by: Michael Walter, Emergency Management

The 2 million residents of Houston are no stranger to emergencies. From seasonal hazards — such as severe tropical weather, inland flooding, wildfires and the ever-present threat of terrorism and hazardous materials — the nation's fourth largest city has extensive experience preparing for, responding to and recovering from disasters.

With that in mind, Houston's Office of Emergency Management developed a version of its website that is optimized for mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets. Residents now have information on emergency preparedness, links to helpful mobile websites, ways to get help, as well as how they can become involved in their community's disaster response structure in a format that's easily displayed on, and takes advantage of the technological features of, their smartphones and tablets. Houston residents can visit m.houstonoem.net to access the new site.

During an incident, the mobile site can also serve as a key resource for important protective actions and disaster information. As recent incidents (including the East Coast’s brush with Hurricane Irene) have shown, even when power is out, many residents still have access to the Web capacity of their mobile phones, which are easily charged in vehicles or with extra battery packs. This can serve as a key information dissemination channel during large events such as the hurricanes, heavy rain and winter ice events that Houston has experienced in the past few years.

"The information needs of our community have changed, and as emergency managers, we have an obligation and responsibility to meet those needs," said Sharon Nalls, the city's emergency management coordinator. "Developing a way to get preparedness and response information into the palm of their hand was just part of what we can do to better engage Houston residents."

The mobile site also augments the Office of Emergency Management's Web and social media presence. The city uses a Web-based content management system, PIER Systems, to produce and publish information from official sources when incidents occur, and can disseminate it to traditional websites, Twitter and Facebook accounts, and various partner websites within the greater Houston region.

As society adapts to new technology, emergency managers must also continue to develop strategies to incorporate these changing mediums and information needs into their planning and responses. Houston continues to be on the leading edge of harnessing the power of new and emerging technology to engage and promote a safer and more resilient community.

Michael Walter is the community outreach coordinator for the Mayor's Office of Emergency Management for Houston.

Source

Emergency Management

Gerald Baron, PIER Founder and Executive VP of Communications at O'Brien's, will be presenting on the topic of "Reputation Resilience" on Sunday, Oct. 17 at 4:15 p.m. at the PRSA Internationsal Conference in Washington DC. Before the seminar there will be a book signing of his crisis communications book, Now is Too Late 2: Survival in an Era of Instant News.

If you would like to meet with Gerald at the conference, or for any other inquiries please contact him at: gerald.baron@obriensrm.com

The use of PIER has been highlighted as a best practice for the Washington State Emergency Management Division by FEMA. The implementation of PIER in 2009 has enabled the Washington State EMD to efficiently communicate and manage: post key planning, response and recovery information and real time emergency alerts.

...the new PIER system made a difference in providing real-time updates. “We could get them information faster: when closures were expected to happen, where alternate routes were available, whether special identification was needed in trucks to travel those routes, and whether capacity on those routes was limited and prioritized.” With that information, businesses reconfigured their supply chains, adding extra critical supplies to trucks delivering to communities that would be cut off by a closure and ensuring that citizens had access to commodities, food, water, and critical disaster supplies.

Washington State Teams with Business

PRSA's Public Affairs and Government Section is sponsoring a special webinar presentation on public information management during the Gulf Oil Spill. Presentation will be at 2:00 - 3:30 p.m. Eastern Time. Neil Chapman, head of communications for BP's global refining and marketing business and a primary communication leader in the spill will present, along with PIER founder and O'Brien's Executive Vice President of Communications Gerald Baron.

The purpose of this 90 minute presentation is to assist public affairs practitioners and government communicators to gain a better understanding of the communication activities during the Gulf Spill, the unique challenges presented, and lessons learned for the future. The presentation will provide an overview of the nearly 500,000 news media stories tracked, provide details of the Deepwater Horizon incident website, the exceptional level of public and stakeholder engagement both through the website and through social media channels. It will also delve into the organization structure, the use of NIMS/ICS and the Joint Information Center and the organization structure that eventually evolved in managing external affairs and media response. Major lessons learned will focus on media relations, use of existing and emerging technologies such as live video, social media and widgets, and how future significant events will be managed.

