This is a quick review of the accomplishments of VashonBePrepared and her allied organizations over the past 12 months. This draft does not cover all the participating organizations or go into exhaustive detail, but still serves to highlight the many accomplishments of all the volunteers on Vashon-Maury Island working on disaster preparedness

VashonBePrepared

·        Initial Bylaws, Articles of Incorporation &Bylaws revision

·        Incorporation

·        501(c)(3) status as a public charity approved 12Apr 2008

·        Monthly Executive Committee Meetings

·        Periodic Board Meetings

·        2008 Budget & Work plan

·        VashonBePrepared.org web site

·        Constant Contact Member Newsletter

·        Grants solicitation and management

·        Invigorated & involved volunteers &raised $3,000 with Soc Hop Fundraiser for Voice Of Vashon TIS Radio Station

ARES & VMIRC

Vashon Maury Island Radio Club (VMIRC) and ARES accomplishments over the past year:

·        Successfully activated the EOC comm center and the backup VMIRC trailer for Sound Shake '08. Voice and E-mail messages were passed to King County EOC and the state EOC. Contact was also made with hospital control and many other locations.

·        Gave a radio class to the medical volunteers.

·        Tested digital (E-mail) communications successfully from all of the LACC's. The equipment to complete this has been identified but not purchased.

·        Participated in the radio communications for the Bill Burby fun run.

·        Managed the radio communications for the Heart of the Sound triathlon.

·        Ran a coordinated drill involving the State EOC at Camp Murray and the Vashon CERT team at Point Robinson.

·        Maintained weekly radio meetings on Sunday evenings with Vashon-Maury hams and the King County EOC radio network.

·        Had a successful Field day emergency exercise involving most of the Island community and open to the public last June.

·        Participated in the annual Lighthouse radio contest from Point Robinson using the VMIRC trailer.

CERT

·        Several 80 hour courses to involve & train new recruits

·        Revamped process to encourage REW certification& training

·        Monthly CERT Core Team refresher trainings

·        Quarterly CERT Team training sessions

·        Many additional meetings and function involving a wide team of volunteers

EOC

Overall

·        Planning underway for Oct 24, 2009 Drill

·        October all-Island drill -- I think unique in the state, especially for a predominately volunteer effort.

·        Sound Shake exercise -- first drill"connecting" with off Island agencies -- emphasis beyond first eight hours to long term disaster needs.

·        EOC procedure manuals generally all have the"big three" items...quick check list, detailed step-by-step, job descriptions.  Gaps have been identified(e.g., Administration, Logistics primarily)

·        Efforts nearly complete to improve public contact center (information desk, volunteer desk, Community Contact Team command post, bereavement center)

·        Voice of Vashon Standing By emergency broadcasting system on the air and funding complete for all-Island coverage

·        Began developing a standard training program for EOC Team (e.g., radio training, drill hours requirement, identifying NIMS courses, etc.)

·        Several activations (6/10/8, November 2006 &more)

·        Regular monthly meetings attended by over 20volunteers

Medical

·        Updating our volunteer list, using a three tier system, and enrolling members with the medical reserve corp.

·        Pediatric seminar in April.  Keeping our volunteers up to date on emergency medicine.

·        Radio training for medical volunteers.

·        Working with King County on Morgue system

Message Center

·        Helped with 1^st iteration of EOC Activation Kit, including initial Activation Plan revisions & some EOC closet upkeep

·        Rewired EOC phone and data lines to improve phone and network connections. Reorganized EOC Phone extensions and PBX names for the extensions; Obtained & distributed instructions for phone system toall bins

·        Helped develop and/or maintain EOC Message Form,EOC Layout, EOC Org Chart, Volunteer (Master) and Infrastructure lists, EOC Communications(Phone) list

·        Mobilized >5 messengers for Sound Shake, >15for October 2007 exercise. Participated in overall evaluation at local &regional level.

·        Several major revisions of our Operations Notebook: Activation Checklists v. 3, Position Descriptions, Inventories,Playbook (barely started), Org Chart, King County Communications document, EOCSatellite phones, VIFR Phone system, communication methods available during an emergency, Message Center Services & interface document

·        Helped PI team post messages to RPIN.org, even trained King County personnel on this!

·        Helped order & set up two laptops, two Brother printers

·        Several team meetings; ~6 team emails with content annually

Public Information

·        Team Training in writing news messages

·        2 way radio training

·        Updating procedures

·        Recruiting a leader for CCT and getting the group organized

·        Organizing and publicizing the Sock Hop

·        Stocking all the LACCs with initial quake advice messages to hand out to the public

·        Developed and drilled on use of standard template system for producing advice and conditions bulletins.

