Rick McLester – Vice President                            William “Ski” Zagorski – Sec/Treas.              Stan Upton – Refugio EM

Rickey McLester – Ex. Design                               Fred Nardini – Board Member                        Leroy Moody – Comm.

Terri Olivares – SPC E911                                     Sandy Olson – ARC                                          Missy Beck – SPC Safety

Mattie Atkinson – SPC Floodplain                         RJ Thomas – CBCOG                                     Jim Lowery – Global Sec

Macy Culpepper – San Pat Co.                               Stephen Burnett – CBCOG                            Stan Bynum – Ingleside

Shanna Owens – Ingleside                                       Ron Dollins – Coastal Plain MHMR               Pete Perkins – Ingleside

Rickie Kilgore – APFD                                            David Offalter – APFD                                    Carsten Meyer – AP EMC

JoAnn Ehmann - IOB VFD                                      Cindy Keese – Care Reg. Med Center           Todd Harrison – E.ON

Jason Burnell – RTFC                                              John Metz – NWS                                            Jason Runyun – NWS

Clemente Sanchez – Sinton VFD                            Sonya Lopez Sosa – Port of Corpus     

I.        Call to Order/Approval of Minutes:  The meeting was held in Sinton at the Sheriff’s Department Training Room.  Vice President Rick McLester called the meeting to order at 1:00 p.m. He explained Bob Blaschke is attending the Refugio County Livestock show to see his grandson participate. He welcomed everyone and asked them to introduce themselves. There was not a motion to approve the minutes.

II.       Executive Report: Rick said he spoke with the state representative and he enjoyed himself at the Appreciation Diner. Ski said they need to give a hand to Missy Beck and Mattie Atkinson for all their hard work on the dinner.  

III.    Financial Report: Ski said there is $41,004.15 in the checking account. There was not a motion to approve the financial report.  He said at the executive meeting they approved the proposed budget and he asked the general member for their approval. Rick McLester made a motion to approve the budget and it was 2^nd by Rickey McLester.          

IV.   Subcommittee Reports:

1.      Communications – Leroy Moody said they are still working on the tower site and the licensing. Once they get that there will be more negotiating.        

2.    Exercise & Design – Rickey McLester Jr. said they set the date for the drill on June 1^st at the San Patricio County Civic Center. They will have a tabletop a couple of weeks prior to the actual drill. He asked all the Emergency Managers to get their list into him by April 7^th. Rick said Bee, Live Oak and McMullen counties will be participating in the drill to get their required state credit.  

3.    Hazard Analysis & Vulnerability – Rick McLester said he had nothing to report.  

4.    Health & Medical – Delores Bacon was not present. Missy Beck said Delores asked her to tell the group the Health Department will be doing training with local medical agencies in conjunction with CBRAC Coastal Bend Regional Advisory Councils.    

               5.   Public Information & Awareness – Bob Blaschke was not present. Ski said he is not sure of Bobs schedule but he is sure they will get back on board. Bob will be needing volunteers to help out. He said they have a good supply of coloring books, crayons and brochures and the trailer is stocked.  

6.   Resource & Funding – Fred Nardini said he would first like to welcome Todd Harrison from E.ON to the meeting. He said contributions are coming in steadily right now. San Pat County has received fourteen contributions totaling $4,850, Aransas County received two at $100.00 and Refugio County received one for $1,500.00. The total amount of Tier II Contributions is $46,50.00 and that does not include a $2,000.00 contribution from Exxonmobile pipeline. He said they are where they need to be this time of the year and if you know someone from any of the companies that have not made a donation to please ask them for a contribution.         

7.  Training – Ski said he will let Shanna Owen speak on the upcoming CERT training Ingleside VFD is hosting. Shanna first explained what CERT stands for. She said it is for Community Emergency Response Team where regular volunteer citizens can respond to disasters. These citizens are under the direction of local emergency responders. The training is scheduled for April 8 – 10 in Ingleside. It will be a three day twenty hour hands on training session. She had a handout on the training and said you may call her to register. RJ Thomas said the CBCOG is having a Basic Incident Command System Course on Monday. You still have time to sign up for this on preparingtexas.org or you can just show up and he will make sure you get in. He said their Hurricane Exercise in Corpus will be on May 24^th. Ski said he has three conferences he will be attending in April, the TAC, Floodplain and Homeland Security Conferences. John Metz said there is two months until Hurricane Season and he is already scheduling for his Hurricane Preparedness presentations. You may contact him if you would like him to come and give a presentation. Jason Runyan said the fire season has started, so be aware of that. John said the next chance for rain is the first week in April.

V.        Action Items: There were no action items.   

VI.       Special Topics: Jim Lowery, General Manager, Global Security Systems, Alert FM.

Ski introduced Jim Lowery. He said all surrounding counties were awarded a grant for the Alert FM Radio and they are using Global Security Systems which is a service provider for the Alert FM. San Patricio and Nueces Counties did not qualify due to their population density. Rick and Stan have already received their receivers but need help getting setup with the software. He said Jim has a lot of information and he then turned it over to Jim. Jim thanked Ski for inviting him to speak at the meeting. He began by explaining how the Alert FM radio will give emergency managers the ability to create and send digital emergency information to specific groups on these receivers. You can report local incidents, evacuation instructions, weather warnings, homeland security messages, amber alerts, school closings, etc. Information can be targeted to certain locations or specific groups such as Fire Departments, Schools, Hospitals, etc. The receivers use the local FM radio stations and they can store up to thirty codes. He passed around the smaller receiver and said once in place, the emergency managers will be trained and then the units could be purchased by citizens at Radio Shack or True Value Hardware for $40.00. The larger receiver which is for businesses cost around $300.00.  John Metz asked if it can be linked into the NWS alerts and Jim said yes it can.  John said right now they get non weather related messages out on the EAS Emergency Alert System. John asked how many lines of information can the unit display and Jim said you can type in 240 characters. John asked what the battery life is on the smaller receiver and Jim said two months but it does have a plug in as well. There was some discussion about Fire Departments using it for paging their volunteers. Jim said they could use these receivers in their upcoming drill. In closing Jim said he will be getting with Rick and Stan to help them get their software set up and if anyone has any questions to please get with him after the meeting. They also have a website. Rick thanked Jim for speaking at the meeting.  

VII.       Next Meeting Schedule:  The next LEPC meeting will be May 19, 2011. Ski said he would like to have Rickey’s tabletop drill on the same day at the San Patricio County Civic Center. Starting at 8:30, then go into the executive and general meetings afterwards. More information will be sent out with the meeting notices.

VIII.     Public Comments:  There were no public comments.  

IX.      Adjourn: Rick said once again he would like for everyone to spread the word to friends and coworkers to please attend the meetings. With no further business Rick McLester adjourned the meeting at 2:00 p.m.

William E. Zagorski Sr. - LEPC Secretary/Treasurer