To register for the event please visit PRSA's website .

HCDE’s www.safeschoolalerts.org Earns National School Safety Advocacy Council Award

Safe School Alerts (www.safeschoolalerts.org) was awarded the 2010 National Exemplary School Safety Program Award from the National School Safety Advocacy Council. Harris County Department of Education (HCDE) Center for Safe and Secure Schools officials accepted the award at the 2010 National School Safety Conference in Orlando, Florida on July 27.

The system is a Web-based, easy-to-use tool for authorized school officials to post emergency school district alerts. Twenty-nine Center district member school districts utilize the system. Superintendents from each district choose key individuals within their respective districts to be trained and post the emergency alerts. The system can provide official, critical alerts via the Web, SMS (text messages), e-mail, RSS feed and chyron (television text scroll) to subscribers and the media simultaneously.

Pasadena Independent School District Superintendent Kirk Lewis nominated the www.safeschoolalerts.org site for the award. Pasadena ISD is one of the 29 member districts currently using the system. Houston ISD is also a center member and utilizes the emergency communication tool.

The robust system is powered through Public Information Emergency Response System (PIER) Inc., a highly reliable, Web-based emergency management communications system supported by a redundant base of nationwide servers. It is hosted by HCDE through its Center for Safe and Secure Schools. Created in 2009, www.safeschoolalerts.org addresses school districts' needs for a Web-based, easy-to-use emergency communications system.

HCDE's Center Senior Consultant John Wilson said the award affirms the power of partnerships as HCDE's Center recognized a need and worked with local partners to utilize an existing communications tool and redesign it specifically for district use.

"Today it enables districts to efficiently and accurately distribute emergency school alerts at no cost to our 29 member districts," Wilson said.

Through the site, districts quickly and efficiently notify media, emergency management officials and the community at-large about emergency-related school events such as school closures, lockdowns, delayed openings and re-openings. The site is not meant to replace any district's existing internal communication systems, but rather to serve as a redundant communication tool.

Current local districts utilizing the system include the following 29 Center member school districts: Aldine, Alief, Channelview, Clear Creek, Crosby, Cypress-Fairbanks, Dayton, Deer Park, Dickinson, Friendswood, Galena Park, Goose Creek Consolidated, Harris County Department of Education, Houston, Huffman, Humble, Katy, Klein, La Porte, New Caney, North Forest, Pasadena, Pearland, Sheldon, Spring, Spring Branch, Stafford, Tomball and Waller.

The PIER, Inc. supported www.safeschoolalerts.org site was one of 30 initial sites selected by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security Houston Area Urban Area Security Initiative (UASI), this group includes: the City of Houston; Harris County; Fort Bend County; Montgomery County; Brazoria and Galveston Counties. The Houston Area UASI is designated as TIER I, one of 10 urban areas nationwide which are at highest risk.

Last year, the Center sought support of school district superintendents to train key employees to use the system and visited local media outlets to announce the service, said Sawyer. "Harris County is vulnerable to both man-made and natural disasters as an energy capital and coastal community. Over 900,000 students are served on 900 campuses throughout the community, and we have an obligation to keep them safe."

"The www.safeschoolalerts.org system is a critical tool to promote safety in our region, and HCDE and the Center are proud to lead this initiative," Wilson said.

About the Center for Safe and Secure Schools:

The Center for Safe and Secure Schools is the leader for the development of increased safety and security strategies in school environments for Texas students and educators. The Center focuses on the emergency management cycle including: prevention/mitigation, preparedness, response and recovery. For more information call (713) 696-0770.

Source:

The Cypress Times

The Unified Command's Joint Information Center for the Gulf Spill is using the PIER System to manage public information and release news, photos, press releases, incident updates, and videos of oil spill clean-up efforts following the Deepwater Horizon explosion incident. The Unified Command website is located at deepwaterhorizonresponse.com.

