Dealing with emergencies was on the minds of councillors recently and emergency planning coordinator Linda Dickson told them about emergency plans and the development of mutual assistance agreements in the county.
Dickson presented two reports to council.
The first outlined the annual status of the town’s emergency management program; the second, focused on the mutual assistance agreement being developed by municipalities during emergencies.
Dickson said this is the third annual report presented to Minto councillors.
“We’re getting near to the end of 2009, and we’ve pretty much completed the requirements with the exception of the annual training exercise,” she said.
That exercise was set for on Oct. 27 in Harriston. It included a field training component with the Minto Fire Department.
She highlighted a few areas of the report for council members.
That included items required under the Emergency Management Act.
She drew attention to the training component.
Members of the control groups and support staff attended a training session with other Wellington County municipalities’ staff on April 15.
Presenters at the workshop included OPP media officer Mark Cloes; Suzanne Bernier, WSIB; Beverleigh Broughton, Salvation Army; Ken McBey, St. John Ambulance, of Fergus; Ryan Maeck, Red Cross; and Christel Hollinger, Perth CEMC.
She added that in September, a continuity of decision making seminar was held for councils and municipal staff.
At that time, the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing presented ideas and processes that could be implemented at the municipal level to ensure an efficient and effective community response, and the ensure that decision making authority is maintained.
In addition to the field exercise, Dickson noted the water operators will be undergoing a table-top exercise.
“It will be their first kick at the cat for this type of exercise.”
Dickson said public education is ongoing – including setups at local libraries.
“In light of our flood experience back in December,” Dickson said there was a debriefing session with the control group back in January. There were a number of recommendations that came from that.
“We’re still in discussion with the conservation authority over monitoring and the best way to proceed with that.”
Another recommendation, is the lobby for another monitoring gauge on the Maitland River, north of Harriston.
Dickson said there was a meeting with local volunteer agencies including Victim Services, Red Cross, St. John Ambulance, and the Salvation Army.
While those groups have a memorandum of understanding, she said in light of the flooding, they are going back to look at it again.
Another item is fine tuning the mapping for flooding zones in the urban centre of Harriston. That would allow various types of warnings in the community.
“That will enhance our flood response.”
She stressed public education and the importance of residents having a 72-hour kit and medical supplies ready to go if there is an evacuation.
Equally important is the need to have such kits for pets.
One suggestion in the report is to initiate the public education in the trailer park area since it is susceptible to the most frequent flooding.
“One of the things that we found, is that the Salvation Army is an agency we forget about – and they can bring some very valuable resources in terms of arrangements with pharmacies, or for getting glasses.”
Dickson said Harriston was “very fortunate” in that flood last December. Reports had called for a significant amount of rain to continue.
“Fortunately, it did not continue. But if we had gotten the predicted amount of rain they were calling for, it could very easily have gone into a regional flood event.”
It was a very good lesson, and learned well, she said.
Mutual assistance agreement
Dickson commented on the work to create mutual sssistance agreements in Wellington County. She explained those are to provide effective emergency prepatory and response measures.
To accomplish that, municipalities can enter mutual aid and assistance agreements with other municipalities. Those agreements are similar to existing mutual aid agreements used by fire departments.
She said the project began a few years ago, and this is not the first mutual aid agreement Minto has considered. She believes the townhad an agreement with North Perth as well.
Dickson said this new agreement would be with all the municipalities in Wellington County. Originally, the idea was considering an agreement between upper tier levels of Wellington, Dufferin, and Guelph only.
But as they began working on various scenarios such as floods and tornadoes, “We realized that with respect to property damage the assessment that the local building departments might have to do, it can be very time consuming to inspect the properties and deal with permits.”
What came about, she said, was the idea of a mutual assistance agreement to deal with building departments. She said the building officials came up with similar wording to use each other’s resources through this agreement.
There are specific aspects to deal with the Building Code, she said.
“Costs will have to borne by the municipality,” she said.
Dickson stressed that this would not supercede the mutual aid agreements between fire departments.
This is a formalized agreement to request assistance from various municipalities within Wellington County.
Mayor David Anderson noted that Minto is always ready to assist, but this would allow municipalities “to more readily be able to assist.”
Council later passed a resolution of support.
Dickson noted there are still a few municipalities to sign that agreement.
