In a large-scale emergency, your next-door-neighbor — not a traditional emergency rescuer — could be the first responder recommending evacuation or administering CPR to the injured.
It’s part of a growing movement by Montgomery County’s Department of Homeland Security to recruit a fleet of civilian front-line assistants.
Under a program called Community Emergency Responder Training, the county is busily training volunteers in the community to play an integral part in providing aid during natural disasters, terrorist attacks and other emergency scenarios.
Eventually, the hope is that 100 to 150 safety advocates will be positioned in each of the county’s six major geographic territories, ready to help at a moment’s notice.
“The whole premise is to have first responders embedded in the community. That way, we’ll have people on site if by chance public safety cannot get right in there,” said Battalion Chief Brian Geraci, a liaison between the Montgomery County Fire and Rescue Department and Homeland Security. “[In an emergency], you need a lot of manpower. And this frees up police and fire to do public safety and take care of the 911 calls.”
Besides notifying residents to get out of their homes and away from danger, the volunteers also are trained to fight small fires, assess and prioritize patients, do light search and rescue, and have a basic awareness of hazardous materials.
Geraci said during the three-week training sessions, participants receive a start-up kit complete with a hard hat, vests, goggles, a utility shut-off tool and work gloves. They’re also added to a text messaging alert line that will notify them when their help is needed. And volunteers are asked to return for monthly follow-up training as well as to keep adding to their supply kits and to stay involved in their communities.
“They basically serve as our goodwill ambassadors,” the battalion chief said.
The CERT program started in Los Angeles 20 years ago so that emergency personnel could ready average citizens to assist after earthquakes.
Geraci said after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, local governments around the country looked to programs in which regular people could help.
Montgomery County got on board two and a half years ago. So far, close to 100 county residents have become CERT-certified.
Geraci’s department wants to raise that number considerably, particularly in the currently underrepresented east-county and down-county areas.
