TVF&R maintains five incident management teams (IMTs),
rotating on-call status on a weekly basis. The teams provide strategic
incident management and support for incidents involving a large area,
long duration, technical or political complexity, extraordinary impact
on population, or any other aspect extending beyond routine response
capabilities. Team members are responsible for arranging coverage for
their position to account for regular duty schedules and vacation;
members are compensated for their on-call time as determined by their
bargaining-unit and exempt status. On-call team
positions include most standard Incident Command System (ICS)
Command and General Staff positions, plus some unique to TVF&R’s teams.
Teams are notified on all second alarms and
automatically dispatched on third alarms, but may be requested on any
incident in entirety or by position. Some positions have their own
response protocol: on-call Safety Officers respond on all incidents of
two alarms or greater (or by on-scene request). On-call PIOs respond on
all working fires and other noteworthy incidents, all IMT activations,
and by request. Aside from Safety and Public Information, the most
common position-specific request is for Logistics, to provide support
beyond standard rehab response on incidents of long duration (e.g.,
portable toilets, fencing, meals). In addition, an on-scene
Incident Commander may request a partial activation of the Incident
Management
Team to an incident (e.g., Logistics only). As situations require,
teams may be dispatched to staff TVF&R's
Fire
Operations Center (FOC) and/or assist in staffing city and county
emergency operations centers (EOCs).
All Incident Management Team members must fulfill
educational requirements and participate in regular training and
exercises. In addition to standard training and drills for their
regular assignments, IMT members receive a variety of training
opportunities related to their team role. Position-specific classes are
offered in-house, with applications geared to local protocols, district
operations, and regional capabilities. Team members also may enroll in
external classes depending on availability, and several members also
serve on incident management teams through Oregon’s Office of the State
Fire Marshal. As a group, all five teams receive combined training
three times per year, which includes a full-scale or functional
exercise.
When an IMT is responds to
an incident scene, the IMT IC commonly performs a face-to-face transfer
of command, and the relieved “original” IC becomes the Operations
Section Chief within the command structure. This maintains operational
continuity while transferring other responsibilities and concerns to the
IMT, which includes maintaining the capability to provide emergency
services throughout TVF&R’s district, i.e., maintaining crew and
duty-chief coverage according to predetermined minimum standards.
TVF&R staffs most of the Deputy Incident Commander positions with non-TVF&R employees; they are senior staff members of
some of the cities within district boundaries. Bringing senior public
works and police department staff into the IMTs helps promulgate ICS and
emergency preparedness in the cities and counties that compose TVF&R’s
district, as well as serving the more political purposes already
discussed. City representatives functioning as DICs can serve as champions
for adopting ICS and taking basic preparedness steps within their own
organization. During incidents, the DICs provide general representation
for municipal responders and, if the incident is within their
municipality, may become part of a Unified Command. As many major
incidents require local law and public works response, TVF&R’s DICs can
provide ready contacts with their peers elsewhere in the district, thus
filling some Liaison Officer functions as well. Beyond their function
as police and public works representatives, however, the DICs help
provide the Incident Commander a more global perspective. As non-fire
personnel, they can look outside the fire service “box” to ensure that
relevant input from other sources is included and that other agencies
are kept in the loop.
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The Operations Section hosts two
unconventional positions: District Operations Chief and Company Officer.
The District Operations Chief is tasked with assessing and
maintaining adequate district coverage by crews and duty chiefs,
in coordination with the independent dispatch entity that serves TVF&R
and all of Washington County; the District Operations Chief may be sent
directly to the 9-1-1 center to accomplish this. Coverage is maintained
primarily through move-ups (using TVF&R and neighboring agency
resources), and assembly and dispatch of task forces in place of
standard alarm assignments, as determined by resource availability and
call volume. The District Operations Chief is also responsible
for determining the need for and implementing personnel callbacks and
staffing of reserve apparatus to maintain coverage.
The
Company Officer position is developmental and voluntary, and does
not require coverage arrangements for shift schedules or leave time.
It provides TVF&R Captains and Lieutenants the opportunity to learn
more about managing large and complex incidents. Company Officers are
encouraged not just to learn by observation, but to select an area of
interest and train for that position. As the position evolves, a
future task for Company Officers may be to serve as a tactical
observer for the Operations Chief, moving around the perimeter of an
incident to provide Operations with a continually updated picture
(verbally and through photos or drawings) of incident status. This
concept is adapted from Portland Fire & Rescue, for whom it has been
fruitful on large incidents.
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TVF&R enhances its IMTs by emphasizing the
functions of the Planning and Logistics Sections. For most incidents
(and in most agencies) ICS staffing is centered around Command and
Operations functions, because most incidents are short enough that the
support functions in ICS, Planning, Logistics, and
Finance/Administration are not needed or can easily be handled by
standard protocols (e.g., rehab). Incidents that require IMT activation
are more likely to require longer-term support functions. Most of TVF&R’s
Logistics and Planning Chiefs are non-line personnel, many with no
background in response: only four out of 14 (including shared positions
that allow for shift schedules) are line officers or duty chiefs, and
some of those line officers were recruited from the Company Officer
position.
Planning Section
functions include monitoring Situation Status (SitStat) and Resource
Status (ReStat), as well as conducting the planning process for an
incident: all of this is applied information management.
The Logistics Section is tasked
with providing any material, service, and personnel support for incident
response, e.g., food, drinking water, sanitation, temporary facilities,
communications support, vehicle and equipment support. In addition, TVF&R's
Logistics Chiefs fill a victim-services role in incident response. Although there are many effective
agencies dedicated with providing temporary shelter, food, supplies, and
social services, TVF&R is likely to be the first agency victims
encounter in an emergency and does not want to see anyone fall through
the cracks. In addition to carrying resource
directories for response needs, Logistics Chiefs also carry directories
for a variety of social services, and have become accustomed to
contacting social-service providers (public and private), translators,
insurance companies, pharmacies, family members, and any other services
that might be necessary until dedicated providers can take over.
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For more information contact
Jeff Rubin, Emergency Manager:
(503) 642-0399
