THE VOICE OF THE TOWNSHIP
Disaster recovery should have no time for blame placing.
The Wayne Township Trustee’s Office has worked diligently over the last several years to have a disaster recovery plan in place that should prepare us for our part in the event of a local disaster. I was very saddened by the events that lead to blame placing in the recent disasters in the gulf. When so much time was directed towards blame, that very same time was lost in helping those in need. Anyone that has ever been in need of a helping hand knows that the time for action was when the need arose. When problems are given a chance to escalate, they require even more time and additional resources. When our time comes to shine, we feel prepared to direct all our actions toward the problem at hand.
The purpose of our Disaster Recovery Plan is to help our organization prepare for, respond to and recover from a disaster or emergency. Our plan is designed to be workable, cost effective, flexible and easy to maintain. One very important part of our plan is to protect our employees, clients and our community and be able to continue providing the highest level of service to everyone. We will also meet with the local Emergency Preparedness Management Committee and incorporate some of their procedures into our Disaster Recovery Plan. This should help prevent some emergencies or disasters and better prepare us for those that cannot be avoided and help us recover sooner if an emergency or disaster occurred. We will continue attending other Disaster Recovery and Emergency Response Planning Conferences or Seminars.
A disaster or emergency can be defined as an unplanned event that can cause physical injury to our employees, clients and the public or that can disrupt and damage our day-to-day goal of serving the citizens of our community. Some examples of natural or manmade disasters or emergencies are: fire, flood, hurricanes, tornados, earthquakes, storms, explosions, hazardous materials incidents, power outages, leaks, terrorism, work place violence, vandalism and theft.
Some of the benefits of having a plan in place are: to protect our employees, the community and the environment; keep us compliant with Federal, State and Local Regulations; help prevent financial losses or regulators fines, damages to our equipment; reduce our exposure to civil or criminal liability in the event of an incident; and to improve our image and credibility with our employees, clients and the community.
Our office has implemented many preventive procedures to ensure our ability to continue providing the highest level of service to the citizens of Wayne Township. All visitors must sign in at the front desk and be escorted while in our building. We have a security guard and security cameras to monitor our building. The doors to our offices are secured by combination locks. The building is protected with a sprinkler system. We are connected to a security office that would alert them to any movement in our building when our offices are closed. Our computer room is locked and secured. Our computers and data are secured with passwords, screen savers, and are protected from viruses by a firewall and software that is continuously updated. UPS devices protect our file servers. Our files and data are backed up and stored in a secure off site location. We have tested restoring our computer systems. We also store supplies of our special forms, vendor information, run procedures and documentation in secure off site locations. We have insurance to replace our building, office furniture, computer systems and other assets.
Our important documents that are not captured on our Computer System are scanned and stored on our Imaging System. These files are backed up and stored in a secure off site location. In case these original documents would be lost due to a disaster, we could retrieve and reproduce these documents.
Our recovery procedures include: informing the public of an emergency or disaster; ensure the safety of our employees and clients, temporarily moving to a different site; restoring or providing offices for our employees and restoring or replacing our computer systems to be able to make available the needed services we provide as soon as possible. The plan is tested and updated as needed.
In the event of a local disaster, the Wayne Township Trustee’s Office has the plan in place to meet its responsibilities. Having served over twenty five thousand families in need this past year, we are second to none in experience. Our own Chief Deputy Trustee Alan Stoller took four weeks of vacation to volunteer in the gulf during the Hurricane Katrina disaster and ended up managing one of the shelters in Houston Texas. We are ready as always to serve you and do our part no matter what the challenge.
Chief Deputy Stoller’s experiences will be the focus of the next Voice of the Township.
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