Do your BEST to be prepared
The headlines say it all …
“Fire guts historic building on 7th Street”
“Bugged driver runs SUV into building”
“Toxic fumes force evacuation”
“Car crashes into Oregon City strip mall”
These local headlines speak volumes for the need to have emergency
preparedness plans in our businesses. This month your Oregon City
Chamber with the cooperation of seven agencies and businesses will
unveil its Business Emergency Survival Toolkit (BEST). Before you
decide that it can’t happen to your business, you should know that
one in four businesses never reopen following a major disaster,
according to the Institute for Business and Home Safety. While
disasters such as 9/11 do occur, they are statistically less common
than other emergencies for which businesses must be prepared. More
often a local business, even our own Chamber, is at greatest risk
for fires, floods, cyber attacks, automobile collisions, death of a
key employee, supply shortage, and being cut off from key supplier
or customer. “Research conducted by the Ad Council found that more
than 85% of small businesses understand that emergency preparedness
is important, yet only four in ten businesses have a plan to protect
their businesses,” said Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff.
Your Chamber and our cooperating partners are making every effort to
see that local businesses have a plan in place to mitigate the
effects of a disruption. If you are in business you can’t afford to
procrastinate — we do not want your business to become a statistic.
Any business disruption can result in loss of jobs, revenue,
customers, supplies/services. The longer it takes a business to get
up and running results in more economic damage to the community. A
plan can help get you back to business sooner. It has been shown
that a business can be hurt indirectly when disaster strikes
customers or an affiliated business, such as a supplier or
distributor.
A business continuity plan is a structured approach to look at your
business and identify what can go wrong and then develop plans to
reduce those risks. A Chamber task force developed the Business
Emergency Survival Toolkit (BEST) that will be made available to you
on CD or by downloading from our Chamber website. The task force has
worked hard to create a tool for Oregon City businesses that
combined the greatest combination of resources to benefit you. The
toolkit provides an overview for emergency planning, walks you
through chain of command communications, helps you identify your own
business essentials (functions, equipment, customers and suppliers),
and summarizes the protection your business needs. Included in the
toolkit are the forms you will need to complete the process and
protect your investment.
Funding for this project was provided through a 2007 economic
development grant from the City of Oregon City business license
fund. The Chamber believes that helping businesses develop a plan to
get them back to business quickly after a disruption is an important
function of our dedication to economic vitality. Because this effort
is for all businesses in Oregon City, our Chamber will mail out
postcards to other licensed businesses in Oregon City and offer them
a CD toolkit. We will work with our press contacts to spread the
word about BEST demonstrating our local efforts to see that all
businesses “Do your BEST to be prepared”.
Special thanks to our Steering Committee members:
Sonja Zrelak, Clackamas County Bank – Task Force Chair
Aaron Breniman, Oregon City DBC
Liz Christiansen, Fournier Group, Risk Management Advisor
Kevin Donegan, Clackamas Fire District #1, Emergency Manager
Betty Mumm, Willamette Falls Hospital
Torrey Murphy, Advanced Business Networks
Lt. Lisa Nunes, Oregon City Police Department
Julie Paulsen, Chamber Communications Coordinator
Dana Robinson, Clackamas County Dept. of Emergency Management
Director
David Wimmer, City of Oregon City Finance Director