Torres on typhoon resiliency: ‘We’re getting there’

Gov. Ralph DLG Torres says the government is working on securing its own warehouse for goods and equipment should the next devastating typhoon hit the CNMI.

Speaking to reporters at the Federal Emergency Management Agency workshop last week, the governor thanked FEMA for their partnership since Typhoon Soudelor last year. “Throughout whole time up today we have strong relationship and future because hardening is going to take time,” said Torres. “Without them we would not be where we are today.”

So you’re question is, are we ready? We are getting there,” he added, when asked if he was optimistic the CNMI could handle the next major typhoon that has still left many in the community without homes and crippled the power grid last year.

Torres, noting FEMA assistance programs, said they have an underground electrical cable proposed up at local Saipan airport. “We have about 70 percent of our wells up there so that will definitely take care of that” and “we are in the process of building our own warehouse. Mr. [Robert] Fenton [FEMA regional administrator] has offered to go to Guam and look at what they have there and perhaps emulate the warehouse they have.”

Torres said they have identified a warehouse site where the CNMI Office of Homeland Security is located on Capitol Hill. Torres says because of its higher elevation, they believe it’s the best-situated part of the island.

Since the typhoon, the governor has urged local agencies to take advantage with hazard mitigation grants or assistance they could avail of from FEMA in their disaster recovery program and asked if he was happy agencies have done this, he said, “I believe all of us can do more. But I believe with the resources and the availability that they have I believe they have done a good job.”

“A lot of this success comes with partnership. I would not be here without the help of Mr. Fenton, and FEMA, guiding us with what we need and what we category we fall into,” he said.

Fenton, for his part, says partnership is critical. He said they had about 50 different federal personnel at the workshop at the Fiesta Resort & Spa last week, from about 15 to 20 different agencies. “Not only are they here as teams that respond during a typhoon, a lot of them have a lot of grants programs where they assist CNMI throughout the year.”

The agencies’ had the goal of building a response and recovery plan to a typhoon, which they plan on working on over the next year with an “exercise” planned at the end of the process to test the plan.

Fenton stresses a “unity of effort. “To respond, it really takes the whole community so it’s not just CNMI and the federal government but the private sector, faith-based, and nonprofits.

“It’s the public here. Do individuals have disaster kits? Are they able to take care of themselves? Do they have a plan?”

“Everyone needs to be part of this. We are all going to work together over the next year…so we are all working toward the same goals to the governor’s priorities,” he said.

Climate change was a topic on the first day of the workshop last week and Fenton says climate change affects everyone. “Not only with potential changes in the climate but sea level rise and so as we look at those effects—not only as they happen tomorrow—but over a period of time, one decade, two decades down the road, are we building that infrastructure to not only withstands the threats today but are we building them with the anticipated threats two or three decades from now so that infrastructure will survive those changes?”

He added that they are looking at putting underground part of the local power system and making sure there is redundancy in the system with regards to water by putting generators near key water wells.

They originally wrote up the recovery project for 450 wooden poles and 250 concrete poles, but Fenton noted that in talking more with the local utility and governor, they’ve adjusted the project in the last month to bring even more concrete poles.