(City of Red Deer)

By Sheldon Spackman

"Be Ready For Anything"

City urges resilience for Emergency Preparedness Week

May 3, 2021 | 5:20 PM

Officials with the City of Red Deer are reminding local residents to be prepared in case of emergency.

National Emergency Preparedness Week runs May 2-8, 2021.

Karen Mann, Emergency Management Coordinator for the City of Red Deer, says the theme this year is “Be Ready for Anything.”

“The ongoing situation with the COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the importance of being prepared, to creating resilient individuals and resilient communities, as well as resilient families,” says Mann. “Our message this year to Red Deerians is to get them to think about what it means to be resilient to any type of emergency that could occur.”

Mann says Alberta has experienced some of the largest and most costly emergency situations in Canadian history over the last 10 years.

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“We’ve seen the devastating impact of wildfires, we’ve seen the impact of winds, we saw that in 2017 here in our city which contributed to longer power outages for some of our residents,” she recalls.

“We’ve seen the impact of flooding and we’ve seen the impact of hazardous materials, so explosions or train derailments or things that may release toxic chemicals or things that you wouldn’t want to be breathing or ingesting.”

But rather than fearing potential emergencies, Mann suggests being prepared for them instead. She recommends knowing the risks in your community, having a family emergency plan, talking about that plan, and ensuring that plan includes your kids, people with special needs, and provisions for people that you care about who might need an additional help.

“If you’ve got relatives living in long-term care, or you’ve got seniors in your life that live on their own that might need some support. Consider them in your emergency plans as well,” adds Mann.

Of course, you can’t forget to have an emergency kit on hand either to help sustain yourself and your family for 72 hours and beyond.

“Copies of your critical documents. copies of your mortgage, copies of your wills, your insurance policies, your birth certificates, and your banking information,” says Mann.

“Have additional prescriptions for any members of your family who might rely upon those. Have extra sets of keys, have some cash on-hand and have some non-perishable food that you can grab and take with you if you were to go somewhere, but also if you’re forced to stay in your home for an extended period of time.

“Also potable water, two litres of water per person per day. That also needs to include your pets.”

Mann says it’s important to make note of who around you might be vulnerable in the case of an emergency.

“There’s a lot of great conversations that could happen at the family level, at the school level, at the business level, if we all took a little time this Emergency Preparedness Week to ask those questions about how we can become more resilient and less vulnerable.”