The transcript is AI generated and lightly edited for glaring errors. Please excuse minor errors.
Introduction
Welcome to When It Hits the Fan, Lane County's favorite podcast for all things emergency preparedness. Whether you're just dipping your toes into the world of emergency preparedness or you've been building bunkers since Y2K, we've got something for you. Hosted by Lane County Emergency Management, this podcast is all about equipping you with the knowledge and resources to be prepared and stay safe, no matter what hits the fan.
Devon
So welcome back. Tiffany and I have the honor to welcome Sheriff Cliff Harrold to the show, and we're very excited to have him come and talk about evacuations, what that means for our community, and how that process works. Before you jump in with that information, though, Sheriff, would you please tell us a little bit about your time at the Lane County Sheriff's Office?
Sheriff Harrold
Yeah. You bet. thanks for the invitation to be your first guest. I've been a part of the Sheriff's Office for over 30 years. Actually, started while I was still in high school as a cadet, and then hired as a deputy as soon as I turned 21. I've had the privilege of working just about every assignment there is in the Sheriff's Office, from corrections to patrol.
And then, the honor of becoming the Sheriff in 2019. So, I'm just a little farther than five years into serving as the Sheriff of Lane County, which is a great honor. And, I really love this community. I've spent my whole life in this community, raised a family in this community, and I really love the people of the Sheriff's Office who are just, each one of them, internally driven to serve this community. So it's a real privilege to get to work with them and to be in this position.
Tiffany
Thanks for sharing that. I didn't realize all of that about you. That's really interesting. Thanks for being with us here today, Sheriff. I'm excited to talk about evacuation. I was actually with your command staff last week talking about how this occurs on the ground with all of us and so it's really exciting to hear from you.
I know you've been doing this for a long time, and that you have a, a lot of passion and feelings about how it goes. I heard that repeatedly last week. So, let's dive into it for our listeners and talk about the evacuation levels in the State of Oregon that we use here in Lane County. You want to go over those?
Sheriff Harrold
Yeah. You bet. So we, we have three levels that we use. Level 1 we refer to as Be Ready. Level 2 is Be Set. And Level 3 is the GO NOW notice. And so we also oftentimes color code those. So Level 1 is a green and Level 2 is a yellow. Level 3 is a red because of the urgency there. So, we like folks when we, when we issue a Level 1 notice, we're really just needing to get the public's attention that's in the affected area and make sure that they're aware that there's something going on in their, in their area they need to be paying attention to. It's, it's the time to make sure that they can locate their important documents, know where their passports are, maybe birth certificates, insurance information, roundup medications and those sorts of things.
It's the first notice. So really there's, there's some time available to folks, to, to locate these things and know where these important things are in case the evacuation levels escalate for them. You know, in a perfect world, we'd be able to just, issue a Level 1, let people know there's something going on, they could pay attention to it to get resolved, and it would never get beyond a Level 1.
Unfortunately, every summer since 2020, we've had the case where it has escalated in some portion of our county. So, the next level is a Level 2 (Be Set). And again, that's, really asking the folks in the affected area to, to dial in, to be real intentional at seeking information and paying attention to information sources.
We're asking people to make sure that they're following the Lane County social media page, the Lane County Sheriff's Office social media page. We're asking them to make sure they're tuning in to the local TV news, radio news, maybe the fire department social media pages. But we want them to be intentional about seeking information and making sure that they have the most up to date information at a Level 2, and being ready to immediately receive a Level 3 notice if it's issued.
Also, at that Level 2 time period, folks who might have a more difficult time evacuating their property should consider evacuating at a Level 2 if there's transportation issues or, or maybe they have large animals that they need to provide care for that would be too difficult to handle if, if we suddenly had to issue a Level 3 we'd ask folks to consider taking care of those things at a Level 2.
And a Level 3 is really the GO NOW notice. It's letting you know that there's an imminent danger and you need to leave your house now. so that Level 3 is really: Now's the time you got to go now. Level 3 is not the time to start locating these things and spend the next several hours trying to make these arrangements.
We hold off on the Level 3, or my personal philosophy is holding off on the Level 3, until it is truly necessary for the safety of, of life to tell you to evacuate your property.
Tiffany
That's great. That was my that was my next question. How do you make a decision? So, when there's a definite threat to life and property, what's it like to have to make that decision? What kind of information do you need in order to decide that the threat has reached that threshold?
Sheriff Harrold
Yeah, I'll tell you. This is, this is an area where I, I feel this responsibility very deeply. And so early on in the event, you know, I work with a terrific team, I've got a great leadership team here at the Sheriff's Office.
