Drill revisited

The purpose of federally mandated emergency exercises, like the one held at the Saratoga Care Center on July 12, is to allow multiple agencies to train together and find deficiencies in local emergency management. Since the exercise held nearly two weeks ago it would appear that at least one issue is what channels the dispatch center do, and do not, have access to.

Following an editorial (“A Saratoga disaster” in the July 17 Saratoga Sun), Mayor John Zeiger and Saratoga Police Chief Ken Lehr reached out to the Sun to not only explain the lack of police presence, but the issue reported in the Sun of lack of communication between dispatch and agencies involved in the July 12 exercise. 

Police Presence

In the Sun editorial, it was stated that Lehr cited a lack of personnel for the exercise. The police chief confirmed this in an interview with this reporter.

“We were short people. I had two officers I put on vacation, I had one that had a dental appointment and, myself, I had to go to Casper for a doctor, so I had a part-timer here. He was tied up on an accident, working prior to that,” Lehr explained. “The sheriff declined as well because he didn’t have personnel.”

The Sun reached out to Carbon County Sheriff Archie Roybal for confirmation, but had not received any as of press time.

Zeiger told the Sun, “I can tell my staff ‘Hey, there’s a meeting such and such date, make it if you can.’ I can’t take them by the hands (sic) and make them go to the meetings.”

According to the Town of Saratoga website, Zeiger serves as the Police Commissioner.

Lehr also explained the reasoning behind why the part-time officer, Robert Pfeiffer, did not enter the Saratoga Care Center when asked.

“The part-timer who was down here, who used to be a Carbon County Deputy, was working an accident and then he happened to go up there and then all of a sudden they want him to go in there. Absolutely not. He’s not going to go in there with live rounds, he’s not going to disarm himself if something comes up. The guy’s not no newbie. He’s been around,” said Lehr.

Zeiger further explained that the federally mandated exercises use the Homeland Security Exercise and Evacuation Program (HSEEP) and that there is a section that covers firearm protocol.

“In those plans, there’s an area that actually discusses firearms and the only ones that can have firearms are those like the Chief if he happens to be (involved). So, a lot of times, depending on the situation, depending where you are, depends on how open people are with the firearm policy,” said Zeiger.

The mayor and police chief also explained why they had been unable to attend the July 3 tabletop pre-exercise training. Lehr stated that he was working on the parade route for the following day, July 4, and was unable to attend. In an interview Thursday, Zeiger said he had been on the phone with his daughter, who was having what he described as a personal crisis.

“So I was on the phone most of the day with her–and family comes first ... That was the reason I was not there,” said Zeiger.

Zeiger did not, however, send a representative as he had promised if he could not attend. Nor did he call for information about the meeting afterward.

As for the day of the exercise, Zeiger stated that he had informed Saratoga Care Center Director of Nursing Stephany Ponish that he would be unable to attend on July 12. Ponish confirmed the conversation took place in a phone call with the Sun on Monday.

“Stephany knew I was going to be out of town,” Zeiger said. “I had a meeting in Cheyenne and I was leaving town the same time the pager went off. So, that is why I wasn’t at the exercise.”

Anyone There?

In audio made available to the Sun, current Emergency Management Coordinator Ron Brown called Saratoga dispatch to inform dispatcher Kandi Starr that the exercise would be run on the Saratoga Fire Department Tactical channel, also called Saratoga tac. According to Lehr, the channel, which is used by Saratoga Fire Department for training exercises and large scale emergencies, is not programmed into the consolette for dispatch and, therefore, is inaccessible to them.

“The emergency management coordinator made the decision to go on Saratoga tac. Well, our dispatch or none of our mobiles or portables can operate on Saratoga Tac. We do not have that capability,” said Lehr.

On Monday, the Sun was shown all the channels that dispatch has access to. While those channels include the regular Saratoga Fire Department channel, the tactical channel was not on that list. The Sun reached out to Brown about the dispatch center’s inability to access the channel.

“That’s actually the first I’ve ever heard of that. That dispatch center should absolutely have access to that tac channel,” said Brown. “It was always my understanding that dispatch center should be able to read every frequency those boys have on their radios.”

Saratoga Fire Chief Pat Vining was also under the impression that dispatch had access to the tactical channel.

