Once again, the people and organizations that call Hancock County home have pulled together to make things happen for the people of the county.

Temporarily, Hancock Hope House will make their facilities available for overnight shelter during the upcoming polar vortex. See details below:
Winter Emergency Shelter

• Person(s) seeking shelter will check in at Hope House office door.
• Hope House staff will do background checks (approx. 30 minute response).
  • If they meet Hope House background requirements they will be allowed to stay. 
    • All temporary residents will be sleeping in the family living room. 
    • If they are not eligible for shelter within Hope House, the Hancock County Sheriff’s Department will provide rides to Wheeler Mission. 
• Person(s) admitted to Hope House under Winter Contingency…
  • Overnight Hours
    • Monday through Friday – 7:00pm to 8:00am
    • Day time warmth can be sought at the Greenfield Library.
    • Weekends – Hours will be determined on a case-by-case basis.
  • Men will be permitted to use the restrooms and showers in the Men’s Dorm and women will be permitted to use the restrooms and showers in the Women’s Wing.
  • Guests can help themselves to the food in the pantry. 
  • It is expected that guests adhere to general program rules.
    • Be and remain drug and alcohol free.
    • Lights out is 11pm.
    • General cleaning of use of facilities (especially bathroom and kitchen areas).
    • No drugs or alcohol will be permitted. 
    • Please smoke more than 25 feet from the door. 

Hancock County COAD is close to having other options available as well. Watch for future announcements. Thank you to everyone who has expressed concern, prayed oveer the effort and helped make this happen.

Hancock County COAD team
www.HancockCOAD.org

Salvation Army Hancock County team
www.SalArmyHancock.org

I recently finished a book by Ted Koppel titled “Lights Out!” You may know him as one of the last true journalists of our time. This is not a fear-mongering doomsday “prophet”. Very well-researched and documented review of the current status of our electric grid. Here are a few excerpts:
“On one level, cyber crime is now so commonplace that we have already absorbed it into the catalogue of daily outrages that we observe, briefly register, and ultimately ignore.”
“Ours has become a largely reactive culture. We are disinclined to anticipate disaster, let alone prepare for it. We wait for bad things to happen and then we assign blame.”
“The weakest links in this system tend to be the smaller companies with the poorest security and maintenance practices.”
“In reality, the ranks of our potential enemies have never been this deep. Our points of vulnerable access are greater than in all of previous human history, yet we have barely begun to focus on the actual danger that cyber warfare presents to our national infrastructure.”
“How does a country’s leadership draw the appropriate line between prudence and paranoia when neither the timing nor the exact nature of a threat to national security can be defined?”

A major role of the COAD during this stage of life is to prepare for a response to a list of 14 potential threats. Success won’t, can’t, be measured until we are struck by one of them.

Practicing what plans are in place (however imperfect they are)  is the only way to know where we are missing something. Watch for an upcoming training exercise.