TODAY'S ISSUE
Being ready is key part of emergency communications plan
By Robert J. Howard, Ph.D
President and CEO
Howard and Associated
email: netshadow004@aol.com
Special to GwinnettForum.com

(Editor's note; Bob Howard is a former director of strategic communications at the CDC and is an expert on crisis dynamics and preparations for the small business or large corporation.-eeb)

AUG. 5, 2005 -- The ability of an organization to move intelligently and aggressively is critical to every successful entity. What is required in this world of instant communications is the test of every senior and mid-level manger

You should be aware of the technology available to you. That means learning the new skills of real-time devices like camera uplink interviews and developing the ability to stay "on message" throughout a crisis. You must understand that each crisis/event has a life of its own, and each impacts your institution in different ways.

There's no such thing as a natural communicator. Those most effective are those who employ the strategies and methods that are tested, true and systemic in their organization

These skills can be honed in your day-to-day communications with employees and those with whom you interact. Does your professional demeanor reflect the skills of a person who has developed a message or "SOCO"(Single Overriding Communications Objective) throughout the discussion? Can you tactfully employ the techniques to weave the message into the thread of the dialogue? Is your organization ready for the really big event that either threatens your survival, or raises your status and provides you the opportunity to embrace the future?

In a significant crisis switchboards will be overloaded, staff will be harried and media will descend with difficult requests for speakers on their deadlines. You will have an influx of loved ones, police and rescue vehicles, disrupted power and water and the ever present superiors "up the food chain" who will demand frequent, accurate and calm messages of reassurance and control. You must be ready for superior or local politician who wants to put his or her face on the event.

Your job is to gather data, and determine what is appropriate, while reassuring staff, informing the public, and of managing the situation.
Invariably, bad things happen when you are not there. You have failed if your staff cannot communicate while you are not there.

Steps to Getting Ready Now

1. Provide staff with a clear understanding of their communications role in a crisis and where they might have to fill in for a colleague who has been called away or impacted by the crisis. For sure, always advise headquarters ASAP of any development.

2. Enable employees to hone public speaking skills.

3. Teach all staff the need for speed and what can be done in advance to assist the media and the public. Use fact sheets, data, and background information on key personnel, products and facilities.

4. Instill mandatory, continuing training. Critique and evaluate after each session.

5. Refine and Review existing behaviors and talents with the goal of placing the "right" person as the face of the event.

6. Teach and reinforce the use of technology to include telephones, e-mail and internal communication systems.

7. Realize that every media encounter sends a message about your organization. Plan ahead and have messages ready and targeted.

8. Enlighten every senior executive that his or her dress, demeanor, behavior, mannerisms, movements, hairstyles or voice, can act for or against them. Help them to understand…that they, too, are the message.

ELLIOTT BRACK
Gwinnett gets highway funds, but comes up short-changed
By Elliott Brack
Editor and Publisher
GwinnettForum.com

AUG. 5, 2005 -- We thought it important to include a story out of Rep. David Scott's office in the Forum recently about Gwinnett getting $20 million in funding out of the House Bill No. 3 from the U.S. Congress.

Now we find that it is not such a big deal. What HR 3 amounts to, it appears, is nothing shy of a national major pork barrel for the feasting representatives.

First one project after another has been approved, judging from a few headlines in Georgia newspapers over the last weekend.

Check out this sampling:

• Transportation bill passes in House
  Savannah projects are slated to receive $19 million from the federal government.
  Savannah Morning News/Saturday
  
  
• Hwy. 280 project in Crisp County gets funding
  U.S. Congressman Sanford Bishop announced on Friday that $800,000 had been earmarked for the project in the Transportation Equity Act.
  Cordele Dispatch
  
  
• Tift County to benefit from highway bill
  More than $10 million of the $286 billion highway bill approved by Congress on Friday will go to Tift County to improve highways, widen Interstate 75 and construct a truck route around Tifton.
  Tifton Gazette
  
  
• Highway bill includes funds for National Infantry Museum in Columbus
  Columbus Ledger-Enquirer/Saturday
  
  
• Athens-Clarke to get nearly $5.8 million
  Athens Banner-Herald/Saturday
  
  
• Macon trail to get more than $6.1 million
  The Ocmulgee Heritage Greenway will be extended with the funds.
  Macon Telegraph/Saturday
  
