By MARTY LEVINE
In light of recent hoax emergency calls on campus and near campus that resulted in heavy law enforcement response and building lockdowns, evacuation plans for those with disabilities was one focus of the presentation of Molly Stitt-Fischer, director of the Office of Environmental Health and Safety, to the University Senate’s Equity, Inclusion and Anti-Discrimination Advocacy Committee on April 25.
Stitt-Fischer highlighted current emergency preparedness resources and shared new communication tools, all of which are available through www.emergency.pitt.edu.
If you can’t evacuate yourself, or need aid in planning or accomplishing an evacuation due to a disability — in mobility, vision or hearing, for instance — “reach out to Environmental Health and Safety, because we can develop a personalized safety plan for you,” she said.
“We will work with you to make sure you have the right information,” she added, based on the office or main classroom used by individual faculty or staff, and the dorm and classrooms of a student.
“We don’t necessarily know who you are or where you are or what type of assistance you might need” prior to notifying her office, Stitt-Fischer said, and thus Environmental Health and Safety is aiming to publicize this service across campus. If employees and students contact her office, she said, “We will meet with you in your location and help to identify safe areas of refuge for you” in an emergency, depending on the building, as well as primary and secondary evacuation destinations — then give a copy of your plan to the Pitt police communications center.
If an emergency occurs in your building, the communications center “checks to see if an individual evacuation plan is associated with the building” as it sends out first responders.
And, of course, if you call a police or fire department in any emergency, those with individual evacuation plans should tell them “definitely to look for you” so that first responders will be alerted.
The Environmental Health and Safety website also has building occupancy handbooks for most buildings on campus. These identify short-term assembly areas (to meet and check on each other and await further word from law enforcement) in emergencies that don’t involve evacuation, as well as longer-term assembly areas.
If you have an individual evacuation plan that requires the assistance of others, the RAVE app is also available from Pitt that allows you to create a “personal support network” of people who know about your evacuation plan and even about your current whereabouts, if you choose to make that known, so that your network can most immediately help.
The site also will soon have links to FEMA for resources for those with disabilities and even for preparing to evacuate pets and service animals.
Stitt-Fischer reminded Pitt personnel to call 412-624-2121 to reach Pitt Police and 911 for an off-campus emergency, which reaches city first responders.
Marty Levine is a staff writer for the University Times. Reach him at martyl@pitt.edu or 412-758-4859.
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