Emergency Management

Town of Bluffton Emergency Management is tasked with planning, integrating and implementing all emergency management related activities for the Town of Bluffton. The role of Emergency Management is to coordinate the community’s efforts to prepare for, respond to and recover from large-scale emergencies and disasters. Emergency Management works to craft a harmonized community-wide effort through the joint collaboration of both public and private organizations responsible for providing services to the community. 

Emergency Management maintains and coordinates the activities of the Town of Bluffton Emergency Operations Center (EOC) during a large-scale emergency or disaster. When activated, the EOC is the central location where representatives of local government and private sector agencies assemble during disaster situations to make decisions, set priorities and allocate resources for response and recovery efforts. The EOC functions as the Command Center for all communications, directions, and plans during a natural or man-made emergency.

Phases of Emergency Management

• Prevention - Actions taken to avoid an incident or stopping an incident from occurring. Deterrence operations and surveillance. 
• Mitigation - Refers to measures that prevent an emergency, reduce the change of an emergency happening or reduce the damaging effects of unavoidable emergencies. The mitigation phase differs from the other phases because it focuses on long-term measures for reducing or eliminating risk.
• Preparedness - Activities increase a community’s ability to respond when a disaster occurs. In the preparedness phase, plans of action are developed for when disasters strike.
• Response - Includes the mobilization of necessary emergency services and first responders in the disaster area. This would include a first wave of core emergency services, such as firefighters, police, and ambulance crews.
• Recovery - To restore the affected area to its previous state. Actions taken to return a community to normal or near-normal conditions, including the restoration of basic services and the repair of physical, social, and economic damages.