But in all seriousness, for things like flooding, it could be a useful tool to get people to evacuate if required, rather than emergency services banging door to door.
TB! as I live right next to the river Spey. My insurance company insists that I join SEPA (Scottish Environmental Protection Agency) which I have done for many years now. (mind you it does no good if I am in Mallorca as I am at the moment).
It works well apart from losing my first Omega in 2008 in a flood when I was doing things in Libya.
So I get texts and updates as to the current situation at the time.
So if it works for us oop north I cannot see the the problem that people seem to be having with this!

Trouble with SMS is that it doesn't scale up without big delays, and also requires (only) residents to sign up, and remember to manage that membership when phones change etc.
Hence using the technology built into the later cellular standards to allow emergency broadcasts.
The technology is a good enough idea, but like everything else, if the governments abuse it, people will simply disable it... ...right up until the point the government mandate to the cellular providers that it cant be disabled....