Sonoma County Emergency Services

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the nineties with your host Rich McGlinchey, How you doing everybody welcome to another edition of Sonoma County in the 90s, we're gonna be talking about emergency services and what to do in the event of an emergency, going to be talking to Dan Nicholas who has been

our emergency services coordinator for about the last six years formerly was in San Francisco knows his business is going to tell us more about what's going on in the emergency services division. And also I'm sure he'll touch on some of the things that we all need

to do because we can't tell you when, we can only tell you there will be another earthquake in our area. Maybe in our lifetime, maybe tomorrow we don't know, but it's something we all should know and dan Nicholas, it's really nice to have you back here.

It's been a while, it has been a while and how's it going with you. Uh, well, we've survived the turmoil of the county's budget problems. Uh, not entirely, but at least we're still in business, still trying all right dan. We're gonna have a lot of questions

to ask you about the uh emergency services division and what all you do. But ladies and gentlemen, before we do that, we like to call your attention to the artwork on the walls today. And our two water colors are by Nina J bonus. Now, Nina was

a planner with the Sonoma County government. She has become an artist and is a marvelous water colorado. She has had showings all over the county. This painting is a mechanical beach. Uh, and that's near fort Bragg. And then the other painting that she has here with

us is of the Vienna vista vineyards in Sonoma, The city of Sonoma. She's a marvelous artist than a marvelous job. And if you're interested uh, to knowing more about her paintings, you're welcome to call Nina at 52515 to 1. That's 52515 to 1. And Nina will

answer any questions you might have. Nina. We thank you once again for these lovely water colors, aren't you? Beautiful, really does a great job. Well, Let's see what was the first thing I had. Oh yeah, I remember. Um, I understand the border supervisors declared the week

December 6-12 as a winter storm preparing this week. Now, what was the purpose of that proclamation. Well, actually it's an awareness uh to try to make people aware of the fact that we are back in our normal weather cycle and we are having winters again, we

used to do this all the time, but during our five or six year drought, we we we didn't do it for one or two years because we didn't really have winter storms. We're back in the cycle again and it's, it's, I think it's important that people

understand that even though we're living in beautiful northern California, we do have weather problems. It is because if I know for years this was part of the, your tasks over there and then the drought came along and there wasn't any storm warnings one year about three

years ago, we declared an emergency for a drought in the freeze in the same week from one side to the other, dan. Do you think this winter is likely to be a repeat of last winter as farmers as let's say, storms and the flooding? We had

experienced all the evidence points to that. I went to a briefing with the National Weather Service about a month ago and uh their contention is that it's probably going to be as wet or possibly wetter this year because El Nino is still around the temperatures in

the ocean are fluctuating. We probably could look forward to a repeat of last year uh or maybe something worse, which means that we're going to have local flooding and mudslides and problems like that. Well, last year, I know we went from from four or five or

six years, whatever it was of really little or no rainfall to a rather healthy, uh better than normal year last year, right, we go to another one this year, uh will be better off, that's for sure. But then one thing I noticed in the paper a

few weeks ago, uh Wilson's governor, Wilson staff were talking about the fact that even if we get wet winters this winter next winter next few, that California is liable to be in a problem for, for water by 2020 anyway, because there's so many people and we

use so much more, but that's statewide, Sonoma County, of course we're in a little better condition than most of our reservoirs are fulfilled. And, and uh we're in much better condition, but statewide he's absolutely right uh, should be a way of life for sure. Exactly. Um

What as a result of last winter, what steps has the county taken to prepare for the eventuality of, of more winter storms this year? Well, in addition to local flooding and by that, I mean streets that wash away or streets that washout, we have, of course

the Russian river and Granville and traditionally, whenever we have too much rain in the Russian river, Grenville gets some flooding as it did last year. Now, luckily last year on the very day that the river flooded law enforcement and fire officials have gathered at Farmersville fire

station to discuss what they would do an eventuality of a flood. I say luckily because they were already there and in place and what they did was they just transformed the firehouse into an an emergency operations center. And uh and operated from there, we of course

activated the emergency operations center in santa rosa County E. O. C. And were in contact with them. Well, it worked so well. The concept of having a forward command post if you will, that we decided we'd make it a permanent uh part of our planning. And

