Berkeley to host pair of disaster readiness workshops

Officials will review the city’s local hazard mitigation plan, one at 5:30 tonight at the Berkeley Public Library and again in July.

By Alex N. GecanJune 3, 2024, 12:10 p.m.

Crews on Grizzly Peak fight a fire in August 2017. Credit: Frances Dinkelspiel

The city is hosting a pair of workshops, one this evening and another in July, on natural hazards and disasters that pose danger to Berkeley, part of a regular update to the city’s emergency protocols.

“New to the 2024 draft plans are actions that individual community members and households can take to reduce risks, community education and risks from infectious disease, poor air quality, sea level rise and high winds,” Mayor Jesse Arreguín wrote in an announcement May 29.

The last update to the mitigation plan was in 2019, before the COVID-19 pandemic.

While most infectious disease outbreaks have limited impact, large-scale ones like COVID-19 “kill millions of people, completely alter daily life and social activities, threaten businesses and the global economy (and) strain existing health care facilities,” according to an executive summary of the plan.

The city has also updated a section on wildland-urban interface (WUI) fire risk with information on Berkeley’s overnight camps, data from the 2017 Grizzly Fire and new analyses on the sections of the city at highest risk of wildfire. It has also published a series of YouTube videos on potential disasters.

The first workshop is scheduled for 5:30-7:30 p.m. today in the Commons Room at the Berkeley Public Library at 2090 Kittredge Street. The second is scheduled for July 20.