Siskiyou County recently adopted a
new County Emergency Operations Plan (EOP) that is compliant with the National Incident
Management System (NIMS.) Companion versions have been made available to local cities for
their adoption. Special Districts are also encouraged to have emergency plans.
NIMS is a bottom-up system where local governments handle emergencies
according to their plan. If and when they find that they need additional resources, they
can call upon the County’s Emergency Response Team. The County may call on the
regional group and the state of California. The Governor may ask for assistance from the
President. The different city and county jurisdictions must have a NIMS compliant plan and
have NIMS trained personnel in order to be qualified for reimbursement of expenses
incurred during a disaster.
Under California Government Code 3100-3109, all public (city county
state or public district) employees have been declared to be disaster service workers
“subject to such disaster service activities as may be assigned to them by their
superiors or by law.” Siskiyou County has been offering regular training sessions for
employees in NIMS and the Incident Command System (ICS) and has conducted “table top”
exercises. (The public can take some of the same courses online at http://www.fema.gov/emergency/nims/nims_training.shtm
)
The County EOP establishes a four level emergency management system:
(1) policy/advisory group; (2) on-scene field response; (3) the Crisis Action Team; and
(4) the Emergency Operations Center (EOC) Emergency Response Team. The system will
coordinate: county-wide support of individual on-the-scene response; resources and mutual aid; and response efforts with
other local jurisdictions. The policy/
advisory group includes the Board of Supervisors and County Administrator who may meet to
ratify a declaration of emergency, or facilitate multi-jurisdictional coordination or
policies.
On-scene field response is the level where emergency response
personnel and resources (police, fire, ambulance, public health, the road department,)
respond to on-site emergency conditions under an Incident Commander and the ICS system.
(This is the same system used by the Fire Departments.) The Crisis Action Team includes
folks like the Sheriff, County Fire Warden, County Health Officer, Office of Emergency
Services, Public Works Director and County Administrator who get together to make
immediate response decisions for the first few hours of a major multi-site emergency like
a flood. The Crisis Action Team may also decide to activate the Emergency Operations Center.
This is a centralized center that has trained personnel to provide support functions such
as operations, planning logistics, and finance. (This was activated in the 2005 flood.)
The EOP includes job descriptions, checklists and forms to assist the
different positions in successfully carrying out their roles and responsibilities. These
also help to keep the flow of information circulated so that decisions about how and where
to allocate needed resources can be made most effectively.
Part of the cycle of emergency planning is to identify the types of
emergencies that can occur and to look at any preventive or mitigating actions that could
be taken to reduce the potential damage from such an event. Currently, a draft Hazardous
Mitigation Plan is available on the County’s website for public comment. http://www.co.siskiyou.ca.us/ A completed plan will give Siskiyou County
eligibility to apply for certain funds to take actions recommended in the plan.
Local neighborhoods can also organize to address emergencies by
forming fire safe councils http://www.firesafesiskiyou.org/ , Citizen Emergency Response
Teams and Neighborhood Watch http://www.citizencorps.gov/.
They can also form informal mutual assistance groups to handle events like being
snow-bound or flooded. Families should also have their own plans in place
http://www.ready.gov |
