Cumberland County School System Selects Prepared Response Inc. for Crisis Management System
Installation of PRI’s Rapid Responder System to be funded by Department of Education Grant Money

SEATTLE, WA-- February 22, 2006 -- Prepared Response, Inc. (PRI), a Seattle-based crisis management planning and response company, today announced that it has been awarded a $733,000 contract for installation of the company’s Rapid Responder® crisis management system in the Cumberland County School System in Fayetteville, North Carolina. The U.S. Department of Education awarded the school system a grant in October to improve emergency response and crisis management plans for its 85 elementary, middle, high school and administration facilities. The Rapid Responder system provides school security, police, fire, and other responders with key information that allows them to act quickly, decisively, safely, and in a coordinated response with other agencies.

“The Cumberland County School system now will be able to create an improved, comprehensive Cumberland County Community Emergency Preparedness Plan,” said Cumberland County Sheriff Earl Butler. “This plan will involve an integrated network of first responders and other stakeholders operating as a unified Crisis Planning Team.”

“We are excited to have been selected by the Cumberland County School District to help improve safety and security for the students and staff in the district,” said Jim Finnell, president and CEO of Prepared Response. “The Rapid Responder system will facilitate planning between schools officials and local first responders to ensure a fast, coordinated response. The system was used at a Washington state high school to quickly contain a gunman and evacuate 2,000 students in 20 minutes, and in another incident to quickly locate the shut-off valve for a broken fire sprinkler system saving the district over $100,000 in damage to a gym floor.”

Earlier this year, representatives from the county, mental health, and emergency responders from all four jurisdictions in Cumberland County met with district officials to discuss further development of the district's crisis response plan.

“We feel the safety of our staff and students is extremely important,” said Cumberland County School Superintendent Dr. William Harrison. “By working closely with the Crisis Planning Team, we can give the critical information emergency responders need in an incident.”

The Rapid Responder system runs on laptop computers and allows first responders to instantly access more than 300 data points, including tactical plans, floor plans, aerial and geospatial imagery, interior and exterior photos, staging areas, hazardous materials quantities and locations, utility shut-offs, and evacuation routes for virtually any school facility. To implement the Rapid Responder system, school officials first meet with their local police and fire representatives to pre-plan how each agency will respond to various emergency situations. Once the pre-plans are established, a PRI data collection team digitally maps the school, typically cataloguing over 300 key data points per building. The pre-plans and data go through a stringent quality control process and then are loaded into a master database that is distributed electronically to the various stakeholders. School system personnel can update any changes at the school via a Web-based tool, ensuring that police, fire, and other responders have access to the most current information.