By jamie dougher
Staff Writer
In an effort to expedite emergency response tactics, Middlesex County officials recently created the Office of Terrorism Preparedness and Planning.
The office is comprised of Middlesex County department heads and senior county officials who will work to provide a timely emergency response to the county’s 25 municipalities in the event of a terrorism-related disaster.
Some of the departments that come under the office’s jurisdiction include the Department of Public Health, the Office of Emergency Management, the county Road Department, the Middlesex County Sheriff’s Office and the Board of Chosen Freeholders.
The office does not duplicate mechanisms already in existence; instead, it combines the procedures outlined by various county departments in their individual response protocols for a terrorist attack.
David Papi, director of the public health department, said the mission of the office is "to coordinate the activities of all Middlesex County governmental departments to provide a unified response capability in the event of an emergency or a weapons-of-mass-destruction event."
Papi said the office acts as a vehicle to enable the various departments involved in emergency responses to meet and determine the services each body offers and how the services will be accessed in a time of crisis.
The office transcends various levels of government to consolidate the efforts of the county to keep its residents safe, he said.
Papi said the office will clarify the county’s responses to various levels of terrorism alerts. "We have to put the county in different states of readiness," he said.
Middlesex County Freeholders John Pulomena and Chris Rafano helped orchestrate the formation of the office. Papi said the office might be the first of its kind in the state.
"The origin did not come from another county," he said.
Papi offered the example of a bioterrorism event to demonstrate how the office is a necessity in times of crisis.
He said if a population needs a vaccine for a disease such as smallpox, there are a myriad of processes that have to happen to provide the vaccine to the community. The office exists to coordinate those activities, he said.
For example, he said locations for clinics would have to be predetermined to ensure successful operation, in addition to the doctors and nurses who are going to be on hand to administer the vaccines, transportation for residents, road signs to direct people and police officers to keep order.
"I think any time you can coordinate your efforts in an organized way, … you’re going to be that much more organized and be able to hopefully save some lives," Papi said.
"We have been training, we have been planning, and this will help put the last piece in for coordination," he said.