CERT Program

The Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) is a new initiative of the Police and Fire Departments to ensure that our community is informed and prepared in the event of a disaster.

In 1994 The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) began promoting the CERT concept initially created by the Los Angeles City Fire Department. Since then, hundreds of communities across the nation have begun implementing the use of CERTs.

CERT training promotes a partnering effort between emergency services and people that they serve. The goal is for emergency personnel to train members of neighborhoods, community organizations or workplaces in basic response skills. CERT members are then integrated into the emergency response capability for their area.

CERT attendees are graduates of either the Citizen’s Police Academy (CPA) or the Citizen’s Fire Academy (CFA) or both. This 20 hour CERT training goes in depth on subjects such as disaster psychology, terrorism, medical operations and fire safety. If a disastrous event overwhelms the City of Euless, the CERT members can assist others by applying the basic response and organizational skills they learned during training. These skills can help save and sustain lives following a disaster until help arrives.

CERT teams are invaluable to a community and will improve the City of Euless’ community emergency preparedness. The CERT graduation takes place on a Saturday and participants participate in a mock disaster drill. This drill replicates problems that may arise during any type of catastrophe.

Sharon Finnegan, CERT, CPA & CFA graduate encourages anyone to take the class. “It was very educational and a lot of fun, especially all of the hands on activities. You never know when you may need to use some of those techniques,” she explained.

“The very realistic graduation made you stop and realize that this really could happen to Euless and we need to be prepared for it. Hopefully we will never have to use what we’ve learned. But if we do, we are prepared.”

If you would like to learn more about CERT or would like to take the course, please contact Sergeant Gary Landers at 817-685-1563.