Fairfax County H1N1 Clinics Featured in CBS Evening News

On the day President Obama declared a National State of Emergency for H1N1, Fairfax County and the H1N1 Mass Clinics held at the Government Center are featured in the CBS Evening News report.

The following CBS Evening News Video and news story are available online.

The clinics were run by Fairfax County Health Department Employees and hundreds of volunteers from the Fairfax County Medical Reserve Corps.

Other Citizen Corps volunteer groups also participated, including Volunteers in Police Service (VIPS) and Auziliary Police Officers (APOs).

Attention All WMATA Metro Riders - Please Read

Be Metro Ready!

All of you have heard the news of the Metro incident in Washington DC. However, the last time you were on public transportation, did you take the time to review the emergency procedures?

Please take a few minutes to review the WMATA Emergency Preparedness tips.

http://www.wmata.com/getting_around/safety_security/emergency.cfm

Spending a few minutes now, RIGHT NOW. It might help save your life or the help you provide may save the lives of others around you.

Sad to say, it takes a tragedy, such as the one we just saw, to bring emergency preparedness back to the forefront.

Be Ready. Be Metro Ready!

Online Systems Getting Hit By Budget Cuts

According to http://az211online.blogspot.com/, "As part of the (Arizona) State’s effort to balance the 2009 budget, the Arizona 2-1-1 Program has been defunded."

This does not mean that emergency alerts are going away for this state, they will be maintained through a blog.

"Emergency Bulletins
The Arizona Division of Emergency Management is preserving the Emergency Bulletin System at http://arizonaEIN.blogspot.com/"


Things are a little different for health services where you will be referred to a non-profit agency.

"Health and Human Service Resources
The health and human service database is no longer accessible via az211.gov. There are a number of non-profit organizations in Arizona that provide Information and Referral services and may be able to assist you."

Looking for additional information at www.az211.gov, took us to the blogspot link listed above.

CDC Emergency Preparedness & Response Site

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has an Emergency Preparedness and Response website that "is intended to increase the nation's ability to prepare and respond to public health emergencies."

http://emergency.cdc.gov/

The latest website updates and announcements can be found at:

http://emergency.cdc.gov/whatsnew.asp

Death Of A President Caused By Inauguration Cold - A Look Back on Lessons Learned

As we look at the windchill factor in the Washington DC area this morning, it currently below zero.

We cannot stress enough, the impact weather can have on people. Even if you are dressed in layers, remember there are parts of your face that may be exposed for long periods of time.

Weather.com has compiled

25 things you didn't know about the Presidential Inauguration

The Clock Is Ticking - Is Your Employer Ready For Inauguration?

In the event of a situation during inauguration week or any major emergency, would your business be ready?

Be Informed.
Do you know what kind of emergencies might affect your company?

Do you know what you will do in an emergency situation?

Develop a Business Continuity Plan.
Do you know which staff, procedures and equipment are absolutely necessary to keep operating?

Do you have back-up plans for those operations?

Do you know what you will do if your building or plant is not accessible?

Do you know what you will do if your suppliers are impacted by a disaster?

Are you ready for utility disruptions?

Prepare your Emergency Plan.
Do you have an evacuation and shelter-in-place plan?
Do you have a plan to communicate with employees before, during and after an incident?

Do you have copies of building and site maps with utilities and emergency routes marked?

Are your employees trained for medical emergencies?

Practice the Emergency Plan.
Have you practiced your plan recently?
Do you practice and coordinate with other businesses in your building or industrial complex?

Have you reviewed your plans in the last 12 months?

Review Insurance Coverage.
Have you reviewed your insurance coverage recently to see if you’re covered in a disaster?

Secure Your Facility and Equipment.
Have you secured all the ways people, products and supplies get into your building?
Have you conducted a room-by-room walk through to determine what can be strapped down?

Improve Cyber Security.
Do you regularly install patches to your software? Have you installed a firewall on your computer?

Do you regularly update your antivirus software?

Promote Family and Individual Preparedness.
Do you encourage employees to have a personal emergency supply kit and a family communication plan?

If you answered "No" to any of these questions, visit http://www.ready.gov/business/index.html and learn how to better prepare your business.

ICE ICE Baby - In Case of Emergency

One way to improve readiness in your community is through local public service announcements (PSAs).

And have fun with them.

Landline, Cellphone, Email

A classroom parent mentioned they wanted to receive any important notices by email and not using the phone tree.

A phone tree? That is so 70’s.

However, it is important to remember that some people are still “stuck in the 70’s” using old technology. Not everyone advances at the same pace. Not everyone has a cell phone.

If this organization were to go to a unified alerting system, which is the current trend with technology, there is one small problem. This organization has problems with email and their internet provider almost on a weekly basis.

A further dependence on technology might not be the best immediate solution for them.

This brings up several major issues for the school, how do they handle emergency alerting? What happens if something happens to the building and all the records are inside? Can the parents be contacted?

But the real question, which came up as a result of all this, what is their emergency plan for the school? If such a plan were in place, then how to handle student emergency records would not be an issue. It would also be clearly documented the process for taking care of the students and where they might be relocated.

