09.11.2020 Facebook Live Briefing Transcript

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Larry Little: Hi everybody. thank you for joining us. i'm Larry Little. This morning we are going to be talking about preparedness. September is national preparedness month and this morning Kia Xiong from the county's office of emergency management joins me to share information on preparing your family for community or natural emergency, but first we want to let you know that prior to this segment we did remove our face mask so everyone including our American Sign Language interpreters can clearly understand, and properly communicate the information that we will be sharing this morning. Good morning, Kia. Thank you for being here. you know i was thinking last night about 2020, it's been a year of surprises. let's just say that way you look at some of these headlines here, earthquake near san jose, the fires of course that are pretty much uh contained to a certain degree here mostly, uh also you know we've been dealing with COVID for several months now, so it's just a sign that you know something is bound to happen, and we need to be prepared as a community. start by telling me about your office, what role do you play in the county and to our community.

Kia Xiong: sure. hi everyone. my name is Kia Xiong. i'm the community and media relations coordinator for the office of emergency management. the office of emergency management is responsible for supporting first responders, including fire, local law enforcement, and emergency medical services. we're also responsible for coordinating the resources from other county departments, cooperating agencies, community-based organizations, and faith-based organizations here in Santa Clara County to make sure that our residents will receive the relief that they need during an active emergency or a disaster, um and you're absolutely right, Larry about all the incidents that have happened this year. it's been truly an unprecedented, unprecedented year and emergency preparedness has come to the forefront of our daily lives, and in my family, what we've done is add add on an additional emergency preparedness measure by making sure that we're taking an active role monitoring our gas levels right in our vehicle making sure that it doesn't fall below half tank so it's emergency preparedness measures small things that we can do every day. we can all do one thing every day uh whether it's weekly, monthly or yearly to prepare for an emergency.

LL: you know, as you you're sitting here telling us all of this, i'm thinking how unprepared i am. it's like what happens like what do you do what do i do with my dogs if i have to leave the home.

KX: right LL: i take. if you take a lot of medication. it's like, do you have backup medication in case you can't get it for several weeks? so let's talk about national preparedness month, which we refer to uh here as community preparedness month share information about that.

KX: sure, right. so national preparedness month is the national emergency preparedness initiative, that's spearheaded by fema. it was launched right after the 9 11 attacks, and locally, here we recognize it as community preparedness month. The the board of supervisors recently just issued a proclamation making it official here in Santa Clara County. The goal of this initiative, really, is to encourage active participation from our residents in the emergency planning process by being prepared citizens, and all that really means, Larry, is that you know they are signed up to receive the county's emergency alerts, that they're making an emergency plan with their family, that they're building an emergency kit or a stay kit in case they have to shelter in place, and also pack a go bag in case they do need to evacuate immediately, and lastly really just making sure that they're able to help their neighbors, their friends in case there is an emergency, and those neighbors can't evacuate. so it's just these five steps that we can all take towards emergency preparedness really.

LL: so let's talk about how some of the recent emergencies are examples of why we should be taking this seriously.

KX: yes um i think the scu and scu lightning complex wildfire has really impacted some of our residents here in Santa Clara County. you know like i was saying before, we've added additional preparedness measures in our family, and you know some additional tips that i'd like to offer is to make sure that our residents are signed up for alert sec really alertscc is the official, you know, county emergency alert and notification system. sign up by going to www dot alert scc dot org (www.alertscc.org). you'll receive a notification to your landline, email and cell phone and if there is an emergency. some of the types of notifications you may receive would include earthquake, flood, um crime incidents that are happening in your area and even instructions from the county.

LL: you know one of the important things too about signing up is, i said before, that if if you live here in san jose, and you have elderly parents that live in south county, you can also put a secondary uh location in and get notifications for their area uh as well. all right. so uh what is ready scc?

KX: yeah and it's a really great tool. it's an app, an emergency preparedness app. that was developed by you know our county here and we use it. if you need uh help planning your or making your emergency plan this app will definitely, help kick start that plan for you. you can download this app from the app store or google play and you can find out more information about this app by visiting our website at www.preparescc.org forward slash ready scc (www.preparescc.org/readyscc).

LL: what is an emergency uh preparedness tip that you find mostly important and would like to share?

KX: yeah you know, Larry every family is different. in my family, my daughter carries around a 15 year old stuffed animal still. my son, who's seven really loves his hugs, and it's these small comfort items, gestures of reassurances, that are often forgotten in the emergency planning, and you need to sit down with your family and decide what your unique family needs are in order to really plan for an emergency, because sometimes it's not always about the physical need, it's also about the emotional needs, as well. LL: all right thank you so much. very important information. any closing thoughts?

KX: yeah i think for emergency preparedness, it really does take the whole community working together, coming together to recover from an emergency or disaster and to rebuild resilient communities, and if you'd like more information about emergency planning or preparedness, please visit our website at www.preparescc.org thank you.

LL: Kia, thank you for being here today and sharing all this very important information for us. of course today is September 11th and we want to honor those who lost their lives on 9 11 with a brief moment of silence. Facebook live in spanish begins at 11 a.m, We will see you back here on Monday. thanks for watching. be safe everybody. have a good weekend!

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