By Duane Barbati
Alamogordo Daily News
ALAMOGORDO, N.M. — The Local Emergency Planning Committee members met Wednesday to educate and solicit support and cooperation from local elected officials, government entities and agencies.
Otero County has two LEPCs working to coordinate plans in case of an emergency. The Otero County Local Emergency Planning Committee and Alamogordo Local Emergency Planning Committee each keep emergency resources available to help residents in the event of a flood, snow storm, flu epidemic or other emergency situations.
The ALEPC and OCLEPC both act as oversight committees for all hazardous emergency management to promote planning, training, education and professional development of members to enhance programs that promote the safety and health of the residents of Alamogordo, Tularosa, Cloudcroft, Holloman Air Force Base and all other residents of Otero County.
Otero County Emergency Services coordinator Paul Quairoli said he interacts with county volunteer fire and emergency medical service departments, hazardous materials-trained personnel and equipment, and communications equipment for an emergency incident.
“We have some training for the volunteer fire departments,” Quairoli said. “We make sure the VFD are ready for some exercises or emergency training. One of the disconnects that we had with the LEPC is not getting everyone involved. It was only a small core of people involved with the LEPC.”
He said he and the LEPC were not getting all the input really needed from the LEPC membership.
“It possibly sets up the emergency plan for failure,” Quairoli said. “We weren’t having a wide review of incidents by everyone. We’re definately encouraged by everyone being involved. The city (Alamogordo) has their own emergency plan available. We should be dovetailing those plans together. Actually, we have to do it under the state’s plan, too, which is supposed to mirror the federal plan. There is some interaction that we have to go through to make sure that they’re going to work together.”
Alamogordo Department of Public Safety director Sam Trujillo said ADPS handles emergency situations every day, but there will be events that will arise beyond resources.
“We have to plan for it,” Trujillo said. “It’s where the LEPC comes in. It’s a group of people that identifies the resources and capabilities in this community. LEPC identifies the likelihood of a disaster happening in this community.”
He said he understands the Emergency Operations Center is handling the disaster event.
“With the size of our community, it tends to be the Local Emergency Planning Committee members being the same people handling the Emergency Operations Center,” Trujillo said. “We have a group of people on the LEPC and a group of people handling that disaster based on those plans developed. We have to have our own planning committee inside Alamogordo for city resources. We’re basically a subsection of the Local Emergency Planning Committee.”
He said Alamogordo is trying to plan for disasters.
“If it’s a small event, then no one is called,” Trujillo said. “We’re handling it every day and not sounding alarms. In the case of the 2006 floods that we had, it was way beyond our capabilities that affected everyone’s organizations. We sounded alarms and made notifications.”
He said it’s important to connect with other agencies and put them together to know what the others are doing in case of a disaster.
“When those emergencies happen, we need to know where to get the resources to handle that event,” Trujillo said. “It’s got to be timely. We need to know who to contact and their capabilities to handle it. This gives us the link when an event gets beyond all our capabilities to go to the state level for additional resources and have them send additional resources. Everyone in LEPC has to be prepared within their own agency to make sure that information gets to the LEPC members and ensure everything works as efficiently as possible in a disaster.”
He said LEPC members need to continue communicating with each other and developing emergency plans.
“We need to keep the plans fluid to adjust with the times,” Trujillo said. “I think we will be much better positioned to handle those emergencies.”
Copyright 2010 Alamogordo Daily News, a MediaNews Group Newspaper