Are you prepared for an emergency? Your neighbors are. West County Emergency Response Team is pleased to announce the graduation of 52 community members from the basic CERT academy on Saturday, October 23rd, 2010. They are your neighbors and co-workers, citizen volunteers trained in disaster preparedness and to compliment emergency services in the event of an emergency.The Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) Program educates people about disaster preparedness for hazards that may impact their area and trains them in basic disaster response skills, such as safety, light search and rescue, team organization, and disaster medical operations. Using the training learned in the classroom and during exercises, CERT members can assist others in their neighborhood or workplace following an event when professional responders are not immediately available to help. CERT members are also encouraged to support emergency response agencies by taking a more active role in emergency preparedness projects in their community.
The 80 active members of West County CERT respond to a variety of call-outs both pre-planned events and emergency incidents from wildfires and flooding to traffic control and missing persons. You may have seen some of them most recently at the National Night Out, Seal Beach Founder’s Day Parade, Neighbor 4 Neighbor disaster preparedness events, and the Wings, Wheels and Rotors Expo at the Joint Forces Training Base. They’ve also helped with sandbagging during flooding, traffic control during parades, health and safety expos, flyer notifications, runners at base camp for large fires and any other city or county events where extra assistance is needed.
Over 350 of your friends and neighbors have been trained in emergency preparedness throughout the six cities since 2007. If you live or work in the West County cities of Buena Park, Cypress, La Palma, Los Alamitos, Seal Beach or Westminster and are interested in becoming a CERT member, please go to www.westcountycert.com for more information on the next academy. Two academies are held each year so space is limited. Sign up now for the next class.