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Politics & Government

OP-ED: CERT Begins Later This Month

One of the co-managers of South Orange's CERT team previews the course.

If you’re like most South Orange residents, the chances are good that you’ve never heard of CERT—or if you have, you’ve confused it with the breath mint.

In reality, CERT refers to our town’s Community Emergency Response Team program. Personally, I had no clue what it was when I sat down at my first Citizen’s Public Safety Meeting. I learned that CERT is a program which falls under the Office of Emergency Management (OEM) where private citizens are educated in disaster preparedness and trained in basic disaster skills such as fire safety, light search and rescue, team organization, and disaster medical operations. CERT’s primary objective is to increase the knowledge held by everyday citizens of what to do in the case of crisis, natural disaster, or any other emergency situation in which the professional responders are not immediately available to help. I felt that learning some basic skills and knowledge on these topics in the case any kind of disaster or emergency were to occur in our area was only a good thing for my family, neighbors, and community, so I took the course—and I’m glad I did.

The CERT training was neither as intense nor as demanding of either time or physical exertion as I thought it would be. When I was first asked if I would be interested in joining the CERT program, I was reluctant. I figured, “How can I find the time to offer such a commitment when I have other commitments such as my wife, kids, a lawn that needs mowing, t-ball, swim lessons, and oh yeah….A job!” The great thing about CERT that prompted me to take the course is that it does not involve a huge dedication of time for either the initial course or for being a CERT member. Also, in no way was it a rigorous training course where I’d have to be 19 to survive as I had pictured. The initial training course was actually a 20-hour modular lesson given four Saturdays in a row for five hours a day. A fifth session was a review of the four previous sessions, and a practical allowed me to put my lessons to the test with a mock disaster (which yes, was a lot of fun and interesting).

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The CERT lessons cover topics such as disaster preparedness, fire safety, disaster medication operations, light search and rescue, disaster psychology, terrorism, and the history of the CERT organization. They include broad and basic concepts and terms, as well as some practical hands on lessons involving first aid and search and rescue. Upon completing the course, participants receive a bag of goodies including a hard hat, vest, tapes, and a spark-proof wrench to turn the gas off in the case of an emergency.

Once you become a CERT member, you will be notified of other courses that are offered as additional education, and you are entitled to attend any of them if you choose. Incident Command Systems, CPR, Basic First Aid, AED (Automated External Defibrillator), POD (Points of Distribution) and Emergency Operations Centers are among some of the additional training courses that are offered beyond the initial 20-hour training course. Sometimes notices are put out requesting volunteers for events or other community-related services, but once again there is no obligation to attend or assist in any way as a member. You can very well take the course for your own knowledge and then never volunteer as a CERT member if you so choose.

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South Orange residents, Jeffrey Angel and Andrew Boyarsky have been recently named the co-managers for our South Orange CERT program. As the OEM designee for the town, the CERT responsibility falls directly under Village President Alex Torpey, but as in most cases where the town official is the OEM designee, we also have a CERT manager position that would be responsible for scheduling and arranging the courses. As the CERT managers we will communicate to members when there are potential CERT orientated volunteer opportunities coming up in the future, or in the case CERT was called upon to volunteer (remember, you don’t have to) for an emergency. As the instructor for the CERT courses, we as a town rely on Tom Giordano, the Assistant Director for Emergency Management at Seton Hall, for our town’s CERT training and distribution of information. Tom was a police officer at Rutgers New
Brunswick campus from 1995 till 2003 where he retired as the Deputy Chief of Public Safety. While in that position, he was tabbed to be the CERT Manager for Rutgers and work under the Office of Emergency Management. In 2004 Tom went to work for the state OEM in the Preparedness Unit and then to Seton Hall in 2008. Tom is certified by OEM to train citizens in the CERT training course, which he holds twice a year for the students at Seton Hall. These training sessions are open to South Orange residents as well, since as of now we do not have our own scheduled training sessions or course instructor.

The next training session is scheduled to begin March 24th, 2012 and will be four Saturdays, (March 24th, March 31st, April 14th and April 21st) for five hours per class. The course will be given at Seton Hall University with the exact location TBD. Please visit the South Orange CERT website to register for the next upcoming class by clicking on the “volunteering” hyperlink, fill out the form and choose CERT from the drop down menu. I look forward to meeting you in the class.

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