Neighbors Helping Neighbors Provide Support To Local CERT Program

The following was submitted to the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors.

Fairfax County CERT and the professional instructors are the best of the best and provide a world class program. There is no other program in the nation that provides such hands-on expertise with instructors with extensive background. Where else can you find a CERT instructor who responded to Katrina, Pentagon, or World Trade Center? Where else can you find a CERT instructor who is on the Urban Search and Rescue Team and deploys to worldwide disasters? Our citizens deserve the knowledge of these experts who live in our community. Many of us do not have the time to be volunteer fireman, but do have the time to take the CERT training and give back as volunteer instructors and outreach. What other CERT program has been on a National Food Show? Ourprogram has the CERT instructor who was featured to thank for that. Not only should you keep the MA2 position, in times when you need to cut other areas, Fairfax County should be considering expanding the program. Fairfax County CERT expanded the program this past year under the leadership of these three instructors who came up with CERT Basic, 2, 3. This gives more access to CERT program to people in other parts of the county and does not cost the county a dime. Please think again about cutting the CERT program. Losing our MA2 would be a deep loss to Fairfax County. Not only do you need to think about the position, but also the people behind it. The people who have made a difference in our lives.

Disaster Tourism? Meeting the needs of interested citizens?

The Common Ground Relief website, which was published in a Facebook group, brings light to the concept, Disaster Tourism.

"Isabelle Cossart was still evacuated in Baton Rouge when she got a call from the Army Corps of Engineers asking her to give some Japanese engineers a tour of Hurricane Katrina’s devastation.

That was October 2005 and she’s been giving hurricane tours ever since."

The complete Hurricane Tours article written by Jessica Grillanda discusses Disaster Tourism in more detail.

"Isabelle Cossart says many people have also gone on from her tours to join volunteer teams involved in rebuilding. But she says she looks forward to the day when she won’t be hosting the disaster tours anymore. “I’ll be so glad when I can go back to showing nice things,” says Cossart."

Other Volunteer Groups Across the National Prepare for Gustav - Other Model Programs

The following article was submitted to the CERT Yahoo group by Jerry Reimer and submitted to the Neighbors Helping Neighbors blog by Ric Skinner - "... Some models here for other CERTs to emulate."

Late Friday afternoon, this message went to all Harris County (TX) Citizen Corps members regarding possible CERT use for evacuation assistance.

Since it's inception in 2001, until recently, Mark Sloan was the Citizen Corps coordinator; now the county's emergency management coordinator. For his efforts sheltering Hurricane Katrina evacuees, he was named ABC News' "Person of the Week" for September 9 2005

Jerry Reimer
Harris County TX CERT

Subject: Harris County Citizen Corps: GUSTAV Update Date: Fri, 29 Aug2008

Harris County Citizen Corps Volunteers: If the storm begins to approach our portion of the Texas Gulf coast, we will need volunteers to support evacuation activities this weekend.

If this is necessary, you will receive an e-mail indicating times and location. Additionally, we will active the emergency / disaster button on the homepage of the website where volunteer information will be posted. Also please monitor the http://www.hcoem.org/ website for periodic updates on the storm.

Enjoy the long weekend and again thank you for making our region safer and better prepared!

Mark Sloan Coordinator
Harris County Office of Homeland Security & Emergency Management 713-755-4077 http://www.harriscountycitizencorps.com/

Harris County is located in Texas, within the Houston-SugarLand-Baytown metropolitan area. As of the 2000 U.S. Census, the county had a population of 3,400,578 (a 2007 estimate placed the population at 3,935,855), making it the most populous county in Texas and the third most populous county in the United States. Its county seat is Houston.