Community Risk Assessment/Standards of Cover
A comprehensive Community Risk Assessment/Standards of Cover (CRA-SOC) is essential to developing and matching appropriate deployment and response models to mitigate the identified risks in the community. A quality CRA-SOC is a foundational, often paradigm-shifting document for any size fire/EMS agency that wants to elevate service performance to the next level. The development of a CRA-SOC is a challenge for any organization, however the payback for your agency will far exceed the effort to create one. Ironwood Strategic Solutions stands ready to assist you through the process at whatever level is appropriate for your agency.
A comprehensive CRA-SOC provides the following advantages for your agency:
- Assesses the community fire and non-fire risk using a quantifiable, systematic approach
- Measures current service program performance
- Sets performance goals and objectives
- Forecasts future workloads
- Enables planning for new unit staffing and station locations
- Provides a platform for maintaining and improving current service delivery
- Helps provide focus areas and goals for a strategic planning process
- Provides a valuable resource when applying for grants and seeking improvement in an ISO rating
Ironwood Strategic Solutions employs a CRA-SOC development process that follows best recognized practices including NFPA 1300, Standard on Community Risk Assessment and Community Risk Reduction Plan Development. Our approach to facilitating and developing a CRA-SOC in partnership with your agency includes the following elements:
Develop customized risk assessment processes that are applicable and effective for measuring your community’s risks and developing response models.
Each of your emergency service delivery programs is unique. Fire risk needs to be assessed in a much different manner than EMS, hazmat, technical rescue, etc. Ironwood Strategic Solutions works with your agency’s members to create a credible and meaningful risk assessment process for each service delivery program. You will not be confined to a one-size-fits-all risk assessment process. Our approach is to develop risk assessment teams for each service delivery program, resulting in a better product and strong buy-in.
Analyze and assess larger regional risks that could affect your service area.
There are many situations where events occurring inside and outside an agency’s response area affect an agency’s response capability in a significant way. We facilitate a process to identify and prioritize these large-scale risks through a customized risk assessment process. Individual response plans can then be developed.
Assist your agency to keep your CRA-SOC relevant, current and a frequently-referenced document.
Like strategic plans, we strive to make your CRA-SOC something that becomes a daily reference for operations decisions and performance assessment. We design your CRA-SOC to be updated annually and can help you develop an ongoing process to keep it “organic.” As part of this process, we encourage you to have your governing board or city council adopt it as policy. This ensures your governing body has a clear picture of the community risks and your capability to respond to them in a well-designed and vetted process. Your CRA-SOC can be described as your “service contract” with your community.
Use an approach that ensures performance goals and objectives have been developed with community input.
What does the community expect in the way of response times and other elements of service performance? We will help you facilitate a process to gain stakeholder input and develop a plan to meet community expectations given current level resources.