  
• Rome, Floyd County to get $21.8 million
  Rome News-Tribune/Saturday
  
  
• Congressional bill to feed more than $40.7 million to Cobb
  Both the U.S. House and Senate overwhelmingly approved the six-year, $286.4 billion infrastructure bill, which included more than $40.7 million for project in Cobb, $92 million in transportation and other funding for metro Atlanta and more than $211 million for the state of Georgia.
  Marietta Daily Journal

Suddenly, HR 3 takes on an entirely different light. Instead of gloating, we in Gwinnett should be concerned. For here is Gwinnett, with a population of over 700,000, and getting only a paltry $20 million in pork from this bill

This really brings up questions when we hear that Georgia gained a windfall of $286 from the bill. When you see the Georgia totals, you realize that Gwinnett suffered even more than we had thought from being treated unfairly by the bill.

Savannah, with Chatham County about a third of our size, with 235,270 residents, gets $19 million. Tift County, with a population of 39,523 residents, snares $10 million. Rome and Floyd County, with totaling 93,368 people, dwarfing in size to Gwinnett, comes up with nearly $22 million.

And Cobb, slightly smaller in population than Gwinnett, gets two times as much as Gwinnett, a whopping $40 million.

Nevermind that always-busy Interstate 85 runs the length of Gwinnett.

Nevermind that heavily-traveled Highway 316 desperately needs improvement.

Nevermind that no matter where you live in Gwinnett, traffic is the major problem.

But it does make you wonder if the root of the problem is of splitting Gwinnett among three Congressional delegations. Gwinnett is has parts of t Congressional districts of John Linder, David Scott and Cynthia McKinney. Yes, it raises questions.

We recognize that when it comes to Congress, it is in the business of distributing pork.

We wonder why Gwinnett is so far missing out on its rightful platter.

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McLEMORE'S WORLD
8/5: Car shark

Another great cartoon from Bill McLemore:

NOTABLE
Long-awaited new bridging of 316 over I-85 work to start soon

Gwinnett motorists are a step closer to seeing changes on the westbound portion of Highway 316 over Interstate 85. The Georgia Department of Transportation will soon begin work on replacing the left-hand entrance ramp onto the interstate with a right-hand entrance ramp. Gwinnett Commissioners this week approved an agreement for the county to purchase wetland and stream credits to replace those impacted by the project. This agreement also includes several plan revisions at a cost of approximately $96,000.

The mitigation work is required by the Army Corps of Engineers in accordance with the Clean Water Act and has a cost of approximately $1.87 million. The state will reimburse the county in full for this expense and that of the plan revisions. These are two of the final work items needed before construction bids can open in September.

Additionally, the project will extend High Occupancy Vehicle (HOV) lanes from their current terminus (south of Pleasant Hill Road) northward to just north of the Old Peachtree Road interchange. The interchange construction will provide direct access between I-85 HOV lanes and proposed future Georgia Highway 316 HOV lanes.

Gwinnett County is providing the engineering and the required services to buy the land needed for the project. The county's cost is about $6 million. The state DOT is paying for the land and is building the project using state and federal funds. The state is paying about $24 million in pre-construction and land costs. The construction is estimated to cost about $100 million.

The project includes 13 bridges with a total length of over one mile and 24 retaining walls with a total length of more than two and half miles.

"The state DOT plans to receive construction bids in September with actual work on the ground beginning late this year or early next year. The construction should take about three and a half years to complete.

County approves $146,000 for boys' shelter from CDB funds

A new shelter for boys will soon get under way following today's approval by the Board of Commissioners of $146,000 in Community Development Block Grant funds for the construction. The new building will be located at Gwinnett County's only shelter for abused and neglected children.

Chairman Charles Bannister said: "The Gwinnett Children's Shelter provides a place where the most vulnerable children are safe, and where a caring staff provides support, counseling, and a place free from violence and neglect," Bannister noted that he was pleased Gwinnett County was in a position to help the Children's Shelter to expand its capability to shelter and protect Gwinnett County's children.

The $146,000 in CDBG funds makes the total CDBG award to the Children's Shelter for this project $496,000. Site development and architectural design costs provided by the Children's Shelter total over $329,000.

Construction of the project is expected to begin in early fall of this year, and the shelter is expected to be completed and occupied by fall 2006.

