Disaster Course Held in Abu Dhabi
March 3, 2010 by CMCG Staff · Leave a Comment
CMCG teamed with the Litaker Group to provide a 3-day course entitled, “Disaster Management: An Introductory Course for Government, and the Healthcare Industry”, recently in Abu Dhabi, in the United Arab Emirates.
The three day course provided an interactive teaching atmosphere using case studies, best practices, and didactic interaction to cover, disaster planning, disaster response, and disaster recovery. On the final day, a simulated Table Top Exercise with full student participation was conducted to reinforce and apply the concepts learned.
The three presenters for the course were Dr. John Litaker, Managing Director of the Litaker Group, Ms. Julie Morrill and Robert Bradshaw, Managing Partner of CMCG.
Donna Bernard
February 28, 2010 by CMCG Staff · Leave a Comment
Donna Bernard is a Contingency Management Consulting Group senior consultant with over twenty years of leadership experience in the public health field. She has demonstrated emergency preparedness planning and training experience and is is an expert instructor and facilitator.
For CMCG, Ms. Bernard recently supported our Spectrum Health System pandemic flu workshop and the NASD Business Continuity Planning Workshop on pandemic flu as a technical consultant and presenter. She also served as CMCG’s lead developer for a point of dispensing exercise for Westchester County Health Department and supported public health emergency planning efforts for two regional projects in Massachusetts.
Ms. Bernard recently retired from the New York State Guard where she retired as a Major. She served as an administrator in the Westchester County Health Department and was active in many aspects of emergency response planning and training. She was directly responsible for planning, management and implementation of logistical support for the organization (400 employees in 6 sites). This included overseeing the areas of Facility Management, Bioterrorism preparedness, Information Technology and Contracts and procurement. In the area of emergency preparedness, she was directly responsible for bio-terrorism response plan writing, planning for infrastructure enhancement; coordination of staff training; responsible for intra and interdepartmental emergency response grant funded contractual deliverables required by the CDC (HRI grant). This included development of RFPs, facilitation of consultant training sessions;
She also worked on the county Radiological Emergency Plan. Due to Indian Point Power Plant’s location within Westchester County’s borders, she had direct responsibility for coordination of the various response activities for the Health Department as it pertained to Indian Point Radioactive Emergency Preparedness.
While with the county health department Ms. Bernard also worked directly with outside consultants to adapt the county’s own Health Management system into an Incident Command System for emergency management including creation of job action sheets, operational branches and, based on public health core competencies, facilitated didactic and functional training for all staff.
Other positions held with the county included Coordinator for Laboratory Services, Westchester County Department of Health, from 1982 to 1984. In this position she established and maintained a functional and uniform laboratory service within the Health Department; was responsible for the development of specific laboratory procedures; establishment of new facilities; and the maintenance of Quality Control
She began her public health career as a licensed Medical Technologist (ASCP Board Certified) in various hospital positions.
EDUCATION/TRAINING
M.S. Community Health/Health Administration, LIU
B.A. Biological Sciences: Herbert H. Lehman College
A.A.S. Medical Technology WCC
FEMA certified ICS/NIMS/Radiological Preparedness
Long and Fruitful Relationship
February 28, 2010 by CMCG Staff · Leave a Comment
Entergy has had a long and fruitful relationship with the CMCG team. CMCG has been a trusted source for emergency planning support at many of our ten nuclear power reactor sites in the United States and many of the state and local governments with which we partner to ensure a high level of emergency preparedness for protection of public health and safety.
Spectrum Health
February 28, 2010 by CMCG Staff · Leave a Comment
Pandemic Flu Exercise
In October 2008, Spectrum Health System in Central Michigan, received a competitive grant from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) through the State of Michigan to prepare a plan on how to deliver essential health care services during a pandemic influenza event. Spectrum Health coordinated this project in collaboration with providers in West and Central Michigan known in federal health care preparedness grant activities as Michigan Region 6. Project Partners established a number of committees and worked for nearly a year to develop a set of planning and operations guidelines that health care providers in a specific region could use to identify and provide essential health care services in a pandemic flu scenario.
After developing these draft proposed guidelines, the second phase of the grant proposed to test and validate the guidelines in an exercise. Spectrum Health coordinated a national search for a firm to assist in the design and conduct of this exercise. The competitive bid process resulted in proposals from nationally recognized firms as well as emergency preparedness consultants from within the State of Michigan. Contingency Management Consulting Group won the contract by demonstrating exceptional knowledge and expertise in the Homeland Security Exercise and Evaluation Program (HSEEP) guidelines, as well as public health and hospital emergency planning.
CMCG followed HSEEP guidelines to establish an Exercise Planning Team composed of members of the Spectrum and Region 6 coalition. CMCG’s consultants, which included public health and hospital emergency planning experts assisted in developing a challenging pandemic flu scenario tailored to Michigan Region 6. Three planning conferences were conducted to develop, review and refine exercise materials.
CMCG was challenged to think outside the box in order to develop an exercise conduct format that met all of the unique needs of Spectrum and its grant program. Ultimately, the exercise included elements of a traditional tabletop format, a workshop, and even a communications drill involving dispatchers using draft triage guidelines developed for a pandemic flu situation.
CMCG also supported conduct by providing a team of experienced and expert controllers and facilitators. By all accounts the exercise was a complete success, validating the draft planning guidelines developed by the Region’s committees. Nearly 50 organizations and over 130 individuals participated. The participant feedback forms, in a rating system from 1 to 5 with 5 being excellent, gave an average grade for most measures of the exercise of over 4.
Laura Borth
February 25, 2010 by CMCG Staff · Leave a Comment
Ms. Borth has over twenty years experience in emergency management. She recently joined Contingency Management Consulting Group (CMCG) as a senior level consultant after serving for several years as the Hazardous Materials Coordinator for Adams County, PA. At Adams County Emergency Management Agency she supported the efforts of the South Central Pennsylvania Counter-terrorism Task Force and was responsible for the county’s SARA Title III hazardous materials program. She is trained to the Hazardous Materials Technician level and is NFPA 472 Pro-board Certified.
For CMCG, she has controlled and evaluated down-dam exercises involving hazardous materials scenarios, and was assigned as a controller for the Indian Point Nuclear Power Plant exercise for the past several years. She is also currently serving as CMCG’s Project Manager for its contract with the North Central Task Force for the development of a law enforcement mutual aid plan.
As a consultant for various other firms, Ms Borth has worked in the all-hazards arena and in such functional areas of emergency management as hurricanes, nuclear power plants, and weapons of mass destruction, hazardous materials, oil spill pipelines, chemical stockpile emergency preparedness and the central artery tunnel project. She has trained adults in various disciplines including fire/EMS, law enforcement, public works, emergency operations center, health care and schools. She has worked at three nuclear power plant sites to develop the emergency plans, procedures and training in order to assist her team in obtaining a determination from FEMA that the public health and safety could be adequately protected.
Ms. Borth has also assisted the Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency in implementing the Department of Homeland Security’s Capability Assessment in 2007 by assisting in data collection.
Ms. Borth also assisted with the design of the Comprehensive Exercise Curriculum (CEC) and the first Consequences of Terrorism Course at the National Emergency Training Center (NETC).
Ms. Borth has a Bachelor of Arts degree from the Bloomsburg University and holds a certificate in Journalism.
