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PR-03/17/2008: Community Emergency Response Teams Rise to the Challenge

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE March 17, 2008 San Mateo County Health Department Contact: Beverly Thames, (650) 573-3935 COMMUNITY EMERGENCY RESPONSE TEAMS RISE TO THE CHALLENGE IN SAN MATEO COUNTY'S SILVER DRAGON II DRILL Foster City and San Mateo Volunteers Deliver Information to 3,000 Households in Under Three Hours SAN MATEO, Calif. -- On March 13, 2008, from 9 a.m. to noon, 45 Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) volunteers from San Mateo and Foster City delivered earthquake preparedness brochures to approximately 3,000 households in selected neighborhoods along the borders of the two cities. One objective for the drill was to deliver a product at a rate of 323 times per hour using a "push distribution method" - that is, door-to-door delivery. The teams easily achieved that goal. In the event of a real medical emergency, the distribution could be medication instead of informational brochures. A command post was established in each city - Los Prados Park in San Mateo and Boothbay Park in Foster City. From there three-person teams dressed in iridescent yellow vests trekked into their respective neighborhoods packing stacks of door hangers. The CERTs practiced radio communications with their command posts as they made their rounds. "Just the logistics to know where the teams were at all times was great," said Robert Cook, San Mateo Fire Department. "It exceeded my expectations." The Health Department and Foster City conducted a similar exercise in January 2007. Dubbed Silver Dragon I, the exercise was limited to one neighborhood and approximately 1,300 households. To add an additional element of reality to this year's drill, the exercise planners included the City of San Mateo and identified houses that presented realistic, simulated communications and decision-making challenges to the team members. Some excitement was created in Foster City when the exercise scenario called for a CERT to pretend to lose communication with the command post and become lost. After some initial confusion and crossed communications, the command post reestablished communication with the team and they completed their mission. "The CERT Teams were given many challenges during the course of the day" said Lee Bach, Foster City CERT Coordinator. "Every challenge was an opportunity to learn and better prepare for a real disaster." After some delay, the Health Department's Departmental Operations Center established a satellite link with the County Office of Emergency Services communication van positioned in Los Prados Park. The camera onboard the van gave the Incident Commander, Environmental Health Director Dean Peterson, a visual of the San Mateo command post. The San Mateo County drill was funded by federal grants for pandemic flu preparedness and the Cities Readiness Initiative. The Health Department plans to make this an annual exercise and to add more cities each year. "I'm very impressed at what the Foster City and San Mateo communities were able to accomplish during this exercise of our "push" strategy. This provides strong evidence of the growing strength of CERTs to help emergency service providers protect their communities from either natural or manmade disasters. I am grateful that our cities and county have put emphasis on this model of citizen preparedness. Other cities need to redouble their efforts in recruiting and training CERTs and need to be prepared to implement the "push" strategy," said Dr. Scott Morrow, San Mateo County Health Officer. In the event of a flu pandemic or a biological attack, there is a possibility that medications and/or vaccines may be distributed on a mass scale. Local health departments are prepared to work with other local, state and federal officials to deliver medications from local supplies and the Strategic National Stockpile to those who may have been exposed to the disease. CERTs and other volunteers will be essential to the success of the response in San Mateo County. "The cities of Foster City and San Mateo would like to thank all the volunteers who participated in this drill," commented San Mateo Fire Chief Dan Belville. "Exercises such as this demonstrate the critical role community residents may be called upon to perform in an emergency and the importance of neighborhood preparedness. I encourage residents in both our communities to learn more about how they can become trained to be CERT volunteers." ### Strategic National Stockpile (SNS) http://www.bt.cdc.gov/stockpile/index.asp Community Emergency Response Teams (CERTs) San Mateo County CERT Training Calendar http://www.smcready.org/Community/Training.html  City of Foster City Contact: Fire Department (650) 286-3350, fire@fostercity.org http://www.fostercitycert.org City of San Mateo Contact: Fire Department (650) 522-7960, rcook@cityofsanmateo.org http://www.sanmateocert.org San Mateo County's Community Alert System, SMC Alert, http://www.smcalert.info/ Sign up for free to send emergency alerts, notifications and updates to your cell phone, pager, PDA and/or e-mail account.