PIER is a comprehensive web-based communication management technology designed specifically for Joint Information Center (JIC) operations. A JIC is established to provide the focal point for all communications in a response operating under National Incident Management System (NIMS) rules. In a JIC, all government agencies responding come together to collaborate under the overall direction of Unified Command consisting of incident commanders from lead response agencies or jurisdictions. Unified Command has responsibility for all information coming from the response through the Joint Information Center. Under NIMS, if a company is involved with legal liability for the event, they also participate as a member of Unified Command as the designated "Responsible Party."

The Deepwater Horizon incident, also known as the BP Oil Spill or Gulf Spill, is the largest environmental disaster in US history, and quite likely the largest coordinated crisis communication event ever. The incident website is the focal point for communication about the event. Through June 9, the website has received over 80 million hits with over 3 million unique visitors receiving information. The system facilitates the development of public information releases, including the complex approval process. Through June 9, over 2200 documents had been drafted and nearly 1800 approved and distributed. Most of the documents were also emailed to the more than 32,000 members of the media and public who have registered to receive regular updates. An estimated 7 to 8 million email distributions have been made.

One of the most remarkable features of this response is the dedication of the Joint Information Center to respond personally to the thousands of inquiries and comments submitted to the Joint Information Center. PIER faciliates inquiry management by directing inquries automatically to appropriate responders based on categories. Because PIER is entirely web-based, a communication team located anywhere and operating 24 hours can participate in the process including responding to inquiries. More than 33,000 inquiries have been received in 35 different categories and nearly all those inquirers have received personal responses from a member of the dispersed communication team.

PIER also provides the capability to quickly generate data-driven forms that can be used to capture information from those interacting with the response. PIER forms are being used to submit claims in addition to claim submission through a call center. Nearly 4000 claims have been submitted through use of the on-line forms. Forms are also used to facilitate the more than 10,000 suggestions that have been submitted by individuals. The forms are directed automatically to a team of experts assigned the responsibility of reviewing all suggestions and forwarding the promising ones to the response leaders.

MediaTools is an important component of the PIER System and includes the ability to instantly create media lists from an up-to-date database. One of the most important functions of MediaTools used in this response is the media search and clipping service. Through June 9, almost 135,000 media entries have been tracked including almost 16,000 broadcast stories. Each day communication and response leaders receive a detailed report on that day's media activities which include print stories, broadcast, online stories, blogs and social media. Tonality analysis is provided and special reports highlight the major broadcast coverage of the day.

PIER is provided as a NIST-certified highly secure web application without any limit on users, nor restrictions on use by agency or employer. Unified Command fully controls access to the control center of the Deepwater Horizon site. There are representatives from many of the more than 60 agencies responding. At any one time more than 40 users can be found working on the same control center performing different aspects of the response and located either in the Joint Information Center locations in the Gulf region or as far away as London or the West Coast. Social media is a very important element of this response and the various social media channels used by the response are all accessed via the main response website. PIER can also be used to feed content directly to social media sites.

PIER is also being used by responders in the field to submit reports of activities in the field into a control center for a common operating picture. PIER's ability to send text messages is being used to distribute information updates to those requesting it by text. And the two-way text capability is enabling members of the public to submit reports and relevant information the response.

In addition to the Deepwater Horizon Unified Command website, BP has also launched four PIER-driven websites to communicate with the communities most affected by this event. These sites can be found at alabamagulfresponse.com, louisianagulfresponse.com, mississippigulfresponse.com and floridagulfresponse.com. These sites are part of BP's extensive community outreach effort which will be in place for a long time to closely coordinate long term recovery efforts with the affected states and communities. Thousands of people have already used these sites to interact with the BP community relations teams on the ground.

PIER Systems has worked closely with the US Coast Guard for over nine years. All Coast Guard public affairs operations use PIER for routine daily communication as well as for major events such as Hurricane Katrina and the Gulf Spill. Similarly, PIER has also worked with BP for over 8 years providing multiple PIER sites for crisis and public communication purposes in many locations throughout the world. In addition to supplying the web-based communication management technology, PIER provides clients such as BP with crisis communication plans, training, response services and drills and exercises. PIER includes numerous federal agencies on its client list and most of the major oil companies, as well as wide variety of other clients in energy, education, healthcare, emergency response and others.