With all these questions that still remain, where do we start?

Understanding the processes that are in place, making sure that everyone knows them, looking at the legal requirements for an emergency plan at a school, and working with professionals to meet those requirements. Then, later in the process, leverage the technology to support those operational business requirements.

We will leave testing the process or conducting exercises for a discussion for another day.

Once you have all of this figured out, what about the company you work for?

Good Morning from Showcase Ontario - Downtown Toronto

Thank you everyone who attended the "Stop! We Have An Emergency! Lessons Learned from a Global Citizen" featured presentation this morning at Showcase Ontario.

Please send an email if you are interested in receiving a copy of the presentation.

Community Emergency Response Team (CERT), Incident Command System (ICS) and other material is also available.

We will also be in the exhibit area, in IBM Booth 701, this afternoon and tomorrow, if you would like to see a demonstration or talk more about the topic.

And remember when developing a system, are you including your citizens in the planning process? And do all of your systems integrate together? And if there was an emergency, would you know?

Also make sure to stop by the Emergency Management Ontario booth.

Showcase Ontario 2008 - Working Together

Why limit National Preparedness Month to the United States?

Sharing this message with neighboring countries,

You are welcome to join us at Showcase Ontario 2008,

The theme "Working Together - Working Smarter"

is key to effective emergency management and disaster preparedness.

On Tuesday, September 9, 2008, 10:00-11:30am,

we present a feature workshop,

"Stop! We Have An Emergency!

Our Citizens Want To Help! -

Lessons Learned from a Global Citizen"

Advanced Registration is required for this conference.

Sponsored in partnership with IBM Canada.

911 What's Your Emergency? Our People!

Like many mornings, we started our day with some time in the Central 911 Call Center.


Yesterday, in the afternoon, there was the opportunity to get to know the EMS, Search and Rescue, and Fire folks in their HOT quarters.

The fire chief explained when he hires new people, he looks for people with "heart". People who have a passion for doing this type of work. "Heart" is so apparent with everyone we have come
across here, volunteer or professional employee. And both work very well together.

As was mentioned in summary at one of my training sessions, a participant said, at the end of the day, it is about the people. That could not be more true!

It was great to spend time with the Central 911 team and get to know them.

The next time you are with your volunteers, please think about this... do you know ANYTHING about their families or their interests??? Or is that not important for YOU to get your job done? It is important for you to be honest with yourself.

And never forget to

Remember the PEOPLE!

What Goes In, Must Go Out

Another excellent bomb drill at a major trade building. This one though created some concern to those that received phone calls, as it appeared so real that people thought it was the real thing. It was just a DRILL! These folks really know how to conduct an exercise with multiple agencies and jurisdictions involved.

With all the vehicles and traffic in this downtown area, it got me thinking about the location of vehicle staging areas.



Notice the clear paths in the picture. Emergency vehicles can easily go in and out. The fire trucks have easy access to the building.

It is also important to take a look at the staging area and other traffic in the area.

Here are some things to consider when setting up a vehicle staging area, many of these items were a non-issue for this drill, but just things for others to consider.

• When arriving on the scene, it is important to determine the best way to leave. The concept of what goes in, must go out.
  


• Will vehicles need to cross paths/intersections in order to get to the exits points?
  


• If fire trucks are lined up next to ambulances, are the ambulances best positioned to transfer the patients from the medical area to transport?
  
  
  
• Could that area be set up in such a way that multiple ambulances could be lined up to load mulitple patients?
  


• If fire trucks are in the staging area, do they have easy access and a clear path to the building?
  


• Where is the incident command post setup in relation to all of this?
  


• And above all, if the building were to collapse, are all the vehicles, people, and responders far enough away that they will not be harmed?

As they often say, it is all about "Location, location, location"

Pictured above are some of the members we have been working with from the Urban Search and Rescue Team.

Another great exercise, job well done!

What? We should not call 911 in an emergency?

When you travel around the United States or to other parts of the world, did you ever think the emergency number might not be 911?

The following is a pretty thorough international resource for emergency telephone numbers.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergency_telephone_number

Should you call the local operator instead? That is not recommended. You should always know your local emergency telephone number.

So far away, yet so similar?

The "Neighbors Helping Neighbors" blog welcomes readers from the Philippines.

Davao City Disaster Coordinating Council (DCDCC) and Central 911.

As you can see from the following website,
http://www.usvirtualconsulatedavao.org.ph/features/features01.html
there are other parts of the world that have emergency response systems similar to the United States and Canada.

In the next few weeks, this blog will share best practices and lessons learned from this region.

Taking National Preparedness Month Across Borders - Showcase Ontario

http://www.showcaseontario.com/2008/

During National Preparedness Month, Andrew Levy, upon his return from the IBM Corporate Service Corps project, will go beyond United States borders again and share lessons learned and best practices from multiple countries.