We have great partners with Lane County Emergency Management, Lane County public information officers. We get great partnerships with our fire departments. And so at a Level 1 and Level 2, you know, oftentimes somebody from my leadership team is standing in a command post with somebody from a fire department or something, something along those lines. And we're I'm, I'm receiving that information.
But my leadership team is, is helping inform that. And, and the Level 1s and Level 2s are happening. I personally feel very strongly about the Level 3s because the, the weight of telling someone who lives in our community to leave their home is a really big deal to me. As the Sheriff, I'll be standing around a bunch of really smart fire specialists, and they'll be, they'll be trying to explain to me what they anticipate the fire will do based on wind and humidity and all of these things.
But I'll be honest, sometimes when you're standing in that room and you're just looking at a map, it can seem pretty simple to just draw a big box and say: everybody in this box should evacuate. And that, that decision can feel a little sterile when you're just looking at a map. But the Holiday Farm Fire, we had evacuation zones for weeks, and we had people in Level 3 for weeks.
And we were, we were exercising our authority over the roads. We had traffic control points set up where we were not allowing people into areas. And so we weren't allowing people to go check on their homes. And that's a big deal. And so I take that real, take that responsibility very heavily. So I listened to the fire folks and I listened to them giving me their best estimates and then I balance whether, how comfortable I feel with telling people now is the time to prioritize your life over your home and the things that are in there. You know, we, we attach a lot of significance, even, you know, even emotional significance to our homes. And so that's a that's a that's a tough thing for folks.
And so for me to be convinced of, you know, this is a life safety issue and we have to prioritize life over things. And so that's the thing for me to, to get to that Level 3. And so sometimes there's some back and forth with the fire experts where I'll say, you know, I feel like you've made a really good case for this area that you pointed out to me, but I'm not convinced about this area.
Yeah. So let's talk about that again. And, and they can give me more information and I might still not be there, but we'll continue to pay attention. And if we need to make that a Level 3, we will. So yeah, I just, I guess I just want folks to know that going from a 2 to a 3 is a is a big deal.
And, and we want to make sure that folks know that we take all of those things into account so that when we do issue the Level 3, they realize: honestly folks we've given this due consideration. It's important for your life safety to, to evacuate.
Tiffany
That’s great. Those sound like hard conversations to have. Do you ever get pushback and are evacuations mandatory? I think a lot of people wonder. We hear about mandatory evacuations. What does that really mean?
Sheriff Harrold
Yeah, that's a great question. And I would say in general, most of the time when we immediately issue a level, something pops up and we, we issue a Level 1 and or it might not even be us. A fire department might ask somebody to put out a Level 1 evacuation.
Those, you know, legally defined would be advisory notices. There is such thing as a mandatory evacuation allowed for in law. The Oregon Revised Statutes speak to it, and so does our Lane Code. And those would happen if the local government is in a state of declared emergency. So that can be a statewide governors declared emergency.
We can have, like, our county commissioners board can declare an emergency, and there can be something called a mandatory evacuation. The reality, though, is, I mean, if we think about it from a sort of a law enforcement police use of force perspective, are we going to kick in a front door and use force against someone to evacuate them out of a property, for their own safety?
And the reality is, no. I can't think of a scenario where we would do that. I can share, and it's, it's a sad story, but I can share that we have delivered Level 3 notifications to individuals not just through the electronic means that we're all familiar with, TV and radio, of course, but also making the phone alerts go off, but also in person, knocked on a door.
It's a Level 3. You’ve got to go now. You’ve got to go now. It's not safe. And, and people have turned us down. And unfortunately there's a situation where an individual was given multiple Level 3 notifications and said, no, I'm not leaving. And then later called 9-1-1 and needed help and wanted to evacuate. And sadly, the only answer that could be given them was we can't get to you.
I share that because, it's a, it's a sad deal, but it is a reality that when we deliver a Level 3 notice it might be the last time that we get a chance to communicate. And so we, we want folks to take that seriously. But to your point, mandatory, we told him it was a Level 3 you need to go now. He said, no, I'm not going. And we said, okay, well, we might not be able to get back to you. So that's how that particular one worked out.
Tiffany
Yeah, that's Harry Truman and Mount Saint Helens all over.
Sheriff Harrold
Right.
Tiffany
People have agency and free choice. I imagine there are different reasons why people don't want to leave their home, that they just want to be home, but also security issues. How does the Sheriff's Office mitigate those concerns when you're telling people they need to leave their homes?
