Existing Challenges to Preparedness Training
The level of community preparedness is the bedrock of an effective response in a disaster. Every segment of society must be encouraged and empowered with the information it needs to prepare for the inevitable impacts of future disasters. Too often, preparedness trainings are only available to the community in an inaccessible fire station; only offered in the evening when public and para transportation lines are limited; or delivered by smaller communities where funding American Sign Language interpreters is not within the budget.

Emergency Managers need to shift the paradigm and start addressing the diversity of their communities as the norm, and not as a special class or event. They need to provide access and equal opportunity to information to allow all community members to empower themselves, prepare their families, and assist their neighbors. The primary role of CERT is to do exactly this; expand the role of our community members.

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Tempe CERT Overview
For the past four years, Mr. Ernie Paquette and Ms. Dawn Hermanson have been co-leads of the Tempe Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) in Arizona, which is overseen by the Tempe Fire Medical Rescue Personnel/ Professional Development section. Tempe CERT partners with the Scottsdale Emergency Manager to provide the basic CERT classroom instruction at least twice a year. Members of the Tempe CERT

Recent Activities
Tempe CERT has been very active recently; working on multiple large-scale initiatives and continuing to perform their more routine preparedness activities. For example, Tempe CERT has developed a strategic plan and completed an important project to map members to their closest cross streets and fire stations. In addition, they have established several important agreements with community partners, including the local Amateur Radio Repeater Trustee.

Twice a year, Tempe CERT assists the Arizona Burn Center, the American Red Cross, and the Tempe Fire Medical Rescue with smoke detector installations. This includes the setup of the HAM radio Network Control System (Net Control) to help manage communications traffic during the smoke detector installation effort. In addition, they assist the Tempe Fire Medical Department annually with Fire Safety Day, handing out relevant documentation and demonstrating fire extinguisher use (in most cases to children). Moreover, they perform fire extinguisher training at businesses in coordination with the Tempe Fire Medical Rescue Public Training Officer.

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Log on now to the new Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) Citizen Responder Registration site to explore the updates. If you were registered on the old site, you can use the same login email to create a new password.

While the design and layout are different, the new site maintains many of the key features of the old site. This new design, however, will make it easier and more intuitive to register and update programs. For example, the button to register a new program is now located front and center on the page.

Moving forward, FEMA plans to continuously add new features to the site. These include enabling you to download reports about your program and posting an annual report on the progress of your CERT.

Visit https://community.fema.gov/Register today to view the updated registration site! For questions on the site, contact FEMA-Prepare@fema.dhs.gov.

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