I agree that EAS is a huge waste of money. For example, ZK operates into multiple cities in Kansas that are within 90 minutes DRIVING distance from each other.

Garden City to Dodge City: 52 miles
Garden City to Liberal: 68 miles

Lakes serves all three cities. Why not just serve GCK and make people from Dodge and Liberal drive there?

Or example two:

Manhattan (KS) to Salina: 68 miles
Hays to Salina: 98 miles (almost entirely on I-70, about a 90 minute drive)

Same deal, just fly into Salina and cut out the other two cities. There are suburbs in major metropolitan cities that are further away from their airport than this. There are countless other examples.

So I wouldn't say that EAS needs to go away completely, but the program could be easily reduced by 50% or more.