winning reputation around more than a decade of innovative and successful partnerships with emergency management, the University of Florida College of Journalism and Communications WUFT-FM/TV partnered with the Florida Division of Emergency Management in late 2023 to fund the development and deployment of a new public alerting concept that would provide a direct and unimpeded channel to distribute alerts to all citizens in the state.  Utilizing proven technology from industry leader Futuri Media and the highly resilient and existing broadcast transmission infrastructure this concept is designed to provide new and unfettered access to send alerts, warnings and notifications to the public from local, county, state and federal agencies.  BEACON is being developed and launched in the state of Florida through investment from the Florida Division of Emergency Management and will deploy in the third and fourth quarters of 2024 and 2025, with the initial beta site projected to go on the air at WUFT, Gainesville-Ocala, Florida in the initial months of the 2024 hurricane season.

The unique and powerful BEACON concept is driven through a partnership between local, county, state and federal public agencies who directly benefit by this new and direct concept, broadcasters who commit their powerful spectrum to the BEACON signal in their market 24/7/365 and the funding organizations that realize the need for and place importance on the safety of the American public.

“BEACON…Florida’s, and now America’s Alerting Channel”