What residents see. What the town sees. What gets recorded.
A short guided tour of CIVIC by GNOSIS — the resident phone app on one side, the coordinator dashboard on the other, and the town’s black box quietly writing it all down.
Part one
Two sides of one system.
Every household in town signs in on their own phone. The coordinator at the council office signs in to the dashboard. They see different things — but they share the same record.
Resident side
On every phone in town.
Built for the kitchen table, not the command centre. Big buttons, plain words, and it still opens with no signal.
CIVIC · Resident
Hello, Madeline
Paradise, NL
Wildfire alert · Standby
Active fire 8 km NW. Pack a bag.
01 · Check in
CIVIC · Resident
Our plan
Saved on this phone
Opens with zero bars.
02 · Household plan
CIVIC · Resident
A concern
Sent to the coordinator
Subject
Hydrant on Bayview is buried
Detail
Snow plough pile from February. Two metres deep. The crew would need a shovel before a hose.
Your name is attached on the town’s side. Other residents don’t see it.
03 · Raise a concern
CIVIC · Resident
My town
Paradise, NL
Households signed up
248
out of an estimated 1,420
Council adoption
Not yet adopted
Use this number to ask your council to formally adopt CIVIC.
04 · Is my town on board
CIVIC · Resident
Alert
From the coordinator
Britannia Road and the north-west cabins.
Leave now. Take Topsail Road south to the Lions Hall muster point. Avoid Highway 70.
2 minutes ago
Designed to also reach text and the landline once carrier integration is in place.
05 · An alert lands
CIVIC · Resident
Helping hand
Behind the scenes
You said you can help with
A truck · a spare bedroom · checking on the elderly
Quiet match
The town paired you with Mr. Pike, two doors down.
If an evacuation order comes, you’re the first one we ask to knock on his door.
06 · Quietly looking out
Town side
What the coordinator sees.
The mayor or town clerk signs in once with the coordinator code. From there, the dashboard shows the dots filling in, the concerns piling up, and what the town has actually decided.
Households
248
Checked in
189
Need help
4
Not yet checked in · 55
Each square is a household. The empty ones are where help goes first.
A · Dashboard
Hydrant on Bayview is buried
M. Walsh · 2 hours ago
Dry brush along the back of the school
C. Pike · yesterday
No reception in the cove past 6 pm
Anonymous · 2 days ago
Elderly neighbour with no family nearby
J. Mercer · 3 days ago
B · Concerns inbox
Wildfire · north ridge
Active fire 8 km NW. Standby issued for Britannia Road.
Opened 14:22 by Mayor Squires
Wind
SW · 25 km/h
Crews on scene
3 trucks
C · Open an incident
Channel
Message
Evacuation order. Britannia Road and the north-west cabins. Take Topsail Road south to Lions Hall. Avoid Highway 70.
When carrier integration is connected, every channel fires at once. Until then, the app channel is live and the record is written either way.
D · Alert composer
Part three
A draft plan, in five minutes.
The coordinator answers a handful of questions about the town — population, water source, fire hall, vulnerable households, exits. CIVIC drafts a starting plan: roles, muster points, who calls whom, when to escalate. The council edits it. The council approves it. It lives on every phone.
It’s a draft, not a decree. The town owns the final word.
Trigger
Fire detected within 10 km, or wind toward town above 20 km/h.
First call
Coordinator calls fire chief. Fire chief calls mayor. Mayor decides standby vs. order.
Muster point
Lions Hall, 12 Topsail Road. Backup: arena parking lot.
Vulnerable households
27 flagged. Each paired with a neighbour buddy. Coordinator confirms each pairing by phone.
Communication
App + SMS + voice call. Fallback: door-to-door by ward.
Part four
The town’s black box.
Every decision the town makes during an incident — the standby, the order, the warming centre, the road closure — is written down with the time, the person, and the reason. So next year’s fire learns from last year’s.
That’s the walkthrough. Ready for the real thing?
Sign in to the live app, or head back to the CIVIC page to register your household for fire season 2026.