SEMINOLE COUNTY, Fla. – Seminole County emergency leaders are taking steps to ensure they have funding for a critical emergency management platform — one most residents have never heard of, but one that plays a vital role when disaster strikes.
The platform, called WebEOC, connects public safety, logistics, operations and field teams through live dashboards, alerts, and reporting. Emergency management teams across Florida rely on it to coordinate disaster response, from requesting generators, temporary dams and other critical infrastructure.
For years, the state has covered the cost of WebEOC for Florida’s counties through legislative appropriations. But this year, Seminole County leaders say they were left waiting until the final hour to learn whether that funding would continue.
The uncertainty prompted Emergency Manager Alan Harris to ask county commissioners this week to build the cost into Seminole County’s own budget in the future as a safeguard— a price tag of roughly $80,000 per year.
During the commission meeting, Chairman Andria Herr asked Harris to walk through what led to the decision.
“What was the decision-making tree on this? Was this legislative?” Herr asked.
“Yeah, this was part of the budget process when they went back to session to pass the budget,” Harris replied.
The good news: The state did include WebEOC funding for every county in Florida this year.
“Luckily, it made it into the back of the bill this year, which is really challenging for us because it’s such an essential system across the state of Florida,” said Steven Lerner.
Steven Lerner, division manager for Seminole County’s Office of Emergency Management, said WebEOC is essential not just during storms, but every day.
“We rely so heavily on this system, not just for emergency operations but day-to-day operations, that we can’t be without it,” Lerner said.
On Friday, the News 6 team visited Seminole County’s Emergency Operations Center to understand more about how WebEOC functions during a disaster — and why emergency managers across the state depend on it.
Lerner says the platform is used far beyond Seminole County.
“WebEOC has been an essential system that we use statewide, every county emergency management office,” he said. “The state uses WebEOC. Every university uses WebEOC.”
When a disaster strikes, the platform becomes the central hub for tracking and sharing critical information across agencies.
“It has all of the tools and all of the coordination opportunities that we need with all of our partners to come into play and make sure our residents have the resources they need,” Lerner said.
“Things like generators, critical infrastructure, security, shelter status — it’s all displayed on each agency’s WebEOC and allows us to share resources and share information during a disaster,” he said.
Shelter management is another key function, with field staff feeding real-time data into the system so leaders can make faster decisions.
“It manages all of our shelter operations capabilities so we know when a shelter is starting to see increased populations,” Lerner said. “So, all of our staff reports that from the field, all that gets cataloged into WebEOC. We can figure out if we need to open more shelters.”
The platform even tracks pre-storm preparations, including sandbag distribution across all seven municipalities in Seminole County.
WebEOC also allows the county to escalate needs directly to the state.
“We can request resources in our system for all the agencies — things like lift station generators, the generators for hospitals, things that we really need to continue operations,” Lerner said. “And then when we need something, we can push something up to the State Emergency Operations Center so that we know that that need is there.”
The system also keeps a formal record of key decisions and documents throughout an emergency.
“We produce important reports that are reviewed by state and local elected officials in the system — local states of emergency, all those essential documents that are put out during an emergency, we catalog all of that there,” he said.
And long after a storm passes, that documentation becomes the foundation for disaster reimbursement claims.
“It is really a historical record of the disaster when it comes time for reimbursement as well,” Lerner said. “So, it’s a huge tool that we use to paint the picture for financial reimbursement.”