The Topanga Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) is gaining momentum in more ways than one. First, an impressive number of residents signed up for the recent CERT and Chamber of Commerce-sponsored 21-hour training course. The program teaches residents how to be better prepared to respond to emergencies when professional first responders are overwhelmed. With more residents at the ready, the community is better prepared to take action following a major disaster (fire, flood, earthquake, etc.).
PHOTO BY BRAD DAVIS  Topanga CERT team members with newly acquired emergency supplies. Back row, standing (left) Claire Davis, CERT Leader, (right) Scott Ferguson. Front row (left to right) Steve Wolcott, Ken Smith, Abigail Bok, Beth Davis, Tali Sperber, Zanwill Sperber, Merilee Sperber, Scott Olson. |
Topanga CERT's mission is to provide support to the community following a major disaster. Los Angeles County Supervisor Zev Yaroslavasky recently made it possible for the team to acquire much-needed emergency supplies to be used to provide post-disaster aid to the community. These supplies include bandages and other first aid items, emergency blankets, generators, emergency lighting and more.
The idea originally came from Topanga resident Brad Davis, who first established a system of disaster supply caches throughout the City of Malibu, where he is the emergency services coordinator. "Having established the system in Malibu," Davis said, "I took a look at my home community and said ‘Why not here?'"
Thanks to the Supervisor's support, CERT has been able to establish four separate caches of emergency supplies in different parts of the Canyon, with the aim that wherever team members may be needed, disaster supplies are not too far away.
"Of course, this is only the beginning," says Topanga CERT Leader Claire Davis. "Our ultimate goal is to obtain additional donations from residents so that CERT can have supplies with which to help the community in many more locations throughout the Canyon. In a catastrophic disaster we are going to need a lot more supplies than we have at the moment, particularly if Topanga Canyon is cut off from the outside world."
For further information on CERT classes and ways you can support the efforts of the Topanga CERT, contact Claire Davis at clairecare@earthlink.net.
