By: Lydia Crawley
The Parsons Advocate
While West Virginia is still under a State of Emergency per the Governor’s Office, residents shouldn’t anticipate seeing the National Guard clearing the streets anytime soon. Tucker County Director of Emergency Management Kevin White says that while the State remains in a State of Emergency, it would take a national declaration to see any real impact in our area.
White informed the Tucker County Commission that the State of Emergency had been carried over to the new Governor’s administration, but that it only existed to place local governments in a position to act. “The State of Emergency is still in existence,” White said. “It was carried over from the previous Governor to the current Governor. That is just something that puts the Emergency Management in a posture to able to respond for things as needed.”
White said that governmental entities can request National Guard assistance at any time, but will incur a cost to do so. According to White the only thing that defers the cost is a National Disaster Declaration by the President that gets FEMA involved. “We can request the National Guard to come in at any time, but there is a cost to incur that whether it be a city entity or a county entity,” White said. “The only thing that defers that cost is if there is a Disaster Declaration put in place by the Governor and then it is honored by the President and then it goes to FEMA. Once it hits FEMA, then there’s Federal dollars available to cover that cost.”
There is not currently a Disaster Declaration anywhere in the State of West Virginia for the latest weather event, according to White. “Currently there is no Disaster Declaration that exists in the State of West Virginia in any County, not for this weather event,” White said. “There may be some ongoing one from past flooding because sometimes they last a year or so to get everything done. There may be some ongoing, but due to the weather, there is no current Disaster Declaration out there.”
White said that the County is free to act without declaring an emergency due to the Governor’s declaration, without it, the County would have to declare a local State of Emergency. “Now if we had a localized event that didn’t effect any other county in the State, then I would have to type up a paper, you all would have to sign it declaring a State of Emergency for Tucker County,” White said. “But since it is a blanket State of Emergency, we don’t have to do that. However, as far as dollars go, until there is a Disaster Declaration declared and then honored by the President and pushed to FEMA, there’s no dollars available.”
Tucker County Commission President Mike Rosenau asked about bringing in the National Guard for snow removal in areas such as Davis and Thomas due to the severe narrowing of the streets. “To me with the snow accumulation that we’ve had in Tucker County, with the influx of people that come to Thomas and Davis area, if there would be a fire or an emergency, the likelihood of you being able to get to that structure or that incident would be really impeded,” Rosenau said. “I was wondering if there was anything available out there to bring into our County to help.”
White said the last Disaster Declaration the area saw was during Hurricane Sandy. “Hurricane Sandy was perhaps our last declaration, I believe,” White said. “And you seen what it took to get that.”
White explained that much of the Disaster Declaration during Sandy was due to the extreme cost of tree removal the Highway Department faced in the days following the storm in order to reopen roads. “The Highway Department falls under a different declaration than us,” White said. “The dollars counted towards us is different than the dollars counted towards the Highway Department. They file their own paperwork. We don’t file theirs for them. If it hadn’t been for them, the Highway Department being under such a financial burden with the tree removal and all that, it may not have gotten a Disaster Declaration at that time. That’s what really the big dollar cost was for Highway Departments to open all these roads back up or subcontract crews. Superstorm Sandy, that was the last Declaration that we received.”
According to White it cost the County $40,000 for a helicopter extraction by the National Guard in the area. “We talked about a rescue helicopter, $40,000 to bring a helicopter in here to do a search and possible extraction,” White said. “To put the helicopter on standby and get the crew up and everything is $25,000 before they take off,” White said. “And then the clock starts ticking and it goes by how big the mission is and how far away it is from Charleston.”
White said the County would be looking at the potential for hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of work should the National Guard come in to remove snow in the towns. “With snow removal you are looking at the same kind of thing,” White said. “You are looking at hundreds of thousands of dollars for them to do that type of work.”
Both White and Rosenau said they did not agree with the cost the National Guard incurred. Rosenau said he felt it was unreasonable to charge for a State resource that was taxpayer funded. “So unfortunately, I don’t agree with it, unfortunately, our National Guard costs us money if we request it,” White said. “Through my office that has been a sore point for the entire basically ten years I’ve been doing this is all Emergency Managers do not agree with this,” White said. “They think that it is asinine and that our State resources cost us if we need them.”
White said that with the extreme weather the past few weeks, he had been working with partners such as energy companies in case of mass outages and has kept local shelters on standby in case. “We have had many communications with our resources such as MonPower, things like that just in case we have mass power outages. I’ve kept all of our shelters on standby just in case.”
White said the County has two main shelters in Thomas and at Camp Kidd, but could open fire stations as warming stations as needed in case of an emergency. “Those are our two main shelters,” White said. “We can always open up a fire station or something for just warming for a few hours, something like that.”
White said that his department prepares for emergencies, but hopes they do not happen. “Its just sit back and hope nothing happens, but be prepared for when it does happen,” White said.
White said he has also been working closely with the schools with daily weather reports. “We’ve had daily weather calls, which is unusual, for two to three weeks now,” White said. “Been working closely with the schools to try to help make some decisions on when our kids can get back into school. Hopefully its not too much longer.”
Temperatures over the past week in places like Cabin Mountain have reached as low as -20 degrees, according to White. Even Parsons has seen temperatures nearing the double digits below zero during this latest cold snap. “The last couple of days the temperatures have just been brutal,” White said. “I’ve been seeing things on reporting stations like Cabin Mountain, places like that 18 below, 20 below in places like that. Parsons nine below. That’s pretty cold temperatures for us.”
White said that officially as of the 22nd of January, Tucker County had received 118.7 inches of snow with 78 inches of that falling in January alone. “We have received officially at our reporting station in Davis 118.7 inches of snow this year,” White said. “78 of that, I believe, was in the month of January. So its been a very, very impactful snow year for us so far.”