we are in fact now transforming the forest ville fire station into uh an emergency operation center. Considering the fact that we're probably going to have another repeat of last year in Greenville. So this time everything will be in place and we'll be ready. We'll be we'll

be more uh more able to respond or respond quicker because of that fact. What should the average citizen be doing to prepare for storms and flooding this year? Well, there are 22 different classes of people, those that live in areas that traditionally flood and those that

don't. And of course they should be doing similar things. But if you're in an area that has flooded before, you're you're planning should be, it's gonna flood again. And you should be doing those things that are are are necessary in the event of an evacuation and

that is having yourself an evacuation kit and evacuation route, keeping your car's ready to go, keeping yourself well informed, listening to the radio and tv and uh and knowing where the shelters are going to be or where you're going to go if you decide not to

go to a shelter and making sure that your home is already have a plan. In other words right? Those of us that don't live in traditionally flooded areas or areas that flood should be ready for things like roads, stoppages, uh local flooding on roads maybe not

being able to get home from your place of work that evening or or or being late very late. And those are the kinds of plans that you should be making for your family, your Children and uh and your friends or your pets if you're not gonna

make it home that night, someone should be right. So we are all affected by storms one way or another. Electric outages, things like that. But of course the people whose area whose homes traditionally flood are the ones that are most affected. I know the answer to

this next question but maybe the public has forgotten it. How can your office help county residents prepare for these things? Well we can provide them with the information that they need uh to do all the things that we just discussed in your last question. There are

certain steps they can take and there are tips that we have, we have pamphlets and brochures and and we can even discuss it with them on the telephone if they like to give us a call and uh give them the information they need to prepare themselves

for those eventualities. Yeah. Your office actually is in um in possession of all the information basically that we know of that would assist people to deal with any of these emergencies. Right? Because then I have worked with you and I've had the pleasure of working with

dan over the years from the public information standpoint when we did have emergencies and I know what a good job he does over there. But I also know how important the offices to the people you out there. So when they give the number later on be

sure to drop this down. You may want to contact these people although they really don't need a whole lot more phone calls when there's an emergency, especially when there's an emergency. That's why we ask people to get prepared now so that we can do our job

and not have to worry about bogging the phone exactly. Um how would how would all this affect county readiness very greatly. The more people are prepared on an individual basis. The less they have to depend on very limited and finite government resources. This is not just

for the county but also for the cities within the county who have to respond. Uh and and it just is better for everyone including yourself to be as prepared as you can to be able to take care of yourself and not have to depend on assistance.

That may not get there for a while. You know, you've said this before and you're saying it again now today that Disaster preparedness is ultimately an individual responsibility. We've all got to be prepared to take care of ourselves for about 72 hours. Now. How does the

government or how does it tie into your government efforts? Again, it ties in with our efforts in the fact that we have uh finite resources and we can respond to the most serious, the most in need without the nagging worry and that nagging uh conviction that

there are other people out there that need us only because they haven't prepared themselves and may not be medically or physically impaired or physically uh damaged but have a need for comfort items. And those are the things that we can't deal with in an emergency. We

have to deal with those who are physically or or or or otherwise in need of assistance. Um We hear a lot more about earthquake predictions than than uh well in the recent past. And we used to, that's for sure. Do we have more information about the

earthquakes threat to Sonoma County now than we had much more, much more since. We do have more. Yes, very little has been known about the Rodgers Creek fault. You know, the Rodgers Creek fault is a fault. That is probably the north, the northern extension of the

Hayward fault runs right through our county parallels highway one oh one goes through or under most of our cities. Uh Very little has been known about it. But since 1989 the USgs, the US Geological Survey has decided to start trenching the fault. And by trenching the

fault, they can give us some information that we never knew before. For example, we know most of what there is to know about the san Andreas fault. We know that it moves at a seven or higher Richter number every 75 250 years. We're in that window

right now. We don't have that knowledge of the or we didn't have that knowledge of the Rodgers Creek fault. Well, we're starting to develop that now. And what we're finding out is pretty startling. Excuse me. For example, we know that the Rodgers Creek fault from Sonoma

