Meeting March 15, 2003
Meeting March15, 2003 Official minutes
MEMBERS PRESENT: Art Jordan, Glenn Schultz, Wanda Hightower, Brooks Hanford, Jim Peters, Jim Brewer
GUESTS PRESENT: Chuck Dunnavant, Sarah Jordan, Steve Reddington, Jim Hightower, Scott Miller.
Next SARVAC Meeting: May 17, 2003
SARVAC‘s mailing address the address as follows:
SARVAC
Washington EMD
Camp Murray WA 98430-5122
The next meeting dates as follows: May 17 & 18, 2003, Conference Spokane time & place to be announced. September 14, 2003, Board Meeting 9:30 a.m.
General meeting 1:00 p.m. Council Chamber Conference on 102 N. Pearl, Ellensburg WA November 21, 2003, Camp Murray EOC Board meeting 9:30 a.m. General meeting 1:00 p.m.
Meeting was called to order at 1:15 p.m.
Introductions: Scott Miller, Okanogan County; Chuck Dunnavant, Cowlitz County; Steve Reddington, Cowlitz County
Election of officers:
Jim Brewer withdrew his name for the position of vice-president. Jim Peters was nominated for the position by Art Jordan on behalf of Sharon Fisher who was unable to attend. The other nominations from the November meeting were Sarah Jordan for secretary and Wanda Hightower for Member-at-Large. It was moved by Brooks Hanford and seconded by Jim Peters that unanimous ballot be passed by the secretary. It passed and the new officers were welcomed.
Acceptance of the minutes.
Executive Board Report:
Terry Lawrence shared with the group information from the most recent WASARC meeting. The 832nd is the new Army Air Guard that is stationed at Fort Lewis replacing the 54th. It is a medical company out of Wisconsin. This unit is very interested in joint training with SAR groups. Requests for training, however, must come from the county's SAR coordinator from the SheriffŐs Office.
Terry also reported that Washington Aeronautical Charts with the state SAR grid system are available free for the asking from Carl Moore at 1-800-552-0666 or P.O. Box 3367 Arlington, WA 98223.
In addition, Terry shared about Senate Bill 5045, a bill that would take away individual counties' ability to monitor emergency workers and that would make the responsibility of registering emergency workers the stateŐs responsibility. The WASARCA board wrote a letter in opposition to the bill last month, but has received no reply from Senator Roach. Brooks Hanford moved that SARVAC oppose this Senate Bill and Jim Peters seconded the motion. Art was given the task of representing SARVACŐs view by writing a letter and/or testifying if the bill gets to committee.
President's Report:
Art represents SARVAC on the Governor's Emergency Management Council. As Homeland Security funds for First Responder Training become available, he will work to have SAR recognized officially as First Responders.
Secretary's Report:
Annual statements have been mailed out to be returned to Sharon Fisher. A new SARVAC membership data sheet needs to be made. Wanda will support the new secretary any way she can.
Treasurer's Report:
Sharon was unable to attend. Wanda had hats, patches, and transfers made with the SARVAC logo on them. She sold over $170 worth (just under half of the cost to purchase the items) to those attending the meeting. Wanda will send the bill for the balance to Sharon to pay.
Cowlitz County paid $50 for 2003 dues to Wanda.
Committee reports:
Training is on hold till Standards are completed.
Snohomish: None
Kitsap: We went to Key Peninsula January 26-27 for 2 days in January to look for a 65 YO male missing for 2 days. The search was suspended after his cell phone was used during the search and other background information came up. It was decided to let law enforcement continue their investigation to see if the search would be renewed.
We had a callout at midnight Saturday Feb. 1 during training to go to Pierce County. It was decided not to respond as we had teams out in the field. We would have to leave not long after arriving to keep under our 48-hour rule and our members had already depleted supplies in their 48-hour pack. We told State that we could respond Monday if still needed.
Feb. 6 Callout for a missing 7 YO girl missing 1 hour. She was located as we were starting the callout.
Feb. 14 Callout for a 40 YO despondent female missing 8 hours. She was found 2 miles away as we were responding.
Feb. 20 Search for a 50 YO male missing after his car was found rolled and totaled the night before. He was spotted leaving the area. This was 20 hours after the crash. We think we woke him up and he was leaving at the time. He didnŐt admit to his name when questioned so the team called it in as he matched the description of the missing man. The Deputy was finally able to get him to admit to his name. Great job!
Training: We have finished training for the year except for our recerts and expect to graduate 15 new brushmonkeys.
Fundraising: We will be parking cars at the 2003 Kitsap County fair.
Jefferson: One mission. A 49 year old male was ill but wouldnŐt go to the hospital. When his wife woke up at 4 a.m., he was gone. At 8 a.m. the team was called. The man was found walking 4 blocks from home.
Okanogan: This county has a new sheriff, new SAR coordinator and new SAR team president. They have spent the last 3 months setting up local response Hasty Teams around the county. Most searches are winter related as the county has 1,600+ miles of snowmobile trails.
Cowlitz: We had 7 missions. In one, a family of 5 were involved in a boating accident. One childŐs life was saved when she was rescued by an Army helicopter that was flying through the area on its way back to Fort Lewis. A rescuer was lowered from the helicopter and retrieved the girl whose temperature was down in the 80Ős. Three other family members survived as well, but the father was not found until 3 weeks later.
Other missions included a lost snowboarder, an Alzheimer patient, a family stranded when cutting a Christmas tree, and 4 snowmobile accidents.
Old Business:
Terry Lawrence made a motion and Scott Miller seconded it to set aside $800 for the purchase of additional SARVAC hats, patches, and transfers to sell at the 2003 State SAR Conference in Spokane. It passed unanimously.
Scott Miller will assist the group in the 501 C-3 process. He has experience in this area and will report on what the process would entail for SARVAC. Concern about the standards for SAR was expressed. WASARCA has Chris Long and Rick LaValla working on the standards. At the present time, Rick is donating his expertise to this project. He is working on it as he has available time. It was suggested that Noel McRae be invited to the SARVAC meetings so that he can give input about the website.
A request was made for a special award to be given at the SAR conference. A plaque has been made and donated for this award. Terry Lawrence made a motion and Brooks Hanford seconded the motion to present the award in May with the other SARVAC awards.
New Business:
We need to keep working on increasing our membership.
SARVAC award applications must be submitted by April 25th to give enough time for the plaques to be made for presentation at the SAR conference in Spokane. Next year we need to ask for award nominees to be submitted in March to expedite the process.
Adjourned: 1615
The newsletters will be posted there.
Any information you would like to see announced, may be addressed
to SARVAC's web manager.
Noel McRae, a life member of Cowlitz County Search and Rescue Team, has agreed
to be the webtech.
The web address is: http://wasar.bizland.com/
For information about the site you can contact the webtech at webtech@wasar.bizland.com
Chris Long [the State SAR Coordinator of WA] can be reached
at the web address: c.long@emd.wa.gov, WA-SAR.net: www.wa.gov/wsem.
From this web page you select SAR.
You can down load forms and find out what is going on within the state.