Early last week, March 24, the city of Healdsburg activated their emergency operations center (EOC) to make sure the city is ready to respond if the COVID-19 situation worsens, or if there is an outbreak in the city.
While the activation of the EOC is different from previous activations, such as with the Kincade Fire, an EOC response allows the city to better collaborate with the County of Sonoma to help keep the community informed and prepared.
“Unlike our activations during floods and fires, the scope of this activation is a little different just because of the nature of things,” said Lt. Matt Jenkins of the Healdsburg Police Department. “We are not responding to an imminent, active threat in the community like when the water is rising or when flames are coming in our direction. This activation is more to make sure the city is ready to respond at any given time should the situation change.”
According to a city of Healdsburg Facebook post, this iteration of the EOC will focus on enhancing the city’s continuity of operations.
“What that really means, is if there were to be an outbreak within the city, how is the city going to continue to function?” Jenkins said.
He pointed out that just like every other illness, city employees are vulnerable to getting ill.
Jenkins mentioned the Santa Rosa Police Department as an example.
“Santa Rosa PD now has three of their officers who are out with coronavirus, they tested positive,” he said. “For each of our departments to be looking at if staff members were to test positive for coronavirus — what does that mean for each department? How is each department going to respond and if there are a number of employees at the same time, how are we going to continue to maintain our services to the city?”
Jenkins said figuring out a plan of continuity is what the activation is about at this point in time.
So what would that continuation of services look like if that scenario were to play out? Jenkins said city departments are still working on a plan to address that question.
“Right now we are looking at that and developing it. It is a very fluid process …You can’t predict everything 100%. It is really a lot of pre-planning internally with all of the departments to discuss what that will look like,” he said.
Jenkins said the second focus of the EOC is situational awareness.
“Making sure that the city is aware of all of the changes that are happening, what the current situation is locally, regionally and at the state, national and international levels,” he explained.
Currently everyone that is assigned a position in the EOC is working remotely from home or their own respective office.
Enforcing shelter-in place
When asked if Healdsburg Police are working on enforcing the shelter-in-place, Jenkins said they are assisting the county.
“The public health officer for the county has asked each local law enforcement agency to assist them in enforcing the shelter-in place order. There are a number of exemptions to that shelter-in-place for all of the different essential services,” he said. “As the police department under her request, we are fielding many of those phone calls that come in about possible violations.”
He said they will be looking at those to determine if any of those are operating in violation of the public health order.
