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‘We’re ready’

By P.J. Standlee

In increasing numbers, Kyrene Corridor residents are honing their disaster- and emergency-response skills right alongside the Chandler Fire Department.

It’s part of a nationwide Community Emergency Response Team, or CERT, goal of which is to train community members in fire suppression, basic medical treatment, search and rescue and that all-important ingredient of disaster response, team building.

With more emphasis on disaster readiness these days, Battalion Chief Paul Sullivan says community volunteers seem to be coming forward in record numbers.

The CERT program prepares those volunteers on how to correctly respond to an emergency and, if need be, work collaboratively with city emergency responders, says Sullivan.

Many of these volunteers, he says, come from the west Chandler area and even Tempe.

No matter which city they call home, Sullivan says, “We tell them how to be prepared to better help their family, neighborhood and community.”

CERT classes, overseen by Chandler firefighters, convene seven days a week for three hours. People from many walks of life, including retirees, doctors, lawyers and homemakers, attend.

Chandler Fire was the first such agency in Maricopa county to launch CERT training, which is offered in coordination with FEMA, the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

Chandler has now trained approximately 400 people in the CERT classes, one of 22 similar programs in Maricopa County and 900 across the nation.

Volunteer Bernie Korczyk, who lives near Ray Road and 56^th Street, said he joined the CERT program after 9/11 with the desire to help protect his family and community.

“If there is an emergency affecting a large area, for example a microburst, I could also help my neighbors and community until the professionals were able to arrive,” Korcyzk said.

“The second reason I joined was because of President Bush’s state of the union Address two years ago, asking everyone to volunteer in their communities.”

Not everyone’s commitment to CERT is the same. Volunteers choose their level of commitment by tiers. Tier-one volunteers, for example, are trained for the awareness level, which means they know how to respond to emergencies experienced by members of their immediate family.

Tier-two and tier-three team members take their expanded training a step further by becoming accredited city of Chandler volunteers, thoroughly drilled in emergency situations and committed to attending refresher classes each year.

Tier-two volunteers are trained to respond to neighborhood emergencies or disasters and act as a first response until official responders can arrive.

Tier-three volunteers are entrusted with even broader roles, with training on how to respond to city or even state disasters if need be.

The training, Korcyk said, isn’t overly intense, which allows older volunteers to participate along with younger ones. Of primary importance, age notwithstanding, is personal safety, says Korcyk.

“The training teaches you not only how to respond, but just as important, when not to respond. There are situations, such as hazardous material incidents, that should be left to professionals. Your safety is highly stressed in the class.”

While virtually anyone can, and should, come and train, according to Sullivan, official CERT team members have to be at least 18 years of age and must pass a criminal check.

“Ideally, everyone should go through the CERT training and, in a perfect world, no one should ever have to use it,” said CERT councilmember Ken Fiebelkorn, who attended a Feb. 12 meeting on search and rescue and incident command at the Chandler Fire Training Facility on south Dobson Road in Chandler.

Fiebelkorn said even though tier members come with different levels of commitment, all have the same initial training. Working closely with official emergency responders helps CERT volunteers to effectively respond to an emergency or work side-by-side with official responders, a relationship that both trainers and trainees take seriously.

The culmination of the seven-week class ends in a drill, where all the students learn is put to the test.

Tier-two and tier-three volunteers will go on to participate in a countywide drill. Even though they don’t involve real disasters, both drills are designed to “expose people to the actual emergency, and tell them how to respond,” said Fiebelkorn.

For more information on the Chandler CERT program visit: http://chandlercert.org. To sign up for classes, contact Chandler Fire Department Chief Paul Sullivan by email at certcouncil@chandlercert.org.

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