HomeMy WebLinkAboutStaff Report 6473
City of Palo Alto (ID # 6473)
City Council Staff Report
Report Type: Special Orders of the Day Meeting Date: 1/11/2016
City of Palo Alto Page 1
Summary Title: Palo Alto Certified as StormReady Community
Title: City of Palo Alto Certified as a StormReady Community
From: City Manager
Lead Department: Office of Emergency Services
Background
The National Weather Service (NWS) has developed a certification program known as
StormReady to guide other governmental agencies in becoming better prepared to deal with
storm emergencies. The City of Palo Alto’s Office of Emergency Services (OES) in cooperation
with the Public Works Department recently achieved all of the program requirements.
Discussion
As described by the NWS, StormReady is a nationwide community preparedness program that
uses a grassroots approach to help communities develop plans to handle all types of severe
weather—from tornadoes to tsunamis. The program encourages communities to take a new,
proactive approach to improving local hazardous weather operations by providing emergency
managers with clear-cut guidelines on how to improve their hazardous weather operations.
To be officially StormReady, a community must:
Establish a 24-hour warning point and emergency operations center
Have more than one way to receive severe weather warnings and forecasts and to alert
the public
Create a system that monitors weather conditions locally
Promote the importance of public readiness through community seminars
Develop a formal hazardous weather plan, which includes training severe weather
spotters and holding emergency exercises.
A representative of the National Weather Service will present the StormReady Community
certificate. Palo Alto is the only municipality in Santa Clara County to have achieved this rating.
The Santa Clara Valley Water District is the only special district in this county to have also done
so.