Emergency management commission's September meeting

Much of La Conner’s emergency management commission’s Sept. 3 meeting explored neighborhood mapping – the method for collecting vital information that emergency responders can access when called into residential areas to aid those impacted by flooding, fires, earthquakes or other threats. Neighbors break down barriers and foster increased communication to better prepare themselves to survive emergency situations.

Commission chair Jerry George led by example at a Sept. 7 meeting in his North Third Street neighborhood. (see Sept. 11 Weekly News, page 1).

Commissioner Jim White added that local CERT (Community Emergency Response Team) members have promoted neighborhood mapping.

White lamented that the commission’s Community Emergency Management Plan, to include a detailed list of disaster risk assessments, has plateaued.

“We’ve done a good job on this document,” George said. “We’ve just run into a hiccup.”

One impediment to completing the plan is that the commission is working short-handed.

“We have a vacancy on the commission,” said George. “There is one person interested in being appointed whose name has been referred to the mayor, but I would like to see multiple people showing interest.”

The commission was formed in 2023. Its primary mission was to put in place flood mitigation measures along the waterfront and in the town’s low-lying areas.

Commissioners are now addressing strategies that deal with other long-term disaster scenarios.