Tag: emergency

#122: Poulsbo, WA 8/2/17

There was no shortage of eyebrow-raising announcements in Poulsbo.

Mayor Becky Erickson set the bar ever-so-slightly off the ground with her unorthodox but low-key warning that “after we leave here, we’re gonna go to the third floor. A conference room setting is a little more conducive to an active conversation.”

Fair enough. A change of venue is good for the circulatory system. But the good vibes instantly dissipated as Council Member Gary Nystul flagrantly stoked an intra-governmental rivalry.

“It’s my privilege once a year to point out to my two Navy associates–Warrant Officer [Council Member Jim] Henry and Commander [Council Member Kenneth] Thomas–that August 4 is the Coast Guard birthday.”

He smirked and prepared to rub in his superiority. “Occasionally the Navy doesn’t follow our directions. One day in Hawaii they didn’t follow our directions right out of the shipyard. They put it into a reef!”

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Who among us hasn’t crashed a battleship into a reef?

The mayor quickly interjected. “You’re walking on dangerous ground, Mr. Nystul! Very dangerous ground.”

“Choppy waters” would have been the more appropriate image, but point taken.

Speaking of danger, quick: cue the Musgrove!

“When an earthquake or something happens is NOT the time to figure out: where do I get food for Fluffy?” Council Member David Musgrove insisted. He gestured to an emergency-preparedness handout decorated with a pensive-looking cat.

“It’s like taking care of an elderly parent. You need to do the same stuff.” (Note to self: stock up on cat food for grandma.)

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Cat sold separately

But if residents didn’t have time to prepare themselves for a disaster, Council Member Musgrove offered a logical alternative. “Tomorrow, 10:30 a.m., there’s a walk-through of the Poulsbo cemetery.”

Council Member Connie Lord struck a compromise between death and doomsday prep. “The mayor has opened up city hall as a cooling station,” she announced helpfully.

Mayor Erickson nodded. “The council chamber’s open. There’s bottled water in the fridge.” After thinking a second, she added, “bring a book. There’s nothing particularly exciting going on in here.”

However, the mayor was having a hard time keeping her story straight. Because not two minutes later, she revealed this HIGHLY exciting event:

“This coming Tuesday, I’m having ‘kitty hall’ here,” she bragged. “The Kitsap Humane Society and I are going to have a whole bunch of kitties/kittens/cats for adoption. So if you’re interested in a new feline furry friend, we’ll be out there.”

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When you pick up your cat, get enough food to last through the earthquake.

The final news item came from Council Member Ed Henry and it was a whopper.

“In our codes, self-storage and mini-storage is allowed in the commercial zone,” he informed the council solemnly. “Is the council interested in putting self-storage in those other zones?”

He glanced around. “It is a timely matter.”

“We appear to be having a LOT of interest about putting self-storage along [highway] 305,” the mayor acknowledged.

“We have very limited space if we want to keep Poulsbo Pouslbo,” Henry fretted. “Tight and constricted.”

Mayor Erickson agreed to look into it. But immediately, she worriedly turned to the clerk as she remembered that everyone needed to trek to the upstairs conference room.

“Rhiannon, how are we going to do this? We haven’t done this before.”

The clerk promptly replied, “I see us going upstairs and continue our audio recording up there.”

With that, the cameras went dark and the citizens who came for the cooling station pulled out their books.

#116: Granbury, TX 7/5/17

The Fourth of July may have been the day before, but here at City Hall the mayor cracked open a tall can of Texas pride.

“It’s my honor to kick this meeting off with a very special presentation–an award for the video of the ‘Granbury PD Officer Saves Child’s Life‘,” Mayor Nin Hulett proudly revealed.

“The video showcases the heroic actions of Officer Chase Miller using CPR to save a three-year-old boy,” he continued. “When he arrived, the boy was unresponsive. Officer Miller performed CPR until the boy was able to breathe.”

“The post of the video has been viewed 37 million times.” He paused to let the staggering number sink into his own consciousness. “Really!”

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All the stats are bigger in Texas.

After the mayor congratulated the city employee who skillfully produced the tear-jerking piece of cinema, a burly citizen stepped forward to comment upon it.

“One of the things I think is very significant: the comments I saw in the video was about how positive this video was and how it made people feel good,” he smiled widely.

Well, there’s your headline, folks. “Man Reads YouTube Comments, Finds Positivity.” Talk about a rare event!

But of course, this being Texas the day after July Fourth, I could have guessed what was coming next.

“I have a property I own,” a woman shot a combative look across the dais. “I don’t live at the property, but I actually went to watch the fireworks. While I was there I was really shocked.”

She smiled out of macabre amusement. “We’re in the city and across the street is in the county.  The subdivision across the street, people shot fireworks in that subdivision. Those homes are six, seven, eight feet apart at best.”

She waved her hand in disbelief and uttered an appropriately-small town Texas reference point: “you could almost reach out and borrow somebody’s sugar!”

“The people shot fireworks till the wee hours and THIS–” she held aloft a charred firework shell “–is the kind of thing that came onto our property ON FIRE! Like professionals would use!”

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NSFW

Her tone turned conspiratorial. “I think they purchased homes because they’re not wanting to follow city rules and regulations. I think that brings a different type of population.”

Oh, please. It’s just a couple of fireworks. It’s not like they could shoot target practice in their front yards.

“They could shoot target practice, I found out, in their front yard!” she exclaimed. She added, in the second-most appropriately-small town Texas reference point, “I’m not opposed to gun rights by any means!”

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Photo of the city-county border

Well, across the street in the county may be Lord of the Flies but here in Granbury, folks care about rules. For instance, the rules of health insurance.

“I want to give you a scenario,” Council Member Gary Couch quizzed the human resources director. “Let’s say we have an employee in Colorado and they’re skiing and they break a leg. What’s gonna be the burden on the employee?”

The burden, sir, would be a couple of hundred pounds on just one leg. Otherwise, the director mused, “that would be considered an emergency and it would be paid for under the normal terms.”

“Let’s say they had food poisoning at a restaurant,” Council Member Couch leaned in like a grizzled district attorney in a courtroom.

“I think that’s probably an emergency as well,” was the response.

Couch narrowed his eyes a moment. “All right. Thanks,” he muttered.