Story by Rodger Nichols for Gorge Country Media
The Dalles City Council, which normally meets on the second and fourth Monday nights of the month, has canceled tonight’s meeting due to spending last Thursday and Friday at an extended goal-setting session.
Last Friday, Mid-Columbia Economic Development District hosted their annual Regional Economic Symposium. Keynote speaker was Erin McMahon, Director of the Oregon Department of Emergency Management. She came to the office as a retired US Army brigadier general, attorney and combat veteran.
She shared a surprising statistic on federal hazard mitigation funds:
“We receive more mitigation money per square mile than any other state. We’ve more than $185 million in the statewide housing mitigation grant funding that helps communities like yours. The Mid-Columbia Development District has received $1.68 million; The Dalles, for example, was able to purchase emergency generators for the water systems, while Wasco County uses funds to purchase three emergency generators.”
McMahon said she tells legislators every dollar the state spends on mitigation saves eight dollars in reduced losses, and she cites her personal experience in Sisters:
“I was out in Sisters, following the terrible fire they had this summer. And you can see in that community, the mitigation work that they did saved that community. There were 85 homes that were in the direct path of that fire, and because of the mitigation that community did, they only lost six structures.”
The theme of the symposium was resiliency, and involved panel discussions, breakout groups and plenty of networking.