10/24/2005 Meeting Minutes - Laserfiche WebLink

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Regular Council Meeting 10/24/05 Page 4 Presentation of Resolution No. 2005-24 Mayor Rinker preliminarily indicated that we live in a climate where we only get rain maybe for half the year and in pretty small doses as opposed to Florida and everywhere along the Gulf Coast where they get incredible storms. This season has been an amazing exception to past history. We all know and are very familiar with the ravages of Hurricane Katrina and Rita. Mayfield Village stepped up to the plate in a lot of different ways. Tonight, we want to recognize not only our residents and businesses that contributed to helping people out in a time of need but also and more importantly tonight for recognizing two firefighters and a police officer who devoted their personal time to taking care of a tough situation. Mayor Rinker read the Resolution, requesting that Council pass it and inviting our safety personnel recipients to step up and share a little of their experiences with us. First Reading of Resolution 1\l0. 2005-24, entitled "A resolution of appreciation to the businesses -and residents of Mayfield Village, Firefighter John Panzero, Firefighter Gino Carcioppollo and Police Sergeant Rick Whitehead." Introduced by Mayor Rinker and Council as a Whole. Mrs. Cinco, seconded by Mr. Marrie, made a motion to adopt Resolution No. 2005-24. Mr. Buckholtz added that he read the letter written by Sergeant Whitehead which indicated that 73,982 individuals received assistance from the Red Cross during the entire 2004 hurricane season; 1,016,130 individuals have received assistance as a result of Katrina and Rita in 2005. That is nearly 14 times 2004 figures in less than a two month period. Damage assessments indicated that over 893,000 homes were damaged, approximately 40% of those were destroyed, there were 224 shelters with 23,970 overnight stays in shelters, hotels were used. The most interesting fact was that before they could help anyone else, they had to organize and help themselves. Every day it was a battle just to find food and fuel. He traveled about 250 miles a day to keep the organization going. Sergeant Whitehead was very instrumental in creating that foundation before he could help anyone. There was really no foundation before they got there. It is an amazing story. ROLL CALL: AYES: All NAYS: None Motion Carried Resolution Adopted Presentation from John Panzero First of all, John Panzero thanked Council, Chief Mohr and the other firefighters that picked up the slack back at the station filling their shifts. It was quite an experience being gone for that length of time. They were proud to serve and to help out people not only from Katrina but Rita as well. There were some down days, but they were an instrumental part of the system with regard to the community-relations aspect of FEMA that were on the street locating people, getting FEMA the numbers so that they can allocate the correct resources to the right area. They followed the news reports. It did not look good the first couple weeks in September. There was a