BY ANITA STIEFEL
ANITAS@OPELIKAOBSERVER.COM
LEE COUNTY — Emergency management professionals and community leaders gathered in Opelika last week for a Resilience Summit.
The event, held on the campus of Southern Union State Community College, is one of a series held throughout Alabama. The summits aim at enhancing the Preparedness for Alabama Resilience Network, which establishes activities and actions to engage everyone in preparedness
outreach and initiatives that will help communities become more prepared and agile in responding to disasters.
The summits, led by the Alabama Department of Emergency Management, discuss communicating, training and planning from a wholistic approach. They are intended for agency leaders, business and non-profit leaders, government officials, legislators, economic and public safety professionals and other partners who play a part in establishing resiliency.
“This is about more than bouncing back, it’s about bounding back stronger than you were before,” said Greg DeJarnette, strategic communications specialist for Alabama EMA.
State EMA Jeff Smitherman introduced Brooks McClendon, who represented Gov. Kay Ivey’s office at the event.
“This summit is representative of what y’all do year round, which is to plan and prepare — even on days when the sky is blue, y’all are working,” McClendon said. “There are five million Alabama citizens who don’t think about who or why or how things get done until disaster strikes. They never think about the countless hours and days and weeks and months of planning that occur before that moment when something impacted their lives.”
Other speakers at the event included Dr. Laura Meyers, senior research scientist at the Alabama Center for Insurance Information and Research in the UA College of Business, Opelika City Councilman Todd Rauch and Jeremy Roberts, senior associate athletic director for Auburn University.
Lee County EMA Director Rita Smith moderated a panel discussion of post-disaster mass community events, featuring Lee County Sheriff Jay Jones, retired Coffee County EMA Director John Tallas, AU Campus Safety Director Ashley Gann and Beauregard Fire Chief Mike Holden.
Lisa Castaldo, Alabama EMA executive operations officer, led a panel on water infrastructure with Aubrey White of Alabama Department of Environmental Management’s Drinking Water Branch, Robert White of Alabama Rural Water Association and Josh Harvell, Chambers County engineer.
The event provided overviews and discussions of resiliency efforts in the state, focusing on actual events, lessons learned and best practices, all of which will lead to action items to be pursued by the Preparedness for Alabama Resiliency Network.