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Twenty-six students completed CERT training; what will they do next?

 

Best practice: train, cross-train, review, practice, drill!

Vashon Community Emergency Response Team training opportunity

Best practice: engaging in ongoing, varied and specialized training programs makes participants even more resourceful for supporting their families and neighborhoods

According to Bill Steele, the public is woefully unprepared for a certain disaster: we just don’t know when. Mr. Steele is Seismology Lab Coordinator for the Pacific Northwest Seismograph Network (PNSN) at the University of Washington Department of Earth and Space Sciences where he has worked since 1993.

In a widely reported story (covered by USA Today and many other major papers across the country), the Longview Daily News reports...

VashonBePrepared uses Constant Contact to manage several confidential email lists. These currently have many hundreds of users on them. The lists are free, and a great way to get the latest, authoritative information during an emergency.

VashonBePrepared Emergency Alerts One list is for anyone who would like to receive emergency alerts by email. This is a great way to receive authoritative information directly from Vashon Island Fire & Rescue (VIFR) and/or VashonBePrepared during critical events affecting Vashon and Maury Island residents and businesses.

Periodic VashonBePrepared Newsletter I’m not sure that we have sent out very many of these in recent years but it is likely that we will start sending out seasonal newsletters to those who sign up for this list.

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The DHS recently released the FY 2012 guidance and application kits for seven grant programs that support the National Preparedness Goal. Grants total more than $1.3 billion, a reduction of nearly $1 billion from FY 2011 and $1.5 billion below the President Obama’s FY 2012 request. The DHS preparedness grants give priority this year to applicants in the nation’s highest-risk areas, including urban areas, with a focus on terrorism prevention. “Given the significant reduction in grant funding this year, we are maximizing limited grant dollars by setting clear priorities and focusing on the areas that face the greatest risk,” DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano said in a statement.

- Read full report at http://urgentcomm.com/policy_and_law/news/preparedness-grants-cut-20120229/

Not too surprisingly, disaster preparedness is not at the forefront of most Americans priority – but many don’t even have any plans. The original research was done by the Persuadable Research Corporation with reports of the survey released by PRWeb and the Homeland Security News Wire.

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Got a business on Vashon? Here’s what you need to know to avoid disruption after a fire, a storm, a pandemic, or an earthquake. It is courtesy of the Washington State’s Emergency Management Division’s Business Preparedness Website, that includes a ton of additional resources to help your business survive!

Step 1: Develop a Business Continuity Plan to ensure core functions and key personnel are identified and to ensure normal operations are resumed as quickly as possible.

Step 2: Promote...

According to the inspector general (IG) of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), state and local fusion centers and emergency operations centers could improve the response of their jurisdictions to terrorism and natural disasters if they talked to each other more often. Many fusion centers and EOCs surveyed do not exchange information.

While Washington State’s fusion center’s near-daily briefing tends toward being a fear based police blotter, extracting news...

VashonBePrepared has been working with the Debi Richards and the Vashon Chamber of Commerce and a large number of local businesses this fall to promote business disaster preparedness. A useful new national program has just been announced that promises to provide some great guidance for all of us. The big aim:

Identify your risk Make a mitigation project plan Implement techniques for ensuring and enhancing business resilience What a great new goal for Vashon businesses in 2012!

The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA)...

A car accident snapped off the power pole at Dockton and Pt. Robinson roads last night about 6 PM. Unfortunately the accident curiously snapped the pole up about 20 feet high and took out the island’s primary electrical power feed. While most of island only experienced a 10 second outage, about 500 PSE customers had a couple hour service interruption. 1200 Maury Island people didn’t have power (and Comcast service) fully restored until about 3:30 PM today.

During the event Rick Frye wrote the following note to the Vashon-Maury Island Radio Club’s email group, which I thought a great reflection on the event:

And while I don’t know anything about the particulars in this case, I do know that sometimes – especially when a pole breaks – a lower voltage line can come into contact with a higher voltage line and this will cause the lower voltage line to become hyper-energized leading to problems along that line that might wipe out a...

CBS recently listed a number of sobering facts about earthquake insurance that anyone from a scesmicly active area - like those of us from the Salish Sea would do well to be familiar with. Most know it isn’t included in standard homeowner’s policies, but even with it beware of the large number of restrictions in comparison to fire or other policies.

The topics covered are:

Deductibles Personal possessions Exclusions Loss of use Uncovered losses don't count toward the deductible Cost of coverage Who suffers catastrophic claims Mitigating risks Read the article at www.cbsnews.com/8301-505144_162-57319955/earthquake-insurance-8-things-you-need-to-know/

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Over the last year Debi Richards, the Vashon Chamber of Commerce’s Executive Director has been thinking about how to encourage businesses to get better...

The FEMA publication Are You Ready?: An In-depth Guide For Citizen Preparedness, is a 200-page comprehensive guide that walks the reader through a step-by-step approach to getting informed about local emergency plans, how to identify hazards that effect their local area, and how to develop and maintain an emergency communications plan and disaster supplies kit. Other topics covered include evacuation, emergency public shelters, animals in disaster, and information specific to people with disabilities. Are You Ready? also provides in-depth information on specific hazards including what to do before, during, and after each hazard type.

You can download English and Spanish preparedness guides or order them for free...

Up to forty percent of businesses affected by a natural or man-made major disaster never reopen

Washington, D.C., June 2, 2011 /PRNewswire/ — Up to 40% of businesses affected by a natural or man-made disaster never reopen, according to the Insurance Information Institute. In a nationwide effort to raise the business community’s awareness about how to prepare their businesses and employees...

An article published May 11, 2011 in Knowledge@Wharton, an online resource from the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton Business School, looks at the question "what motivates individuals to listen to warnings and act" using the virtual world as a laboratory.  Robert Meyer, a Wharton marketing professor who is co-director of the Risk Management and Decision Processes Center, developed an "interactive simulation to study such factors as news media reports, storm warnings and the level of concern expressed by friends and neighbors" motivate people to act before an impending disaster.

Excerpts from the article include:  "The group that was bombarded with news about very bad storms actually prepared less in the simulation that followed than the other group. 'You have a crowding out effect with disasters,' according to Meyer. 'As you have one after another, people care less about the next one.'"  "...the group that viewed a graphic showing the most likely path...