Polk County Itemizer-Observer • August 26, 2015 5A
Polk County News
Oregon Resilience Plan for the Itemizer-Observer
Quake: More effort has been made to be ready
for disaster by state and individual households
Continued on 1A
In the valley under cur-
rent conditions, people
should expect to be without
electricity for one to three
months, longer the farther
you are from an urban cen-
ter.
Clean drinking water and
sewer systems could take
one month to a year to re-
store. Police and fire stations
could take up to four
months before they are
functional.
Major highways damaged
in the quake may not be us-
able for six months to a year.
Other resources, such as
gasoline, likely will not be
available to anyone outside
first responders for months.
Life will change dramati-
cally, with one of the more
noticeable differences in
what happens when people
call 911.
Estimates are that after a
disaster of this proportion,
about one-third to one-half
of first responders — police
and fire — will be unable to
report to work, leaving de-
partments undermanned to
handle calls for help.
Bender said under those
circumstances, residents
will need to make a plan to
help themselves.
“If people become self-
prepared, it takes the bur-
den off government because
we are not going to have the
people to go help them,” he
said. “There are not enough
of us.”
In this scenario, Kimber
Townsend, Polk County
Community Emergency Re-
sponse Team (CERT) man-
ager, said the prescribed 72-
hour kit of food, water, and
other supplies will not be
sufficient. She recommends
at least three weeks, and, if
possible, up to three months
of supplies.
Statewide and local agen-
cies have been busy assess-
ing what damage may occur
and what can be done to
mitigate it.
Townsend said she’s en-
couraged by the moves
made at the state level in re-
cent years, but still believes
More fun facts about quakes
• The tsunami that could hit the Oregon Coast after a 9.0
magnitude Cascadia subduction zone quake could reach
130 feet.
• The last “really big one” took place in January of 1700.
Dating back 10,000 years, the average number of years be-
tween Cascadia quakes is 243 years.
• It is predicted that six major highway bridges would col-
lapse in a 9.0 magnitude quake. Total bridge repairs
statewide would cost $1 billion.
— Source: Oregon Office of Emergency Management.
Oregon and the rest of the
region that will be affected
by the quake is playing
“catch up.”
“We are behind the curve,
but I think we are rolling a
little faster,” Townsend said.
That includes the Oregon
Resilience Plan, completed
in 2013.
Rizzo said she would like
to see the recommendations
in the plan be accomplished
in small chunks.
She said the steps the
Oregon Legislature took in
its last session to prioritize
funding for seismic up-
grades, particularly in vul-
nerable schools, was a posi-
tive sign that may happen.
More is on the horizon, as
well.
Next year, the states of Ore-
gon, Washington and Idaho
will participate in a large-
scale drill called “Cascadia
Rising,” focusing on how to
respond in the aftermath.
“There are some good
things happening
statewide,” Townsend said.
“I’m really looking forward
to the Cascadia Rising exer-
cise next year. I think there
are going to be so many les-
sons learned that will be ac-
tionable items.”
As for individuals and
families, Townsend believes
with the amount of informa-
tion out about the quake —
and its destructive poten-
tial — everyone has an obli-
gation to learn how to take
care of themselves as best
they can for as long as they
can.
“You know you live in an
earthquake-prone place,”
she said. “You better be pre-
pared for it and, if you are
not, shame on you.”
Rizzo said she thinks the
tide is turning on awareness.
Since the world witnessed
the Indonesian quake and
tsunami in 2004 and the 9.0
that hit Japan in 2011, Cas-
cadia has become a topic of
more concern and conver-
sation, she said.
“That was the first time
Oregonians had really seen
what we can expect to see
here,” she said, referring to
the Indonesian quake. “It
just takes time. People have
to hear about it often
enough. Since 2004, pre-
paredness has gone up ex-
ponentially. Before that,
there were just a few voices
in the woods.”
Now that it has become a
shout from the mountain-
top, officials say it’s time for
people to take it seriously —
and hope the fault remains
dormant long enough to
give the state and its resi-
dents a chance to be ready.
“We are hoping that
Mother Nature gives us the
50 years that the Oregon Re-
silience Plan is based on,”
Rizzo said.
Next up:
• Sept. 9 — How well are
local agencies, the county,
cities and school districts,
preparing — and what more
needs to be done.
• Sept. 23 — What individ-
uals and families need to do
to be prepared for “the big
one.”
Have questions? Send
them to reporter Jolene Guz-
man at jguzman@polkio
and she’ll try and get them
answered.
Expansion on target for 2016
Grants received last month will get construction started
By Emily Mentzer
The Itemizer-Observer
MONMOUTH — Funding
for the Monmouth Senior
Center expansion project is
complete with a $90,000
grant awarded on Aug. 17 by
the Ford Family Foundation.
That, coupled with
$40,000 from Meyer Memo-
rial Trust, $30,000 from Ore-
gon Community Fund and
$15,000 from the Collins
Foundation, will be added to
the $127,000 raised by
Friends of the Monmouth
Senior Center and $120,000
donated by the city of Mon-
mouth.
Bids on construction of
the 2,133-square-foot addi-
tion will go out in the next
few weeks with expected
completion in 2016, said
Mark Fancey, Monmouth
community development
director.
The expansion plan has
been 10 years in the making,
starting out at a 3,600-
square-feet add-on costing
$800,000, Fancey said.
The city applied for a
Community Development
Block Grant to construct the
expansion, but the Senior
Advisory Board would have
to make policy changes to
either only allow people
older than the age of 60 in-
side the building, or to only
allow residents of Mon-
mouth.
The senior center serves
Monmouth and surround-
ing communities, including
sister city Independence,
which does not have its own
senior center.
The advisory board did not
want to make policy changes
as a condition of funding,
and so went back to fundrais-
ing and finding other av-
enues to pay for the project.
“The committee devel-
oped a revised plan …
(which) would add three
new meeting rooms, an ad-
ditional set of restrooms and
additional storage,” Fancey
said. The revised plan had
an estimated cost of
$370,000.
With the grant from the
Ford Family Foundation, the
total project has raised
$422,000.
Additional funds will be
used to either expand the
storage area further or possi-
bly add a solarium, Fancey
said.
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Solution on Page 6A
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