IceStorm 98 Study

When the decision was made to have the Emergency Control Centre in City Hall, Gardner Church asked me to make way for a control centre. I chose this department because it has the most computer terminals and telephones all in one spot. I spent about two days working here because the people who would come weren't familiar with the building and the computer system, the phone system, the photocopier, and the fax. After a couple of days, things became more organized and Donna Pothaar, a communications specialist in my department, began attending the meetings and preparing press releases. I had some of my staff come in and do clerical work and assist Donna. The first few days were spent showing people the building, etc. and then we moved on to communications because that became a real need.

When did you first realize how bad the storm was?

I had an 8:30 January 8 meeting at Tercentennial Lodge. It was just like a war zone in that area with branches and wires down. I couldn't get through any of the side streets and there was a sign on the door saying that the meeting was cancelled. So I came back to City Hall where I spoke with Gardner Church. I worked 16 hour days for the next two days and then Bell began to work on the communications. We had people working around the clock.

What were the first things that were prioritized in terms of initial strategy once everyone knew what they had on their hands?

Most important was to get the shelters set up. We had someone looking after drivers, someone looking after generators, and cots etc. People were calling from other municipalities wanting to send workers to help and of course the military came to help also.

What about your responsibilities in terms of communications?

It was really tricky because of the 8 or 9 usual media sources that we normally deal with, most of them were down. The word just wasn't getting out and people were wondering what was happening. CKWS and CFOX were down.

From your perspective or the people you were working with, the question of money, given the exceptional circumstances, were people thinking about that?

Denis Leger, our financial expert, was certainly thinking about it. My assistant helped him set up a system that documented every single thing we were doing as we were doing it so that we wouldn't lose track. Even though there were lots of donations, there was a transfer of money that had to be spent very quickly. We had this system in place by the end of the first day.

What about authority? Did you take initiative yourself and the people you work with immediately or was it still quite structured?

In terms of spending money it was very structured.

What about other initiatives? Was there a lot of ad hoc or was there a lot of waiting about to see what others were doing or saying?

No. I think Lance Thurston's department moved right in and got things working in terms of the shelters being up. The trouble was that then they would go down (loose power). So that made communications a bit tough.

So the normal chain of command was more or less intact or was it a bit more flexible?

I think with respect to spending it was pretty close. Certain people were put in charge of areas where they had no expertise and it worked fine.

Who made the decisions? Did you find that you had to make more yourself?

No. All of the communications went out and obviously we had trouble getting information. We would wait around and attend these meetings. But until we actually got Jim Keech in here and the fire chief and all those people to report around the table, we weren't able to communicate Most of the information came from those meetings and updates came from client services on the shelters. One of the things I will be doing is preparing an internal departmental plan for emergencies so that the internal communication is better so that ultimately external communication will be more up to date. The buses which were used as shelters were a success. The military handed out flyers containing information.

What worked well and what didn't?

We didn't have time to prepare for this storm and no one had looked at the emergency plan which had just been adopted at the last meeting of the transition board in December. Given that the new city had just been formed, I think we did quite well.

In the event of another disaster, how would you proceed differently?

I would establish a protocol in terms of the internal communications in order to get the information regularly so that we can get it out to the people. Information just wasn't forthcoming quickly enough. In future, you would hope to make initial contacts immediately so that you can set something up right from the beginning.

What about in terms of the provincial and federal links and their eventual responses? How did you find them from your department's point of view?

That was pretty much handled by the mayor. I had to officially notify the province that the mayor had proclaimed a state of emergency. I also know that the mayor was flying over the area with Jean Chretien in a helicopter, so the government did respond.

How did you and the people you work with deal with the stress factor?

Overall, fairly well. There were some individuals who probably stayed too many hours, but they wanted to and so they did. We had some volunteers who put in tremendous hours. Overall, I would say it wasn't too bad.

Any anecdotal, funny, or close-call moments that stand out?

I found it amazing when you come down to City Hall to work at 7 in the morning and leave around midnight, it's like one world and then you go on to the real world. Kids would be lined up at the bars and having a good time - almost like nothing was going on for the younger people. In my own home, the power wasn't off hardly at all. There were parts of the city that went on just as normal. Some students would call to see how long the power outage was expected to go on. Some of them took buses and went home for a few days.

Do you think this will have a good long-term effect on the team itself at City Hall?

If you were one of the people doing the hands-on work and getting some gratification in terms of really helping people, maybe so. But when you are in administration, it's not the same.