Exercise Development Plan

Player Guide

Exercise Player Guide

CUEPCOM
Exercise

Exercise Date: July 10, 2008

NW Oregon Health Preparedness Organization

Purpose and Scope

This guide provides exercise players with information required to participate effectively in the CUEPCOM exercise. This information will also be discussed at the player briefing at the simulation cell* prior to the start of exercise play. The players are free to ask questions concerning their roles and responsibilities and the rules of exercise play.

*The simulation cell is a physical location where the PIO and Community Connectors will make calls from.

Play Concept

Overview

The Northwest Oregon Health Preparedness Organization (HPO) is a partnership between public health and private health organizations that was formed in the fall of 2001. The goal of the HPO is to plan for large-scale health emergencies so that the community can respond effectively and efficiently to protect the public’s health. An important part of the emergency response is developing strategies and networks to communicate effectively with culturally-specific populations. The HPO’s leadership determined that in an emergency, the needs of culturally-specific and other special populations is a priority. The Cultures Uniting for Emergency Preparedness (CUEP) Project was created with the goal that:

Methods for communicating with culturally specific populations in an emergency will be clearly defined, and enhanced, in order to improve the timely distribution of information. As a result, culturally-specific populations throughout the region will receive, understand, trust, and be able to act upon the information they receive.

Community-based organizations (CBOs) developed culturally-specific communication plans and methods for African American, Latino, Native American, Asian, and African and Russian immigrants and refugee communities. Public Health Disaster Activation and Notification Procedures for Community Connectors and Community-Based Organizations was produced in order to activate the Multnomah County Health Department Community Connectors and notify Community-Based Organizations in the event of a developing or expanding large-scale public health emergency.

Exercise Purpose

Exercise the Public Health Disaster Activation and Notification Procedures for Community Connectors and Community-Based Organizations.

Exercise Objectives

Public Information Officer activates Multnomah County Community Connectors either directly or through an assistant PIO responsible for community relations.

Community Connectors work under the direction of the PIO and support public information/risk communication measures.

PIO provides event-specific content to Community Connectors including but not limited to:

 Information about the event and desired actions by community to protect selves, families, and reduce burden on responders

 When/where more information will be available

 Where communities can access information independently (i.e. internet, designated phone lines)

Community Connectors rapidly inform Community-Based Organizations of an event, general risks they can correlate to their communities, and requested actions by CBOs.

CBOs contact community members to notify community of impending health emergency utilizing internal communications plans and contact lists.

Exercise Scenario

The functional exercise begins at 0900 on July 10, 2008. The simulation cell will close at 1300 on July 10, 2008. The scenario is an impending extended period of unseasonably hot weather.

Exercise Play

The exercise starts at the simulation cell with a briefing at 0900 by the PIO to the Community Connectors about an impending extended period of unseasonably hot weather. Following the briefing, Community Connectors will call CBOs until 1100. When contacted, CBOs will contact community members. CBOs will determine how much time they want to contact community members, and have until July 16th to conclude exercising their plans.

For the purpose of this exercise, CBOs can contact Community Connectors and the Public Information Officer at either (503) 936-1207 or (503) 988-6700 if they have exercise questions, or have information about the following:

 Anticipated impact on the community

 How the community is responding to the event

 Assessment of community reception of messages about the event

 Factors influencing their response to the event

 Particular needs the community has related to the event

The simulation cell will close at 1:00pm on Thursday, July 10th. However, the PIO will be available to exercise participants by cell phone until July 16th for URGENT questions that arise ABOUT THE EXERCISE OR EVENTS that occur as a result of the exercise.

PHONE: (503) 936-1207

Exercise Locations and Hours of Operation

Thursday, July 10th Hours of Operation:

Simulation Cell 0900-1300

Multnomah County Emergency Operations Center (EOC)

501 SE Hawthorne Boulevard

Basement Level

Portland OR

Community-Based Organizations (participating at their offices):0900 until they have made all desired contacts within pre-determined scope

African American Health Coalition
Asian Health & Service Center
El Programa Hispano-Catholic Charities
Hacienda CDC
Immigrant & Refugee Community
Native American Rehabilitation Association
Russian Oregon Social Services

Exercise Rules

 Real emergencies take priority over exercise play. If a real-world incident occurs, play will be stopped by controllers and a determination that to either suspend, cancel, or to continue play will be made. A decision to terminate or suspend play will be followed by an “EMERGENCY EXERCISE SUSPENSION/TERMINATION” message transmitted to all participating organizations.

If controllers need to temporarily stop exercise play, “TIMEOUT” will be the designated phrase.
Players will apply existing plans, policies, and procedures. In the absence of appropriate written instructions, players will be expected to apply individual initiative and common sense.

Disaster response plans, policies, and procedures applied during the exercise should depict actions that would be expected to occur under actual response conditions and, therefore, provide a sound basis for evaluation.

Actions to direct unit, personnel, or resource deployments will result in simulated movement during the exercise.
Written and voice communications made during the exercise will begin and end with the statement that, “THIS IS AN EXERCISE”.

Public Information

Jurisdictional/Facility

No real time media activities are planned for this exercise. The public information situation will be provided by the controllers. Participants can fit that information to their communities.

Communications

All normal and back-up communication devices may be used (telephones, cell phones, e-mail, etc).
All exercise participants making calls to exercise participants will identify their position, which agency they are simulating, and who they wish to communicate with.
Written and voice communications made during the exercise will begin and end with the words, “THIS IS AN EXERCISE”.

Exercise Simulation

Important instructions for participants:

If speaking with an individual who is not an exercise participant, ensure that they are clear that this is an exercise and that the scenario is not real. No actual actions should be taken that would disrupt normal services or incur expenses.

Reporting and Evaluation

Reporting

All participants are expected to maintain records of actions taken during the exercise:

PIO records include but are not limited to:

 Community Connectors notified of activation

 Community Connectors who reported for duty (including sign-in sheet)

 Activities of Community Connectors under direction of PIO

 Other PIO exercise-related activities

Community Connector records include but are not limited to:

 CBOs called

 CBOs contacted

 Outcome of contact

 Feedback received from CBOs

 PIO exercise-related activities

 Other Community Connector exercise-related activities

Community-Based Organization records include but are not limited to:

 Agencies/individuals called

 Results of calls (if contacted, left message, call returned, not reached, secondary contact called, etc.)

 Feedback received from community on:

Anticipated impact on the community
How the community is responding to the event
Assessment of community reception of messages about the event
Factors influencing their response to the event
Particular needs the community has related to the event

 Other CBO exercise-related activities

Evaluation

All exercise participants, controllers, and evaluators are expected to complete an exercise evaluation form. PIO and Community Connectors will participate in a hot wash following the exercise to capture comments about any action, event, strength, or weakness that was observed during the exercise. An exercise debriefing is scheduled for CBOs on August 4, 2008 from 0900-1200 at the Multnomah Building, 501 SE Hawthorne Boulevard, Conference Room 315, Portland OR.

Records and evaluations are to be submitted to the following address by July 28th:

Kathryn Richer

Region 1 Coordinator

NW Oregon Health Preparedness Organization

426 SW Stark Street, 8th Floor

Portland, Oregon 97204

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