Community Utilities, facilities, and services
Emergency Services
Resilient communities are better able to withstand and recover from disasters. Two key elements of resilience are emergency planning and preparedness. Comprehensive emergency planning is achieved by mitigating potential hazards through implementation of sound land use practices and establishing emergency procedures to guide effective response and recovery. Community experiences during and following Tropical Storm Irene in 2011 and the flooding of July 2023 revealed the importance of direct emergency preparedness, achieved through having the infrastructure and resources, trained personnel, and emergency services in place to respond swiftly and effectively.
Emergency Planning
Vermont Emergency Management contracts with most Vermont regional planning commissions to assist towns with emergency planning. Statewide, this has changed emergency planning from a top-down system to a more locally and regionally coordinated process. The WRC coordinates with Vermont Emergency Management (VEM), the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), local emergency responders and emergency management directors, mutual aid organizations, the Red Cross, the Vermont Agency of Transportation, the State Emergency Response Commission and other regional planning commissions to continually promote emergency planning and disaster resilience for our member towns.
Building disaster-resilient communities through sound land use planning is a primary goal of emergency planning. Emergency planning involves prevention, preparedness, response, recovery and mitigation. Prevention and mitigation involve strategies aimed at vulnerability reduction or elimination to protect and/or relocate public and private property away from predictable hazards. Preparedness planning involves having the appropriate policies, plans, protocols, training and equipment in place prior to an event. Response planning is both creating tools to assist towns with their own on-the-ground response efforts and ensuring that they have what is needed for that response. It also involves up and down information sharing between state agencies and towns during and after events. At the planning level, recovery involves short- and long-term actions taken to assist towns with recovering to a less vulnerable state and it involves coordination across many organizational boundaries. In short, accidents and natural hazard events will always happen; the extent to which they become emergencies or disasters is partly a function of readiness.
With the enactment of the Federal Emergency Planning and Community Right-to-Know Act (EPCRA) of 1986, Congress imposed upon state and local governments additional planning and preparedness requirements for emergencies involving the release or spill of hazardous materials. Provisions of this law require that facilities with hazardous materials stored on-site report these products to local fire departments, the Local Emergency Planning Committee (LEPC) and the State Emergency Response Commission (SERC). VEM and the SERC have organized the LEPC structure to form a statewide LEPC that fulfills EPCRA requirements with Regional Emergency Management Committees (REMC)in place to maintain local engagement. WRC provides administrative support for the Windham REMC. Membership is composed of two REMC appointees from each member town: the local emergency management director and a second interested volunteer who is actively a part of an emergency response organization serving the Windham Region. REMC meetings cover requested topics or the latest emergency management issue facing the region and provide opportunities for networking, skill sharing, problem solving and learning. The WRC also has an Emergency Planning Committee to provide an opportunity for commissioner engagement in the work of the WRC that is supported by funding through the Emergency Management Planning Grant, to develop effective strategies to support emergency planning within towns, and to develop a cadre of commissioners to supplement staff in the event of another large-scale disaster.
Response assistance for all types of emergencies may be provided by local and Vermont State Police, local fire companies, public works departments, state agencies, the local Red Cross Chapter and private contractors. Other disaster relief services, such as emergency shelters, are provided by these same local response organizations, and may be coordinated with FEMA or state agencies, as appropriate. The role of Regional Planning Commissions (RPCs) in disaster response and recovery is defined through a comprehensive memorandum of understanding (MOU) between the RPCs and VEM. This MOU recognizes the essential and varied emergency response and recovery roles RPCs have assumed both within their own regions in support of their towns, in the provision of assistance to sister regions, and at the State Emergency Operations Center.
Emergency Preparedness and cross-town efforts
National Incident Management System (NIMS) provides a consistent nationwide framework and approach to enable government at all levels, the private sector, and non-governmental organizations to coordinate response and recovery efforts. NIMS trains emergency responders from different jurisdictions and disciplines to work together effectively and efficiently in response to natural disasters and emergencies, including acts of terrorism. One of the major elements of the Command and Management component of NIMS is the Incident Command System (ICS). ICS is used to organize on-scene operations for, ranging from small to complex incidents, both planned (such as a parade or holiday event), and unexpected, such as the sudden onset of a natural or man-made disaster. ICS is structured to facilitate activities in five major functional areas: Command, Operations, Planning, Logistics and Finance/Administration. ICS is used by all levels of government – federal, state, tribal and local. VEM and the FEMA provide in-person and virtual training in ICS throughout the year. These and other emergency management trainings can be found on the Learning Management System. WRC promotes the importance of training all town employees in ICS 100, which is the most basic level.
WRC works or has worked with the vast majority of member towns to develop or update a Local Hazard Mitigation Plan. FEMA approved Local Hazard Mitigation Plans are critical in helping towns to identify their vulnerabilities to natural hazards, determine the level of risk and the potential impact of those hazards, and to ultimately develop strategies to mitigate the loss to property or lives which could result from those hazards. The WRC helps member towns understand the significance of natural land processes and how such knowledge should inform their land use decisions, i.e.: where to build, and where not to build. Workshops and trainings with experts in various fields of emergency planning are held occasionally for town officials and interested members of the public. These events are a way of bringing officials from the region’s towns together to meet one another, develop cross-town communications networks, and come away with new knowledge about how to plan for and manage emergency events.