·        Only PI team in the region well enough organized to send news bulletins to RPIN during the drill

Utilities

The Utilities Team members have been active participants in the two drills at the EOC this past year and have had the following interactions with the major utilities on the island (PSE-electricity & gas, CenturyTel-phone system, and the major island water districts- primarily through Water District 19).  Specifically:

 

PSE

·        Meetings with PSE:  April 2008, August 2007and March 2007

·        Numerous emails during the past year

·        Discussions were held on the electrical and gas infrastructure and how to coordinate our emergency operation procedures with theirs.  We have gained valuable insight on how they react in an emergency(electrical or natural gas).  We have an excellent working relationship with PSE and very good communications with them as issues arise or if we need information.  We are on the PSE distribution list for email updates when they have a major power outage.

 

CenturyTel

·        Meeting with CenturyTel: August 2007

·        Occasional emails during the past year

·        Discussions were held on the wired phone infrastructure on the island and on coordinating our EOC activity with CenturyTel and the permanent team of people the company has on the island.  We have a good relationship with them and the ability to coordinate in the event of an emergency event.

 

Water Districts

·        Meeting with Water District 19 (Jeff Lakin):November 2007 & attendance at Vashon Water Purveyors Meetings

·        Occasional phone calls/email with people in other water districts

·        Water District 19 is providing coordinating activity for all major island water districts in the event of an emergency.  To help this process I prepared thoughts on EOC/water district interaction in January 2008 that was slightly revised in coordination with Jeff in March 2008.  Jeff will be using this in his activity to set up an emergency coordination process with the other major water districts.

NERO

·        Gradual increase in number of organized neighborhoods to near 100

·        Spreadsheet of NEROs maintained and geocoded

·        Participation in October 2007 Exercise

VEPC

·        Care & Shelter team meetings

·        Participation in October 2007 Exercise

VOV

·        Traveler Information Service conceived

·        1^st tower up & in operation

·        2^nd & 3^rd tower funded, North end tower sited & progress being made to find a south endsite

·        Active participation in the Soc Hop fundraiser

Vashon School District

·        Talks held regarding the new school design and how it might serve as a sheltering facility with better emergency power facilities

2008/2009 misc

·        Not so long after our formal formation: April12, 2007

·        Hank Lipe’s arrival/presence: a new day! Working more closely than ever with the commissioners, the staff, and VIFR is taking even a more proactive role!

·        Hank Lipe, Rick Wallace & Jane Hubbard’s Comprehensive Disaster Plan – harmonizing our homegrown efforts with national standards

·        N1H1 Flu response

·        Jan Milligan’s Recruiting Efforts &REW preparations

·        New Message Center Unit Leader: Kathleen Kury Farrell

·        New Public Health Branch Leader: Camille Staczek

·        Planning: John Moore

·        Policies (on Spokespeople, Financial &Real/Intellectual Property) drafted and proposed by ExCom for the Board

·        King County 2008 Grant:

·        Enhanced Financial Reports & Financially healthy despite state of the global economy

·        This will 5^th(?) year of Annual Work Plan/budget process

·        Thanks to King County& NACCHO

·        Sock Hop

·        Working toward Oct 24^th drill: The Blizzard of 2009

·        VoV 2^nd & 3^rdTransmitter towers in place

·        VoV regular coverage & stories

·        Team Building: All our groups are meeting relatively regularly – Social action - like tonight’s; Working relationships

·        EOC Team drill nights

·        PSE regular Updates & Coordination

·        Patricia McClements’ (of PSE) help in managing our Volunteer DB

·        COAD participation, Tacoma conference, WebEOC meeting, other regional meetings

·        Business cards

·        VashonBePrepared.org  updates; web editing guide

·        Over 2500 emails in past year – LOTS of communications– at all hours of the day and night!

 

Future Issues

·        Blizzard of 2009

·        More sophistication with volunteer recruiting and risk management (Blizzard exercise to aid in this)

·        Finance and Admin Section

·        Completion – and consequences of Comprehensive plan

·        Global Warming

·        Actions falling out of the Comprehensive Plan.

·        Enhanced internal communications – through technology

·        Serve as a guide for others around the region

·        Sustainment of VashonBePrepared (no stable financial funding source; keep community & volunteer interest up: without us “crying wolf”, or being seen as Chicken Little, Chicken Licken or HennyPenny and Foxy Loxy)

·        REW Process

·        VoV Transmitter synchro, blinky lights, wireless signal propagation