Palm Beach Post
Published Wednesday, September 13, 2006
By Julie Waresh -

Neighborhood Post Staff WriterTropical Storm Ernesto may have been little more than a breeze in these parts, but the storm provided the area’s emergency responders with valuable training. Particularly in Boynton Beach, where members of the the Community Emergency Response Team were able to test a new portable radio system. “It was like night and day,” Deputy Fire Chief Jim Ness said of the quality of CERT communications before and after Ernesto vs. before and after Hurricane Wilma. The morning after Ernesto moved through, Ness was able within a half hour to contact CERT members by radio and get a complete assessment of conditions throughout the city.That’s because the 50 new radios Ness bought with a county emergency medical services grant, coupled with a tower-mounted radio repeater inherited from the police department, dramatically boosted signals. “The signal strength is strong enough that I could sit in my office and talk to someone at the Wellington mall,” he said. t was a different story following Wilma. Then, communication was spotty because CERT members were equipped with an old radio system that did not have a repeater to boost its signal. “People at north end (of the city) could not hear people at the south end,” Ness said. “With this, people could hear everyone.”

In addition, the new radios work with AA batteries, while the old system used rechargeable batteries that relied on electrical power. Ness said he hopes to buy 25 to 50 additional new radios in the coming year and to boost CERT’s ranks to more than 200 by next hurricane season. Today, the city has about 140 CERT members, but not all of them participate. About 50 members took part in the Ernesto training exercise, Ness said. The CERT program, developed by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, is designed to teach citizens how to take care of themselves and their neighbors. In an eight-week class, CERT members are trained to help fire-rescue by assessing injuries and damage to structures and utilities after a disaster. For information on the next CERT class, scheduled to start in October, call (561) 742-6329. For residents who live in unincorporated areas west of the city, Palm Beach County has its own CERT program. For information, call (561) 712-6400.

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Memorial highway: A statewide program to line Federal Highway with signs that read POW/MIA Memorial Highway starts this week in Boynton Beach. The city commission will unveil the first of two memorial signs on Friday at 10:30 a.m. in the commission chambers at city hall. The event is open to the public. Tom Kaiser, chair of the city’s Veterans Commission and co-chair of the Boynton Veterans Council, has worked for years to restart the Federal Highway (U.S. 1) memorial sign program. Launched in 1990, the program lapsed after signs went up in Jacksonville and Key West, said Kaiser, who led a similar effort in New York. Kaiser said he tried to revive the program here but was stymied repeatedly by inaction from officials. But a recent meeting with State Rep. Adam Hasner, R-Delray Beach, helped kick-start the program, Kaiser said. “We owe him,” he said. “We had tried over the years to get this done and doors closed.” The Florida Department of Transportation provides the signs, which are brown with gold lettering, Kaiser said.

For information, call the DOT at (561) 432-4966.