Introduction
At Willamette University Facilities Management, planning ahead for emergencies is part of our normal planning effort with all members of the campus community sharing the responsibility for preparedness. A viral/infectious emergency incident can strike anytime or anywhere and a large scale event will affect everyone. The Facilities Services Department maintains that a major viral/infectious incident in the community affecting our students, faculty, and staff is a University emergency.
Emergency Response Mission & Priorities
In any emergency situation the Facilities Services Departments overriding mission is to:
- Be prepared to protect the health and safety of the students, faculty, staff and guests in and around the University community.
- Respond immediately to contain and prevent any further spreading of virus/illness.
- Communicate effectively with the campus community about our response.
- Preserve and provide a clean and safe environment for all on campus.
Emergency Response Priorities
General emergency responses will follow these priorities. The contextual characteristics of a particular emergency event (such as the time or day when an incident occurs) may require some adjustments within the following priority categories as follows:
- Buildings used for dependent populations such as;
- Residences, occupied classrooms and offices
- Occupied auditoriums, arenas and special event venues
- Buildings critical to health and safety such as;
- Medical facilities, emergency shelters, food service and supplies, sites containing potential hazards.
- Classroom and research buildings
- Administrative buildings
- Buildings used for emergency operations or facilities that sustain emergency response systems such as;
- Energy systems and utilities, communications services and computer installations.
- Transportation systems.
Preparedness
Facilities Services will
- Keep an up to date and ready inventory of personal protective equipment, hospital grade disinfectant (Oxivir Tb) and other emergency supplies.
- Conduct yearly bio / blood borne pathogen cleaning training with department staff.
- Arrange appropriate preparedness training for department staff.
- Communicate emergency plans and procedures with department staff during annual training.
- Identify a primary sub-contractor to partner with who specializes in supporting on site emergency response services.
- Establish campus communication procedures and strategies which will be driven by the nature of the emergency, the location of the emergency and the stakeholders involved in the emergency.
Response
Once an emergency incident is reported to the Facilities Management Office:
- The Facilities Service Manager will quickly review the information provided and make a determination if this incident or concern can be safely and quickly resolved with existing staff and resources or if it may be supported by a subcontractor who specializes in emergency preparedness events.
- The Facilities Services Manager will communicate the decision of which response is to be employed to the Director of Facilities or the appropriate leadership staff.
- The Facilities Services Manager will coordinate the emergency preparedness plan and deploy existing staff and or resources to effectively sanitize, contain, and stabilize the immediate environment.
- All staff entering a flu/virus cleanup emergency response will be equipped with the proper personal protective equipment (gloves, eyewear, bio suit, booties, etc.) and hospital grade disinfectant.
- When emergency conditions are stabilized and normal operations can resume, the Facilities Services Manager will communicate with the appropriate leadership staff for their evaluation of the incident. A determination on the appropriate time to resume normal operations for the space or areas affected by the incident will be made at that time.
10/25/16