As part of this years theme, "Working Together - Working Smarter", participants will leave this featured presentation with:

1. Increased knowledge of how to leverage citizen groups for emergency response.
2. Understand ways to reduce load on Government during an emergency.
3. Learn how to reduce redundancy in public and private emergency programmes.
4. Be able to increase citizen participation in emergency simulations.

Last month, Andrew spoke at the World Conference on Disaster Management in Toronto, Canada, where he was asked to return to speak to this audience.

Liability Insurance - Does Anyone Have The Same Answer?

While in Toronto and others places that I speak, the question often comes up from volunteers, "what about liability insurance?"

Could I lose my house if I am just using my training and trying to do the right thing?

For example, if you see an accident happen and pull over on the side of the road and use the skills that you learned from a training class, would you be covered by the agency that trained you?

A volunteer may hear they are covered under the "Good Samaritan Law". And more often than not, in this example, that is probably how you are covered.

* Note - It is important to note there are often specific regulations as it relates to traffic management.

You will see there is much discussion in the industry about this. For example, check out the description and comment on Wikipedia -> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Good_Samaritan_Law

Some additional questions to consider:

- What if a person is asked to volunteer in a booth at a fair providing awareness to the public, are they covered?

- If a person is trained to act in a disaster, but there is no formal deployment plan and they help their neighbor are they covered?

- What if you are trained by one agency but deployed by another or volunteer for multiple agencies?

- Are you covered when you are at a training exercise?

- What about when you drive to the meeting or activity, are you covered?

- etc.

Some jurisdictions require activation or a state of emergency to be declared at the state level for certain coverage and deployment to occur.

Have you ever asked these questions and found the person you volunteer for needed to research it? Have you ever asked multiple people and got different answers? If so, which answer really applies?

Bottom line, if you have any concerns about this, you might want to ask for the official document that specifically highlights the coverage. And if you find that for your type of volunteering that it is not covered, might you want to ask why? After all, are you not an extension of that agency?

And no matter what you hear, you might also consider a personal liability umbrella insurance policy. The following website provides some addition information -> http://personalinsure.about.com/cs/umbrella/a/aa110503a.htm

Again, keep in mind, this is just something to think about and not legal advice.

World Conference on Disaster Management in Toronto Canada

Stop! We Have an Emergency! Our Citizens Want to Help!
Presented by Andrew Levy

How will you handle all the different volunteer organizations in your community? Hear how technology used by volunteers can play a major role in planning, communication, response, recovery, and security. Learn techniques you can put to work immediately and also with questions that you probably did not think of.

Presentation available upon request.

Fairfax County Citizen Corps Chairman Posts Editorial to Washington Post Article

The comments can be found at: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/05/16/AR2008051603735_Comments.html

levy_andrew wrote:
Many of the programs and ideas that you mention as needed have been put in place in Fairfax County, Virginia. Preparedness goes well beyond CERT. What your article does not appear to mention is a key program - Citizen Corps. The Citizen Corps Council includes the Community Emergency Response Team (CERT), Medical Reserve Corps (MRC), Volunteers in Police Service (VIPS), Auxiliary Police Officers (APOs), Fire Corps, Neighborhood Watch, and affiliates such as Red Cross, Volunteer Fairfax, Amateur Radio, Chamber of Commerce/Business Organizations, Religious Organizations, Government Appointees, and many others. Our Citizen Corps Council also includes student programs where we have a student representative and work directly with the local public schools, Boy Scouts, etc.Your article mentions many things that are needed. While I agree steps need to be taken, there are programs and best practices available. Please take a look at our website at http://www.fairfaxcountycitizencorps.org/ and blog at http://citizencorps.blogspot.com/ Then, feel free to contact me at andrew.levy@fairfaxcounty.gov on ways to implement these programs in towns. Our program, along with others across the county, address the majority of the items you bring up in the article.


goupmarket wrote:
Mr. Levy raises a good point. There are agencies available to help us help ourselves and get better prepared to respond, if and when an emergency happens. The issue seems to be that few, if anyone, actually knows or cares that such resources exist.

Faith Communities In Action (FCIA) - Emergency Planning Reaching Out to the Interfaith Community

...

This newsletter is distributed to the faith community
throughout Fairfax County.

For additional information on FCIA, please visit:
http://www.fairfaxcounty.gov/dsm/cil/fciadefault.htm

Leap Day Emergency - Please Read

You may have made a New Years Resolution to be better prepared for an emergency in 2008. But, do you have that plan? Do you have an emergency preparedness kit?

HAVE YOU DONE NOTHING TO BE BETTER PREPARED???

Take this extra day of the year to follow a few simple steps.

The Fairfax County Office of Emergency Management and Citizen Corps Council suggests a simple four-step process for residents to prepare themselves, their communities and their businesses for naturally occuring or man-made emergencies.

Information on the process can be found at:
http://www.fairfaxcounty.gov/oem/

If you have already taken steps to be prepared, consider helping others in the community to do the same.

Also consider the many volunteer emergency preparedness and awareness volunteer opportunities through the Fairfax County Citizen Corps Council at: www.fairfaxcounty.gov/oem/citizencorps/

What are you waiting for? Click on the links above to start taking some action today.