During the Sept. 10 Mountain Emergency Service Committee meeting, Kathleen Henderson, Riverside County emergency services coordinator for the mountain, discussed the work of the new Emergency Management Department that the Board of Supervisors established in May and was effective July 1.

The agency has created a website (www.rivcoready.org/) to help county residents prepare and plan how to react in case of an emergency.

Directions on preparing an emergency kit, a family plan, as well as a list of other government websites, which would be sources of information during an emergency, are available on the EMD site.

The county is working on a hazard mitigation plan in order to be prepared if the forecasted major El Niño event occurs this fall or winter. More information will be available later this fall as the plan is completed.