2004 NATIONAL EARTHQUAKE CONFERENCE

Award of Excellence Recipient

Award Category:  Multi-Jurisdictional Planning

Program Name: Vermont Geological Survey

Contact: Laurence Becker, State Geologist

Vermont Agency of Natural Resources

103 S.Main Street-Laundry Bldg.

Waterbury VT 05671-3273

Phone:  (802) 241-3496

Fax:      (802) 241-3273

Email:   Laurence.becker@anr.state.vt.us

Mitigation Plan uses HAZUS-MH output produced by the Survey and it is worked into what is hoped to be an enhanced hazard mitigation plan for Vermont. The Survey is also involved in other natural hazard mitigation awareness activities as well. In 1997, the Vermont Geological Survey in cooperation with Vermont Emergency Management (VEMA) and FEMA Region I made initial use of HAZUS to predict potential damage from the postulated events. As part of the analysis, new geologic information for the default "soft soils" was substituted in the Burlington area.

After the first HAZUS runs it was realized that there was the potential for significant losses from postulated events so contact was made with Regional Planning Commissions to bring HAZUS information to planning efforts. Through VGS membership on mitigation planning committees at VEMA there is a general awareness among regional planning commissions of the uses of HAZUS to predict potential damage from projected earthquake events. Presentations were made to regional planners and Regional Planning Commission GIS specialists. The first prototype of a pre-disaster mitigation plan in Vermont, the VGS ran a number of scenarios to predict earthquake damage in Addison County. The earthquake estimation and loss data are to be transferred to plans that will be adopted by towns as preparation for earthquake events. The format for the use of HAZUS information in the Addison County plan was transferred to plans for Rutland, Bennington, and the Central Vermont Regional mitigation plans with HAZUS information particular to these regions.

In a region where damaging earthquakes are regarded by the general population as an almost non-existent phenomenon, the VGS has done outstanding work in educating the public and making them aware of the reality that this very real threat poses.
  

The Organizing Committee of the 2004 National Earthquake Conference is doing business as the Western States Seismic Policy Council.