Region C ahead of the rest in disaster management

Thanks to passionate community people like Ebrahim Hoosen, Annette Reed and Thembi Mosia the city’s Region C is the first to make sure it is well prepared, should disaster strike.

The Disaster Management Advisory Sub Forum in Roodepoort is the first of its kind in the entire city, and the City of Johannesburg is boosting it to encourage other regions to follow suit. It has accomplished a lot since its inception a year ago. The forum brings together both community leaders like Hoosen, residents, businesses, NGOs, the Roodepoort and Florida Police, Joburg EMS, the Metro Police, CPFs and representatives of government departments and agencies. It develops and manages plans in case of emergency for areas like Bramfischerville, Thulani, Boskruin, Ruimsig, Constantia Kloof, Weltevreden Park, Helderkruin, Princess and Cosmo City.

It is constituted in line with the city’s Disaster Management Unit and the National Disaster Management Act.

To date the forum has managed to initiate a few projects; getting houses properly numbered so they’re easy to locate in an emergency, locating all fire hydrants, capturing them on a database and mapping them for firemen to locate extra resources and finally, getting volunteers together to help in larger emergencies. To date 39 volunteers have registered to help out with disaster management in Region C. The forum also recently produced a pocket-sized directory of all emergency numbers for the community at large, with the eye on educating residents about disaster management.

“We have adopted a proactive approach to disaster management to mitigate any risks,” Hoosen said in a recent press statement.

“The Florida fire station has huge challenges in locating fire hydrants during fires in the area.

“Ageing infrastructure and the lack of records play a major role in the inability of emergency personnel to locate them.”

Hoosen said the sub forum hopes to utilise one of its members, Dorcas Aid, in running a conjoint competition for community members to spot a hydrant and win a prize, all in a bid to locate all the region’s hydrants.

“A cell phone application for this use is in the final stages of development and we hope to use this app to record that information on our database.”

More details will be communicated as they become available.

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