Mountain to the bay is probably locked up and has been locked up for at least 100 and 85 years, meaning that there's been very little movement now in late 1992 and early, I'm sorry, late 1993 there has been some some very startling movement on the southern

portion of the Rodgers Creek fault and that's getting the attention of not only the scientists and geologists, but the residents of Sonoma County. So what we've got here is we've got a double whammy. We've got the Rodgers Creek fault which has the potential of great movement

and of course the san Andreas fault, which uh which we have the historical perspective of 1906 where santa rosa was probably the most destroyed city by an earthquake in U. S. History comparison. One question before we pause the new information on the Rodgers Creek fault, will

that change our preparation? Won't change it, But it will certainly make it more imperative that we continue to increase it and increase it. Exactly. Because that fault is 185 years. It's been fairly in one portion of it has not has has had very little activity and

it's just spoiling for a little shift, isn't it? That's the content of what we know in the past. We don't mean to frighten anybody but knowing what we know in the past. When the fault has been known for being interactive that long, You just have to

face back. Anything can happen at any time and did recently to some degree. Well, we have some information about the 1969 quake that originally was thought to have occurred in santa rosa on the Rodgers Creek fault. Well, with all of the attention that's being given to

it now, one geologist has the feeling that it may not have been the Rodgers Creek fault, but may have been the Bennett Valley fault, which is a few miles to the east. The reason the reason they they they've come to that conclusion is that the type

of damage that was done, which was broken mains and broken pipes and, and pavement and roads had more to do with ground shaking that went with fault rupture. So as you can see, we're changing our conception of what, what may have happened or what can happen

based on knowledge. And that's of course most important when you know the threat, you can better prepare for it. Got a lot more questions to ask you ladies and gentlemen, first this important message and then dan Nicholas and I will come back. We'll talk more about

preparation for emergencies. That could be earthquakes, floods, fires. We learn more about what we should do in case this happens and what we should do in advance of this happening first. This important message because disaster strikes someone every single day, there's always going to be one

more night someone needs food shelter and a place to rest. Please support the american red cross because without your help, one more night could be hard to come by boy, I really did it last night. Got drunk acting stupid, went home with with who is that?

What am I stupid? How did I do this? Barry began to worry really worried. What about then he remembered, hey, I'm just a cartoon. I don't even have to shower, get high, get stupid, get AIDS. Welcome back to this edition of Sonoma County in the 90s

we're talking about emergency services and what you should do in the event of emergencies. Now we're talking about earthquakes, talking about floods, fires, uh probably any number of other things I know, gas bills and that sort of thing. We're talking to Dan Nicholas, the coordinator for

emergency services for Sonoma County and we've talked about a number of things so far, including wet winter and the possibility of another one this year. But then when we're talking about emergencies of this nature, what types of structures are the most dangerous if you're talking about

ground movement, unreinforced masonry or brick and cinder block type buildings that have not been reinforced. The tilt up buildings that are built prior to oh say 19 in the late 19 seventies and you see some of those uh in the form of warehouses or even retail

stores in some places. Uh those are probably, and and of course any building has not been reinforced uh to maintain its integrity are probably the most dangerous buildings to be in. The structures in Sonoma County in general. This is an aside from trust and I jotted

down here, what would you say is the condition of most structures in Sonoma County? Most structures in Sonoma County are probably uh more lean more towards the safe than the unsafe santa rosa for example, has very stringent building codes because of 1906 and 1969 of course.

So most of the buildings in santa rosa conformed to quite rigid standards. The rest of the buildings in the county are probably the kind that are probably most safest which are would one or two story one or two family dwellings and they're very resilient and of

course can take a lot of ground movement. Again though we've got to remember that those buildings even so are better able to withstand forces when the integrity is maintained and that is that the walls of the building are bolted to or attached to the foundation and

the roof is attached to the walls which makes it a rigid structure. Most people think that just constructing a box that way will will perform that task but that's not the case. You should get down inside where your where your walls and your your foundation meet

and see if they are bolted together. Uh Some houses are not, if you remember pictures from Kalinga and santa cruz and humboldt County, you'll remember seeing pictures of structures that just slid right off of the, of the foundation or roofs that slid right off of the

building. That's because they weren't constructed properly and didn't have the bolting and all of the sheer walls and all the rest of those things. Now it's very hard to describe how to do that. But I do again have pamphlets and booklets and even a tv tape

that I could let groups of people borrow and of course the pamphlets are there for the asking that show you exactly how to inspect your home and how to in fact reinforce it. If it isn't already reinforced, it's not a hard thing to do. Uh the