“If they don’t have that, that’s news to me. They should have it because, on a large scale emergency, they should be able to monitor that because we will switch up into tactical groups with their own radio channel for large scale incidents,” said Vining. “As far as I knew, they had those channels. They have all our tactical channels and our dispatch channel. If they don’t, that was brand new news to me no one’s ever made me aware of because we use that practice all the time of utilizing a tactical channel. If we’re not set up correctly in dispatch, that’s something that needs to be found out and relayed. To myself and, especially, to my guys that are using it because that could get us in some safety issue if they’re calling on another channel that they think is going to be monitored and something goes wrong. That’s a big concern of mine.”

To The Audio

Shortly after 10 a.m., Starr issued a call to Saratoga Fire Department and the Saratoga Ambulance. The calls, in fact, are within one minute of each other as Starr informed both agencies of a bomb threat called in from the Saratoga Care Center, adding that it was a drill.

“Attention Saratoga Firemen, this is a drill, I repeat, this is only a drill. We have a report of a bomb threat at the Saratoga Care Center and the Saratoga Care Center needs help evacuating the building. I repeat, this is a drill, this is only a drill. We have a report of a bomb threat at the Saratoga Care Center and the building needs to be evacuated. I repeat, this is only a drill. At 10:04.”

Saratoga Fire Department copied the call, telling dispatch that they were waiting on an “all clear” by law enforcement. Starr responded, informing the fire department that everyone would be running on the tactical channel. South Central Wyoming Emergency Medical Services (SCWEMS) Director Melissa Sikes also responded, informing dispatch the ambulance was on the scene. Sikes later informed Starr that the ambulance had been told they were no longer needed and returned to the ambulance barn.

Following that, Kathy Wachsmuth was called by Platte Valley Clinic R.N. Mandy Cooper, who asked if SCWEMS was aware they were supposed to pick up Classic Air Medical at Shively Airfield. When Wachsmuth told Cooper that they weren’t informed, Cooper asked dispatch to get ahold of the ambulance. Starr attempted to call SCWEMS twice on radio and once by phone with no success. At the end of the exercise, Cooper called Starr and asked if she found out what happened with the ambulance.

“No, because I wasn’t able to get ahold of anybody,” said Starr.

“They pulled up at one point and then they left,” replied Cooper.

“Well, they had pulled up and said that they were on scene and everything like that and then they said that the patient that they were supposed to take out wasn’t being moved or something like that and then they went back to the station,” Starr said.

Starr also contacted part-time officer Robert Pfeiffer and informed him of the exercise. Pfeiffer informed Starr that he was aware of it and asked if law enforcement was required, with Starr stating that training was for all departments. Later, Pfeiffer called into dispatch, telling Starr he was informed that both Lehr and Roybal had declined to participate.

“Hey, apparently Ken and Archie declined to participate in this is what IC’s (incident command) telling me. So, they’re doing, like, sim (simulated) gunshots and bombs and stuff. So, it doesn’t mix well with firearms,” said Pfeiffer.

Time To Get A Cop

Both Lehr and Zeiger believe that many of the issues with the exercise arose from the short amount of planning time between the tabletop meeting on July 3 and the actual exercise on July 12.

“That’s what created the big ripple as far as a lot of it went. The shortage of personnel; it wasn’t a lot of time to plan. I get a phone call. July 3rd they had this deal ‘Okay, we need officers.’ Normally, it’s 3-6 months,” Lehr said. “On a training this scale, it takes 3-6 months to get everything lined up and they tried to throw it together in eight days.”

“That last exercise I was involved in was probably 2-3 month out planning. We discussed it at our LEPC (Local Emergency Planning Committee). Once I got the exercise done and ready, I got a copy to those participating agencies … so they knew what was going on,” said Zeiger. “I had hoped to be there on the 3rd, but family issues came up. Family’s going to come first. That’s why you try and have that three or four month (planning) so at least Ken’s going to make one of those meetings. He may not make the first one, but he’ll make the second one.”

Zeiger added that he believed the Saratoga Care Center should take some responsibility for how the exercise went.

“You have that type of exercise, you can’t have a meeting on July 3 and expect to pull it off nine days later. It takes more prep than that,” Zeiger said. “Perfect example, the tabletop exercise. You’re not going to get every player to the table at one meeting.”

It should be noted that every other agency involved had a representative present at the tabletop meeting or had reached an understanding by phone.