JACKSON — Gov. Haley Barbour says he prefers strengthening construction along Mississippi’s coastal counties to lower insurance rates rather than subsidizing insurance policies through the wind pool program.
“Since Katrina I have emphasized the need to build back stronger than before,” Barbour said. “Working with the insurance commissioner, we’re putting $20 million into helping people upgrade [...] [...]
James Lee Witt, the former director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and the current co-chair of ProtectingAmerica.org is urging a subcommittee to the House Financial Services Committee to move quickly to enact legislation that would help American families and communities be better prepared for and protected from the devastation caused by massive natural [...] [...]
MISSISSIPPI GULF COAST — The Obama administration today laid out a plan to deal with the catastrophic dangers of rising sea levels, hurricanes and erosion on the Gulf Coast, and backed efforts to invest in restoring barriers islands and wetlands in Mississippi and Louisiana.
Experts hailed the policy document as the strongest sign of support for [...] [...]
ADAMS COUNTY — Adams County is the latest community to receive the StormReady designation from the National Weather Service. Mississippi now has 28 StormReady designations including 14 communities, 11 counties and the University of Southern Mississippi and University of Mississippi.
StormReady is a nationwide program of the weather service that helps communities protect their citizens [...] [...]
GEORGE COUNTY and LAMAR COUNTY — Sen. Thad Cochran (R-Miss.) and Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) announced approval of more than $4.83 million in federal funding to support the construction of community saferoom facilities in George and Lamar counties in South Mississippi.
The grant funding, provided through the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) Hazard Mitigation Grant Program, [...] [...]
It was a beautiful Friday in April 2008 when Percy Thornton stepped out of Southern States Utility Trailer in Richland to grab a bite to eat for lunch. He found it curious that the storm sirens were sounding. Gauging the sky and a few innocent looking clouds, he disregarded the warning and drove off.
It would [...] [...]
HANCOCK COUNTY — The “all-hazards network” system, HazNet, developed through the Innovative Partnership Program at NASA’s John C. Stennis Space Center, is being implemented across the space agency.
HazNet incorporates maps, reports, Internet-derived data and real-time sensor input into a geographic information system (GIS)-based display to provide organizations and officials with comprehensive information during emergency and [...] [...]
ACROSS MISSISSIPPI — The Mississippi State Department of Health (MSDH) has partnered with the Mississippi State Department of Education, individual school districts and several county emergency management agencies in a new program called AmbuBus to help provide mass patient evacuations in the event of a public health emergency such as a hurricane.
“Many lessons were learned [...] [...]
JACKSON — Sept. 1 marked one year since Hurricane Gustav left nearly 40,000 Entergy Mississippi Inc. customers in the dark. Now, Entergy Mississippi reports it is more prepared than ever to help customers get the information they need when widespread outages occur.
“People understand that major storms can and will knock out their power,” said Gloria [...] [...]
Hurricane Katrina’s lessons are still fresh
While the State of Mississippi’s response in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina generally drew high marks, the storm drove home some harsh lessons about disaster preparedness. Keeping the public informed about potential storms and directing first responders to areas of need, improving the flow of traffic in the event of [...] [...]