Each major hazard event we experience teaches lessons about emergency preparedness. Towns now know how critical it is to have a consistent and thorough documentation mechanism in place to keep track of all recovery and repair work for reimbursement purposes. Towns also realize the importance of keeping their emergency shelters ready and fully functional in the case of an event that displaces people from their homes. The Red Cross Local Shelter Initiative is able to offer towns permanent supplies of cots, blankets, and pillows for their local shelter, as long as the space is capable of meeting Red Cross standards and the town recruits a separate pool of volunteers, not including town officials and first responders, who will be trained for emergency shelter operations. In many towns it is a challenge to find and keep up to date volunteers for this task. Towns must also have staff trained and ready to run the town Emergency Operations Centers (EOC) where response efforts are coordinated at the local level. Other practical steps for towns to increase their resiliency are: to develop interoperability of communications between fire, police, road crew, and town officials; have hydraulic and hydrologic studies for road/culvert/bridge improvements done in advance; and create detailed capital improvement budget plans to implement the mitigation strategies in their Hazard Mitigation Plan.
fire
Most towns in the region have local fire-fighting capacity within their boundaries. The towns of Brattleboro and Wilmington and the villages of Bellows Falls and Saxtons River have fire departments which are also divisions of local government. The remaining towns are served by privately incorporated volunteer fire companies and some are partially staffed by paid firefighters. Many of these private fire companies receive a significant amount of their funding from the towns they serve, but they operate successfully because of the dedication of the fire company personnel who volunteer their services and a great deal of their time. Several towns have more than one fire company within their boundaries to better serve different areas. Only Athens, Searsburg, and Somerset do not have local fire companies. Athens is served by the Saxtons River fire department. Searsburg and Somerset are served by the Wilmington Fire Department.
All of the region's fire companies are members of mutual aid systems, associations that allow local fire companies to receive fire fighting assistance or back up service from other member fire companies. There are five mutual aid systems that serve Windham Region towns: Keene Mutual Aid, Tri-State Mutual Aid, Tri Mountain Mutual Aid, and Deerfield Valley Mutual Aid. Some towns belong to more than one mutual aid system. These types of mutual aid systems are critical for providing emergency response services given that many communities in the region have small fire departments with limited equipment and personnel.
Increasingly, the lack of volunteer fire fighters and rescue personnel threatens to seriously compromise the effectiveness of the region's fire companies and emergency medical squads. As is true for many fire services nationwide, limited discretionary time at work, increased cost, increased training demands, and an aging population of fire service personnel combine to restrict volunteers' availability. Additionally, many fire departments are seeing increased calls to respond to medical emergencies and there is a need for properly trained personnel for these service calls.
Emergency Medical Services
First response squads respond to calls for emergency medical service by getting to the injured person as soon as possible and stabilizing the person's condition until a licensed emergency medical transport vehicle arrives. Many members of these local rescue squads also volunteer to use their own vehicles and equipment to respond to calls for emergency medical services when contacted by a mutual aid system or other dispatching service. The following towns maintain volunteer first response squads: Brattleboro, Dover, Dummerston, Grafton, Guilford, Halifax, Jamaica, Marlboro, Putney, Rockingham, Vernon, Wardsboro, Westminster, Whitingham, and Winhall.
Five ambulance/rescue squads provide emergency ambulance services between towns and health care facilities. The professional and private State-licensed ambulance services include Deerfield Valley Rescue (Wilmington), Rescue, Inc. (Brattleboro & Townshend), Golden Cross Ambulance (Rockingham & Westminster), and Londonderry Volunteer Rescue Squad. Other entities outside of the region provide back-up service to these companies through mutual aid agreements. In addition, C&S Wholesale Grocers has a full-time rescue squad for its facility in Brattleboro which will respond to Mutual Aid calls as needed. Stratton Mountain Rescue functions during winter months only.
police
Law enforcement is organized into town and village police departments, the Windham County Sheriff's Department, and the Vermont State Police. The Village of Bellows Falls and the towns of Brattleboro, Dover, Winhall, and Wilmington have municipal police departments. Towns are allowed by Vermont Statute to employ constables, although the level of activity and authority of constables varies. Typical duties of a town constable include patrolling at sporting and community events and serving court summonses.
The Windham County Sheriff's Department has contracts with towns for the provision of service. The towns of Dummerston, Halifax, Jamaica, Marlboro, Newfane, Putney, Rockingham, Vernon, Westminster, and Windham have contracts with the Windham County Sherriff. This Department also has contracts for police protection with schools (Dummerston Elementary, Leland and Gray, and Windham Central Supervisory Union), Saxtons River Village and Newfane Village. The County Sheriff's Department responds to calls in towns that do not have contracts and which do not have their own police department; however, this service is provided only when staff is available and the Department is not responding to more urgent calls. The County Sheriff's Department also provides backup support to town police departments and the Vermont State Police when requested.
Troop B1 of the Vermont State Police serves the majority of the Windham Region out of their station in Westminster. The western towns of Readsboro, Searsburg, Somerset, Stratton and Winhall are served by Troup B3 of Shaftsbury. Vermont State Police provide backup assistance to towns that have their own police departments (sometimes through contract) and often provide primary police service to towns which do not have their own police squads and do not contract with the Windham County Sheriff's Office for service. The Vermont State Police has primary responsibility for patrolling Interstate 91.
Law enforcement is a problem for many towns in the region, especially since only five municipalities have police departments. Traffic and speed enforcement continue to be issues that towns are struggling to address. Other concerns include slow response times and drug trafficking, especially along the Interstate 91 corridor.
enhanced 911
The rural pattern of development in the Windham Region can present frustrating and potentially life-threatening delays to callers, dispatchers and emergency responders. The Vermont Enhanced 911 (E911) emergency calling system was developed to reduce these delays through a statewide system of street or road addresses linked to telephone numbers and to mapped locations. Each town regularly updates its street address data and forwards the information to the State E911 board.