PIER was acquired by O'Brien's Response Management in late 2009, the leading crisis and emergency response provider. With the addition of PIER, O'Brien's resiliency capabilities extends to helping clients, prepare, respond, communicate and recover. For more information about O'Brien's please visit: obriensrm.com.

Visit the Deepwater Horizon Response PIER site at deepwaterhorizonresponse.com for the latest information about the incident.

Additional Resources

• Interview with BP's Neil Chapman

• Read the NextGov.com Article:
  Coast Guard's PIER Delivers the News on Gulf Oil Spill
• Read the ReadWriteWeb Article:
  Oil Spill Social Media

BP recently launched four informational websites to offer state-specific information to residents of communities affected by the Gulf of Mexico oil spill. The sites offer information and updates such as news, press releases, photos, videos and response statistics and graphs.

The sites are intended to provide the latest information about local events and activities that would help educate or provide resources for residents of various communities with each state. Visitors can subscribe to RSS feeds and register to receive email updates in order to stay informed.

The sites can be found at:

Alabama: www.alabamagulfresponse.com

Florida: www.floridagulfresponse.com

Louisiana: www.louisianagulfresponse.com

Mississippi: www.mississippigulfresponse.com

Read the full article here: BP Announces Launch of State-specific Response Web Sites

Bellingham Firm Helps Handle Flow of Information for Gulf Oil Spill

Dave Gallagher - The Bellingham Herald

A Bellingham company is providing the Web-based system for the official information site for the Gulf oil spill.

PIER Systems Inc. has been working with BP and the U.S. Coast Guard since the explosion rocked the Deepwater Horizon oil rig last month. The company, which has an office on Railroad Avenue near the Herald Building, has been providing support through its Web-based system onsite in Louisiana and Alabama as well as from Bellingham.

Within hours of the explosion, a website was operational, providing information, photos and video as well as having a system in place to handle inquiries from the public and the media.

The website, deepwaterhorizonresponse.com, has had more than 19 million hits since it became operational last month. It also has handled more than 14,000 inquiries from the public, directing those to the proper person for a quick response. Visitors can click on links to social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter for public discussions and notifications.

The overall handling of the flow of information has gone exceptionally well, said Gerald Baron, who in 2000 developed PIER, which stands for Public Information Emergency Response. PIER Systems was acquired by O'Brien's Response Management Inc. in December 2009, and Baron stayed on as the company's executive vice president for communications. It has 11 employees in the Bellingham office.

"There are always surprises, but PIER was developed to handle surges of traffic in events of this size," Baron said. "It will also be an important site for information in the long term for those communities impacted by this event, even after media interest is gone."

The site has received praise from the Coast Guard, an agency that has used the PIER system for years, including during the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in 2005. In a recent article on NextGov.com, Lt. Cmdr. Christopher O'Neil, a media relations chief for the Coast Guard, said PIER is a powerful tool other agencies should adopt for crisis management.

The idea for PIER came about in response to the 1999 Olympic Pipeline explosion in Bellingham. Immediately following the pipeline explosion there was confusion in the community and between agencies about what was going on, and Baron believed a Web-based solution was possible.

"That explosion led to many changes in terms of safety and regulation, but it also changed how agencies communicate with the public and the ability to handle inquiries in a crisis situation," Baron said.

WHO USES PIER

A wide variety of government agencies and companies use the PIER System. Here are some examples:

City of Bellingham, City of Atlanta, Los Angeles Metropolitan Transit Authority, Port of Houston, U.S. Food & Drug Administration, Washington State Poison Control, Whatcom County, Bonneville Power Administration, Shell, BP, Tesoro, Allstate Insurance, Boeing, Western Washington University and Bellingham Public School District.

Source:

The Bellingham Herald - Sunday, May 16th, 2010
http://www.bellinghamherald.com/2010/05/16/1431843/bellingham-firm-helps-handle-flow.html#ixzz0oCuM39iM