average do it yourselfer could do it and for those people that don't have the skill or don't feel comfortable, there are probably companies out there that would do it for them. You're touching on this in a sense of the word but specifically say which are considered

safest of all. Again, the the wood frame uh reinforced structure is probably the safest structure to be in when when the ground moves, okay. Um now this is what we're talking about, Ladies and gentlemen earlier, some of the things we want you to be very attentive

to dan, what can the average homeowner do to improve the safety in their home? Okay. First of all the structure, but we've already discussed that research has shown us that most people are hurt or killed more by the context contents of the structure than the structure

itself and the best thing to do is to just take a look and conduct what we call hazard search, take a look around your your house, take a look around the rooms that you inhabit and see what is there that might fall down or might become

a flying object which would happen when the ground moves laterally and could hurt you. Once you've identified it, take the steps to either move it or to reinforce it or to secure it? And you can do that by securing bookcases to two studs in the walls

and uh using velcro to secure telephones and and computers and television sets. They have what's what's now considered to be construction grade velcro, not the kind that you would use on your clothing, but very, very, very strong velcro. Again, I have the pamphlets and booklets available

that would show you how to do all that. Yes, certainly have seen lots of them. What about our schools? How prepared are they right now? You know, you asked me that question of 65 or six years ago when I first started this job and at the

time I told you it was kind of a mixed bag. Uh Well, I'm very happy to report that the Office of Education has since then uh done a lot of work and has in fact developed a school prototype school plan and school district plan that if

not is in already in all our schools should be. And it's a fill in the blanks type plan where each school or school district could modify it to their own use. I'd say overall our schools are very aware of the problems are very aware of their

responsibilities and those responsibilities include maintaining or keeping the students there until someone picks them up or at least taking them to a safe place until they're picked up. They're very aware of those responsibilities and have taken steps to prepare for it. How about the business community,

how well prepared do you think they are for their next, there's a community, it's hard to get a handle on because there are uh, there are associations, trade associations and associations of manufacturers and things like that. That that are easy to get to because you can

speak to them as an association. But then the typical mom and pop grocery store or small business uh, probably does not have the same information. So we've got a mixed bag there too. You know, I remember in many exercises I've worked with you. Uh, communications was

a prior problem in disasters. Have made any improvements in those areas were continually improving our communications. In fact, the state has finally institute of satellite information System. So our Emergency Operation Center has a dish on the roof now that is linked to a satellite so we

can at least speak to sacramento and speak to state authorities. Uh Probably un uninterrupted. We have instituted a couple of different radio frequencies that we never had before. Every time we go through something like the flood. For example of january 1993. Uh, we we improve our

communications. We have our communications van which you featured, uh, the last time we met which showed the public everything that was in there. Well, we've even made improvements to that and we now have fax machines and cellular telephones which were not in use. Uh as recently

as a couple of years ago to the extent that they are now. Um we're down to a couple of minutes here. And, and I think one thing we ought to do is kind of go back over And have you summarized what the average residents can and

should do to prepare for the disasters we're talking about. Sure. First of all, consider that you're preparing for the worst case scenario. The worst case scenario being an area wide earthquake similar to 1906. You've got to prepare yourself where you spend most of your time, which

is at home. You spend about 60% of your time at home and you can do that by doing all the things that we've discussed in this program or calling my office at 5-72361 for some assistance in the way of pamphlets and things. So prepare yourself at

home, prepare yourself with your neighbors, get yourself a little group, a little uh neighborhood group together. And then of course your workplace is the place where you spend the second most, probably about 30% of your time get together with your co workers and your boss. And

if you already don't have a plan, try to develop one. And if you do those two things, you'll probably be as ready as you can see, I'm always cutting you off right. And it seems like because there's so much to talk about and we just don't

seem to have time to get it all in. But we do definitely. We'll have you back in the near future and we'll talk about more. Ladies and gentlemen. My guest has been dan Nicholas. He's the coordinator for emergency services for Sonoma County and does a darn

fine job at it. My name is Richard Kuklinski. Program is Sonoma County in the nineties. I'll be back with you next week with another member of the county government or related agency. Another interesting program. So until then. Good night, good luck and good health to each

and every one of you. Make sure you take the precautions dan. Told you to take care of the next emergency. Bye bye.