CSD to Participate in Cooperative Effort to Provide POD Trailer to Big Bear Valley, for Use in Emergency Situations

The Board of Directors for the Big Bear City Community Services District met for their second regular meeting of the month last night, during which time CSD’s Water Department overseen by Tim Moran was awarded the district’s third quarter Safety Award. There were no action items on the agenda, though the Board did approve all items on the Consent Calendar, including a Solid Waste Department request to spend roughly $14,000 in department reserves for the repair of a 1996 Volvo trash truck. The department’s Superintendent Mark Motherspaw was said to have creatively managed the major repair work necessary, saving the district $6000—for this, Directors praised Motherspaw for the efficient management of taxpayers’ funds.
In addition to presenting the Safety Award, the district’s Safety Compliance Officer Rachael Jahn also presented a Power Point on the Valley’s new mobile POD—the POD, which stands for Point of Dispensing, is a trailer for use by the entire Big Bear Valley in emergency situations. A joint effort of San Bernardino County, the Community Services District, the City of Big Bear Lake and the Big Bear Airport (which will ultimately house the POD trailer in a secure location), the trailer will be used in emergency health situations, as it is equipped with generator, emergency lighting, computer, tables and chairs, cots and blankets, ventilators, easy-ups, tools and fence posts, as well as many other supplies. In public health trial clinics, an average of 450 individuals per hour received treatment from such mobile PODs which, in a real emergency, could be a mobile clinic providing protective measures and preventative health supplies to a large number of people in a short amount of time. Jahn noted that for the POD to be effective, there must be community cooperation and preparedness between key agencies, including the hospital district, fire departments, law enforcement, government entities and volunteers. Cooperation has already allowed for this much progress, as the POD will soon be in the Big Bear Valley, likely in December, pending approval of the Memorandum of Understanding, which County Supervisors are scheduled to address in their December 1 meeting.