News UW Cuts Emergency Response Team
posted by on June 11 at 15:27 PM
The University of Washington has disbanded its two-year-old Campus Emergency Response Team (CERT) because of a lack of funding.
CERT—a 306 member, all-volunteer emergency team made up of staff and students, trained in CPR and crowd control—was created two years ago using school and federal money, to coordinate a campus-wide emergency response in the event of an earthquake, major storm or terrorist attack.
According to UW Spokesman Norm Arkans, CERT, the loss of federal funding—along with CERT’s director—led to the termination of the program. “The grant expired and we don’t have the resources to pick up the funding,” Arkans says. “It’s a great thing to have if you’ve got the funding for it. It has people out who can be of assistance on the ground when you have emergencies.”
The UW does have “backup” emergency management plans, but much of that appears to rely on former CERT volunteers. Charles Kennedy, UW’s Associate Vice President for Facility Services—which managed CERT—says the school still plans to call on former CERT volunteers in the event of an emergency, in the hopes they’ll respond. “The people who are trained…have not totally removed them from the [campus] alert system,” Kennedy says.
UW administrators will spend the next year evaluating the CERT program to decide whether to fund the $100,000 program in the future. Right now, the school is focusing on developing a plan for restoring operations on campus and paying bills and staff after a “catastrophic event.”
Arkans and Kennedy do not believe the loss of the program will put students in danger, as CERT has only been activated once, in the wake of a shooting on campus last year.
How about they cut the UW president's annual salary of $494,000 by 100,000 dollars? Problem solved. He'll still be pretty well off.;)
who cares when students die?
I'll be a volunteer for $100K/year.
How much do they pay the Huskies Football head coach?
UW's president actually makes more than that. Closer to the tune of $900k.
@1 - they'd save more if they cut the Husky sports salaries ...
Salaries are a matter of public record, actually.
Willingham gets $1.47 million per year and by far the highest-paid state employee. The highest-paid state employee in EVERY state is a football coach. Shocked yet? Willingham is only the 39th-best paid college coach in the country, and only fourth in the Pac-10.
Feel any differently about college football yet?
More to the point, the shooting death last year could not possibly have been prevented by CERT, and CERT did not protect any other students then or at any other time.
fun with public salaries thanks to Mr. Louis Bloom:
http://lbloom.net/uw07.html
It's also at this page if you want an official link.
CERT wasn't meant to prevent shootings, CERT exists to respond to disasters, like earthquakes that WILL happen. This is a damn fool mistake to shut down CERT.
I agree. Shut down Husky football first.
the thing that's sad is that there are some profitable ncaa football teams out there but theyre actually good teams and they have huge fan bases. Ohio State, Texas, Michigan, Florida, USC etc etc. In typical washington fashion, people like to compare the huskies to those teams...based on what, I don't know.
About time too. All this Disaster! Emergency! Preparedness! is soo Bush post-911 and it was always an overreaction. The fear of cataclysm is product of a middle-class comfort and small-mindedness.
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