Jamaica
OAS White Helmets “Building Community Resilience” Project
By ODPEM, Jamaica
Fri, 10 Nov 2006, 09:55

The Office of Disaster Preparedness and Emergency Management (ODPEM) will be staging four (4) regional workshops on Disaster Management, as part of the “Support to the White Helmets Initiative: Building Community Resilience Project”.

The initiative is supported by the White Helmets Commission in Argentina, the Organization of American States (OAS) and the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB). The aims and objectives of the workshop are as follows:

• To select and train local volunteers (from schools, churches, citizens associations and other community-based organizations) on issues of disaster preparedness and management.
• To strengthen linkages between the Government and Civil Society to effectively address natural disasters.
• At the end of the three-day workshop, participants should have the necessary skills to effectively respond to natural disasters such as hurricane, fire and flood as well as form themselves into associations that facilitate disaster management and response at the community level.
  

• Phase 1 covers the parishes of Kingston, St. Andrew and St. Thomas and will be held at the Office of Disaster Preparedness (ODPEM) on November 14-16, 2006.
• Phase 2 spans St. James, Westmoreland and Hanover and is scheduled for the 21st to the 23rd of November 2006.
• Phase 3 targets participants from Clarendon, Manchester and St. Elizabeth and is scheduled for November 28-30, 2006 at the Golf View (or the Mandeview) Hotel in Mandeville.
• Phase 4 covers St. Mary and Portland from December 5-7, 2006 and will be held at the St. Mary Civic Centre.