Texas officials planned on NIMS for Dean response | 08.22.2007 | 07:55:25 | Views: 5899 | ID: August 22 '07: Earlier last week when initial forecasts had predicted a possible Texas landfall for Hurricane Dean, Texas officials immediately began to plan their response and evacuation scenarios. The Houston Chronicle reported that Governor Rick Perry and state emergency officials would have worked under the National Incident Management System (NIMS) to coordinate a broad-base of operational management and cooperation. According the Chronicle, the NIMS "calls for a multiagency committee to coordinate the actions of regional jurisdiction. Here (in Texas), that's a committee of 15 people, including 13 county judges and the mayors of Houston and Galveston. The committee will not usurp local control, but, rather, will coordinate decisions that have regional implications." When the NIMS was formed, the federal government mandated all states, territories, tribal nations and U.S. protectorates to adopt the guidelines issued through NIMS. In Texas, the Chronicle reported that the regional response committee was responsible for coordinating possible evacuation routes, providing evacuation buses and stationing fuel trucks along those routes to help move residents out of low-lying areas. Additionally, a regional communication system was set up that would "allow Galveston County to inform Houston officials on the pace of any exodus so the city [could] time its evacuation and keep traffic to a minimum."(Click below to download file) national-incident-management-system.pdf
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