The Gwinnett Children's Shelter has been in operation since 1987 and has provided emergency shelter to more than 4,000 youth. It is the only organization located in Gwinnett County that provides emergency shelter, counseling and care for children who have been abused and neglected by their families and who have been placed into protective custody of the Department of Family and Children Services. The shelter's facilities are under a 50-year lease with Gwinnett County, which owns the shelter site.

UPCOMING
Red Gwinnett offering launching own business seminar

Red Gwinnett, networking in Spanish offered by the Gwinnett Chamber, is offering a special seminar on "Launching Your Own Business: Essential Information to Help You Succeed," presented by Salvador Norman, Service Core of Retired Executives (SCORE). The seminar will be held on Tuesday, August 9, at 6 p.m. in the John D. Stephens Education Room of the Gwinnett Chamber of Commerce.

The seminar will cover the finance, legal, marketing, accounting and insurance aspects of starting a business. By attending this seminar, participants will gain practical knowledge of how to structure a business and operate it for success as well as learning pitfalls to avoid. Attendees will also be provided with the basics in the major professional areas of business start-ups.

Red Gwinnett is held the second and fourth Tuesday of every month from 6 - 7:30 p.m. No reservations for the group are required. All are welcome to attend. There is no charge to attend.

RECOMMENDED READ

• An invitation: What Web sites or books have you enjoyed? Send us your best recent read along with a short paragraph as to why you liked it, plus what book you plan to read next. --eeb
  
  

GEORGIA TIDBIT
Signing of Yazoo bill disgraces Gov. George Mathews

George Mathews (1739-1812), a veteran of the Continental army, migrated to Wilkes County from Virginia between 1783 and 1784. He quickly rose to service as a state legislator, governor, and member of the U.S. Congress.

By 1777 Mathews obtained appointment as colonel of the Ninth Virginia Regiment. During the Battle of Germantown, Penn. his entire regiment was either killed or captured. Mathews remained a prisoner of war until December 1781.

Shortly after his release Mathews rejoined the Continental army in Georgia and South Carolina. Mathews opted to purchase property in the Goose Pond region of Wilkes County, near the Broad River, and obtained additional state lands for his revolutionary service.

Mathews lived in a log cabin with his wife, Anne Polly Paul Mathews, and their eight children. He sought entrance into the public and political life of the Georgia backcountry. Mathews stood as a candidate to the Georgia Assembly in 1787. Legislators took advantage of his reputation as an aggressive military leader and Continental officer and elected Mathews as governor for 1787-88.

As the new chief executive Mathews chafed at the restrictions placed upon the independence of the governor by the Georgia Constitution of 1777, which prevented his quick response to border conflicts with the Spanish and Creek Indians. In 1788 western residents elected Mathews as a member to the House of Representatives. In spite of a lackluster term, defeat in 1791 by a land speculation faction called the Combined Society, and failure to win a federal senatorial seat in 1792, Mathews rebuilt political support and maneuvered legislative election as governor in 1793.

In 1795 private land companies revived a failed 1789 effort to purchase the state's western land claims extending to the Mississippi River. His approval of the Yazoo land sale catapulted him into political disgrace. Since most of the anti-Yazooists followed the principles of the rising Jeffersonian-Republican faction, Mathews's identification with the Federalists intensified those accusations.

Mathews sought a new life in Mississippi Territory, where he married a propertied widow, Mary Carpenter. His efforts to revive his political career included an 1812 commission by U.S. President James Madison to encourage an East Florida rebellion against the Spanish government and annexation of that territory to the United States. The revolt took place, and Mathews began to organize an attack on St. Augustine. But he worked too successfully. Members of the federal government felt it politically inexpedient to acquire Florida at that time, and the president issued a recall to Mathews. Mathews took the rejection of his Florida efforts personally. He started to travel to Washington, D.C., to confront the president but fell ill while passing through Augusta. There he died and was buried in the cemetery of the St. Paul Episcopal Church.

• To access the Georgia Encyclopedia, go to http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org
  
  

THOUGHT OF THE DAY
Ever consider that happiness could be like a butterfly?

"Happiness is like a butterfly which, when pursued, is always beyond our grasp, but, if you will sit down quietly, may alight upon you."

-- Author Nathaniel Hawthorne, via Barbara Grastat, Lawrenceville.

• Another invitation: What's your favorite saying? Share with others through GwinnettForum. Send to elliott@gwinnettforum.com.
  

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