When Hurricanes Irma and Matthew were bearing down on the East and Gulf Coasts, hundreds of people evacuated to Macon-Bibb County, and the American Red Cross of Central Midwest Georgia worked with Macon-Bibb’s Emergency Management Agency (EMA) and Recreation Department to open several public shelters. Hundreds of volunteers and employees stepped up to help these people in their time of need, from staffing the shelters to providing supplies to delivering meals to cleaning the buildings and more.
Now, the Red Cross and EMA are offering a training course that will allow more people to get involved in these efforts and support people that would shelter here in the future. The class is happening from 1:00 to 5:00 p.m. on Wednesday, September 28, at Macon-Bibb City Hall (700 Poplar Street) in Commission Chambers. Anyone is welcome to attend, but you must register first. You can do so here.
“Responding to a disaster takes a whole community,” says EMA Director Spencer Hawkins. “ This is your opportunity to be part of that response community by learning how shelter operations work during disasters and learning how to help during a very difficult and stressful time.”
During the course you’ll learn:
- Philosophy and principles of sheltering;
- How to identify client needs;
- How a shelter is structured and operates;
- Activities and tasks which need to take place in a shelter;
- Understand the types of work shelter workers do and how to do it.