Building Community Resiliency and Preparedness

In the event of a major disaster, our town staff and public safety personnel will be inundated with emergency actions and calls for emergency assistance. Consequently, residents may have to take independent action to both prepare for emergencies and take actions to protect their families and possessions.

The First 72 Is On You !!

During most disasters, the first few days is the time that the Town staff and public safety responders will be nearly overwhelmed at the number of needs for their assistance. During this time, calls for assistance will be evaluated and the most urgent requests will be handled first. Many of the request will fall down on the list of priorities.

A well thought out individual and household plan will greatly minimize the impact of the disaster to a family. Ready.gov is an excellent resource that can get you on the way to better disaster preparedness.

But, besides what individuals can do to prepare and respond, there exists a wealth of resources within each geographic community area to help. Residents such as doctors, nurses, contractors and military veterans possess unique skills and resources that can greatly reduce the severity and impact of a disaster on a community. Building a Community Team is a way to identify and pool those resources.

The Community Emergency Response Team (CERT).

Portsmouth’s Emergency Management Agency is embarking on a program to organize and develop CERTS within Portsmouth. Assistance and training is available to help organize and manage a CERT for a geographic area of town. Several communities have embarked on CERT development and other communities can capitalize the their lessons learned in developing their own CERTs.

Want to build a community team?

More information on Community Teams that are being developed will be posted here soon that can be used as model programs for your community

If you want more information on a CERT program for your community, contact the Portsmouth Emergency Manager, Ray Perry, (rperry@portsmouthri.com, 401 643-0350)