Emergency Preparedness Expo Aims to Ready Families for the Unknown

The sky was blue and the sun was shining Saturday at Hammond Park in Monroe where first responders, local officials and GEMA and FEMA representatives gathered for the inaugural Walton County Emergency Preparedness Festival.

While the beautiful weather sharply contrasted images seen worldwide of disasters such as the flooding in Colorado, it is during times of tranquility that citizens should be vigilant in planning for the unknown emergency, explained Brad Stanley, coordinator for CERT in Walton County.


"We have to be prepared," said Stanley, one of the organizers of the expo.  "Look at 9/11. No one knew what to do.  No one knew what was going on or how to deal with it or anything else.  That was a rude awakening to the fact that we need -- as a community and a society-- to better prepare ourselves for any event."

Participants at the expo were given free materials on emergency preparedness.  They witnessed safety demonstrations such as how best to handle a kitchen fire, courtesy of the Monroe Fire Department.   Walton Wellness also set up an obstacle course that was used for fitness demonstrations.

"We didn't have any idea what the crowd size was going to be, and it didn't really matter because we wanted to start it," Stanley said.  "Any time you start something, it's going to be small. But we had a great turn out of vendors.  Hopefully we'll have the same type of turn out next year and hopefully we can get more people understanding what it is."

The event was organized by Walton County Citizen Corps Council and the Walton County Emergency Management Agency.

Walton EMC, The Home Depot, Clearview Regional Medical Center, Stone Mountain Pecan Company, Chick-fil-A of Monroe and Accolades served as sponsors.

For information about how to prepare your family for disasters, visit http://www.ready.gov/.