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City staff outlines emergency-management plan phases, training needs and FEMA-related work
Summary
Fire and emergency staff reviewed the four phases of emergency management (preparedness, mitigation, response, recovery), said the city has contracted with county emergency management for a hazard-mitigation plan and urged expanded public education and training.
A city staff member and fire staff outlined the city's emergency-management priorities and said the council previously approved an interlocal agreement with Grays Harbor County to prepare the city's annex to a larger hazard-mitigation plan.
Mike (fire staff) told the committee that the hazard-mitigation plan and a comprehensive emergency management guide are roughly 600 pages each; the city has an annex in both and the interlocal agreement with the county to prepare the annex was said to be for about $40,000. "We talked about this about a year ago and you approved it," Mike said, describing the county-led work on the plan.
Mike described emergency management as four phases — "preparedness, mitigation, response, and recovery" — and urged the city to update its municipal code on emergency services (he said municipal code 2.72 and its corresponding ordinance date from about 40 years ago). He recommended using standard FEMA training to build capacity (IS-700, IS-800 and ICS 100/200 were named in the discussion) and said those certifications feed annual reporting the state consolidates for FEMA grant eligibility.
Council member Lisa asked about public education and whether the public should be expected to be self-reliant; Mike and other staff responded with outreach proposals including tabletop exercises, Map Your Neighborhood, the Great ShakeOut drill participation, town halls and distributing preparedness materials through water bills and local real-estate channels.
Staff also noted an operational space for an Emergency Operations Center in the fire department's large training room and said the city will coordinate with Grays Harbor County and Washington State Emergency Management (Washington EMD) to debrief and present guidance to the council and public. No new ordinance or formal policy change was adopted during the meeting; staff said they will bring updated ordinance language and annex documents back to council for consideration.
