Citizens of oakland respond to emergencies

In Oakland, California in the United States, the Citizens of Oakland Respond to Emergencies (CORE), is a City of Oakland program that provides free training for individuals, neighborhoods and organizations throughout communities. When a major disaster overcomes first responders most citizens will be on their own for the first 3 to 5 days.

The CORE program teaches skills for individual self-reliance and neighborhood establishment of an incident command center and response teams to care for the neighborhood until professional emergency personnel can respond.

CORE classes educate and empower through lectures and demonstrations. each teaches basic emergency preparedness and response curriculum. The curriculum is addapted to the needs of the elderly and the disabled, residents of apartments and condominiums, and public and private sector employees.

CORE provides manuals in Spanish and Chinese. Translators and interpreters assist in providing CORE to many language groups throughout Oakland.

About CORE

The mission of CORE is to promote the spirit of neighbor helping neighbor and provide the highest quality emergency and disaster prevention, preparedness and, response training.

Since it began in 1990, the CORE program has provided free, community-based training to more than 17,000 residents. CORE is a model for community and city-wide collaboration. It was one of the first community emergency response team curriculums developed.

Advisory Task Force

The CORE Advisory Task Force collects feedback from the community. Task Force members include neighborhood leaders, Oakland Fire Department representatives, employees of the city of Oakland, and business representatives. Each brings perspectives, expertise and resources.

History

The City of Oakland was rocked in 1989 by the Loma Prieta earthquake. The earthquake created significant damage in Oakland. This immediately strained resources of the first responder system - police, firefighters and paramedics.

The Oakland Fire Department's Office of Emergency Services responded by developing the CORE program to empower citizens and to increase self-sufficientcy in emergencies and disasters.

Oakland was again shocked when the Oakland Berkeley Hills Firestorm occurred in 1991. This destruction and trauma emphasized the importance of expanding CORE's curriculum to encompass fire prevention and suppression. Soon afterwards CORE became a multi-hazard training program to include preparedness and response to earthquake, fire, chemical accidents, severe weather, and terrorism.

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