Commitment to Our Community

Our Commitment

Part 1
Being Prepared
Evergreen Fire/Rescue has a strong commitment to our community. In fact, it is our mission as an organization to protect life, property, and the environment through prevention, preparedness, education and emergency response. What does that really mean, you ask?

We have a philosophy that the more you, as residents in the Evergreen Fire Protection District, know the better you can be prepared. The more we can provide education about risk reduction on your property and in your home, the more you can identify and reduce your personal risk. The better you are prepared, the better we as a district are prepared. And the emergency response part of our mission? That is what we do every day as firefighters and paramedics serving the community. We hope you never have to call 911 but if you do, we want you to know we are here for your emergency.

Being prepared takes many forms. In the coming weeks we are going to provide opportunities for the community to learn more about how to commit to preparedness and prevention for your safety and that of your family and friends.

What is the first thing you can do? Sign up for Lookout Alert if you live in Jefferson County and for CodeRed if you live in Clear Creek County. These programs provide us and the County Sheriff’s offices a way to send you emergency notifications such as flash flood, active shooter/shelter in place, or fire evacuation messages through a reverse call, text, or email to you from our 911 call center. This is the most efficient way of getting these messages and instructions to you in the event of an emergency. Sign up now!

Part 2
CPR and AED’s Save Lives
As part of our commitment to our community Evergreen Fire/Rescue partners with local nonprofit Evergreen Public Access Defibrillation (EPAD) to bring CPR/AED education to our residents monthly. It is estimated that 325,000 to 350,000 die annually due to a Sudden Cardiac Arrest. Quick response CPR and use of an AED can drastically improve the chances of surviving a heart attack. If one of your family members suffers a heart attack, are you prepared to save their life?

The team at Evergreen Park and Recreation District were when one of their customers playing pickle ball went into Sudden Cardiac Arrest. At the Evergreen Chorale, when their director of music went into Sudden Cardiac Arrest on a dark snowy night with long ambulance response times they were prepared! We even have teams of responders throughout the Evergreen community who are CPR certified and have actually signed up to be notified if a Cardiac Arrest happens near them and their AED!  

You can make a commitment to your family, friends, coworkers, and the community by learning to perform CPR and by knowing where the closest AED is located.  You can go a step further by registering to be notified when CPR/AED is needed in your neighborhood so that life-saving intervention can begin while an ambulance is on the way. During their 21 years EPAD has placed more than 90 AEDs in public locations in Evergreen, Conifer, and Genesee where they are accessible quickly. The partnership between EPAD and Evergreen Fire/Rescue along with the support of St Anthony Hospital/Centura has provided low cost education in CPR and how to use an AED to thousands in the community.

February is Heart Health Month. Register for a CPR class today by checking the schedule at this link and calling us to sign up! 303.674.3145 (https://www.evergreenfirerescue.com/divisions/aha_heartsaver_cpr_aed_classes/2021_cpr_schedule.php)

Part 3
Wildfire Evacuation Planning
Evergreen Fire/Rescue, our surrounding fire districts and the Jefferson County Sheriff's Office continue to coordinate efforts in wildfire response and attack. EFR, for example, worked with the Sheriff's Office and other agencies on developing a pre-plan document the deputies can use in the case of a wildfire to help guide them in decision making.Our greatest challenge is the dynamic nature of wildfires, which is dependent on temperature, relative humidity, fuel moisture, topography, fuel load, wind speed, wind direction, time of day and forecasted weather in the coming hours. All of these variables are what makes pre-planning evacuation routes very difficult.  We, like all other responding agencies, put life safety first when faced with a fast moving event like a wildfire. A unified command is established in a command post, where we then determine the size of the evacuation area, the direction of travel for the evacuees, and a shelter location for people to go based on the fire conditions generated by all the variables listed here, and more. Law enforcement then executes that plan while the fire department attacks the fire.  

We ask our community members to become familiar with the different ways to exit their neighborhoods and to leave early. Law enforcement will direct traffic, stop ingress into areas we are evacuating, and work to keep traffic flowing out. We are aware of the bottlenecks and the pinch points in areas of our community and where possible, will move people out in multiple directions. This will all depend on the fire and smoke conditions at the time.  

Hopefully, this helps you understand the dynamic nature of wildfire and why we have to make evacuation route decisions depending on the fire conditions.

If you are interested in helping our efforts to better prepare our community in the event of a wildland fire, please reach out to Jess Moore, our Wildland Project Coordinator. She can put you in touch with your CWPIP Plan Unit Ambassador. These volunteer Ambassadors help get information on defensible space, home hardening and evacuation preparedness into the neighborhoods throughout our fire district. Visiting our website, you can also sign-up for a free defensible space inspection and help inform your mitigation project.

The following links are some resources for your preparedness and awareness:

Be Your Own Hero Emergency Preparedness Guides

Lookout Alert Emergency Notifications (Jefferson County)

CodeRED Emergency Notifications (Clear Creek County)

Community Wildfire Preparedness and Implementation Plans (CWPIP)

From Jefferson County Sheriff's Office
Many of you asked what we do for fire training in Jeffco. Check out this link https://jeffcosheriff.co/5280Fire to a 5280Fire.com article and pictures from our multiagency April 15th training. The JCSO works with your local fire departments to provide as many resources as possible during a wildfire event and to safely get people out of harm’s way. You, too, can #BeYourOwnHero and prepare your home, family and property for wildfires. Visit our JCSO emergency management webpage to learn more at https://www.jeffco.us/508/Wildfire.