Sheriff Harrold
Yeah, that's a really good question. You know, we do have some really terrific partnerships and so I'm going to use the Holiday Farm Fire as an example again. In the early days, you know, even though it was well outside of any city limits, all of our city partners helped us out.
The Eugene Police Department, the Springfield Police Department, Cottage Grove, Junction City, Oakridge, Coburg. I hope I'm not forgetting one of our partner agencies, but everyone was willing to be out there to help us provide a more robust presence when we were asking people to leave their homes. And then as that stretched on, we ended up with help from around the state.
So sheriffs, there's 36 sheriffs in the State of Oregon. And, we had representatives of, I don't know, at least a third of those sheriff’s offices in our county at any different given time as that event went on. In fact, I actually had one, two sheriffs, no, three sheriffs, that came to Lane County for a period of time during the Holiday Farm Fire to help, help us out them personally.
So we do what we can to beef up our staffing. Sometimes we will have traffic control points where we're trying to limit access, and so that's limiting homeowners’ access, but it's also limiting individuals who want to use a crisis for bad means and, and get into a neighborhood and, and take things that don't belong to them.
We will ask our deputies, we will put our own deputies on what we call 12 on, 12 off so that we can have a greater number of staff available. But I also have to be real realistic that when there are large stretches of county roadway that we've told everybody to leave, unfortunately, there are folks who will try to use a back road or something to take advantage of that, and that's frustrating obviously.
Very, very frustrating to all of us. But I think we also just have to remind ourselves we're prioritizing lives over things. And so when it gets to that situation, we maybe have to remind ourselves about that periodically. We have to prioritize lives over things. I will say, and you had mentioned, Tiffany, you know, that different people might have different reasons why they don't want to leave when they're issued a Level 3 and one of the things that I struggle with is that they would say that, that maybe distrust of the government giving them that notice is one of the reasons they may not leave, is like, yeah, we're not so sure that government really knows what they're talking about when they give that notice. So that's why I take it so seriously is I really want people to know and trust that when we issued the Level 3, it really is time.
Tiffany
Yes. And you worked hard to develop a reputation for performing that due diligence. But you can't, you can't ensure that everybody knows that about you. I appreciate that. So you talked a little bit about boots on the ground issuing evacuation notices, but that we also use Lane Alerts in the mass notification system. Is that automatically redundant? When do you decide to also send people out into the field to issue an evacuation? Is that just at Level 3 or does that happen sooner?
Sheriff Harrold
Yeah, it happens sooner. So, so very proud of the Lane County Sheriff's Search and Rescue corps. You know, we have a couple hundred volunteers as part of Sheriff's search and rescue, and they are incredible in times of these emergency and natural disaster sorts of emergencies where they respond to the call and they come out and they'll go door to door, at earlier levels, to hand out information, to have face to face contact with folks and let them know why we're, why we're doing this, to problem solve a little bit. And also to get information from the residents in advance if they're going to need assistance with evacuating. And we've had great success with sort of that pre-deployment before Level 3, having those conversations, realizing that there's a transportation issue or a, that the community member has a particular need and we captured that information at the time so that if it gets to the next level, we're actually sending them assistance for that transportation.
And I'll, I'll give the example of the time where we evacuated the city of Oakridge due to threat of wildfire. The Search and Rescue folks had made contact ahead of time. They had filled out this electronic information, which was communicated to the emergency operations center down here in town. And so they had a list of addresses that needed mobility assistance for evacuations. So, when it came time, like, okay, we really have to evacuate Oakridge I was up there in Oakridge at a command post when a medical transport assistance company showed up and said, I've got a list of these addresses of people that need help. And I said, that's fantastic. I'm so impressed with the emergency operations center, that they've compiled that data and sent you up here with that list.
And that's, that's a great picture of how those things are supposed to work. The command post providing information down to the emergency operations center, the emergency operations center doing real time preparation, advance preparation, for the next step and having resources available when, when they’re needed. So, so yeah, Search and Rescue goes out. They, they do those knocks. If they don't contact somebody, they tape information on the door. And, we always endeavor to do that well before we get to a Level 3, to make sure that folks are notified in advance and are dialed in to pay attention to their information sources.
Tiffany
Well, that's a great story to hear about interface with the county emergency operations center.
So once you've made that decision for a Level 3 evacuation I imagine, depending on the population, that could be pretty hectic, especially if it's happening really rapidly. What are some of the variables and complications that occur in a situation like that?
Sheriff Harrold
Yeah, that's a really good point. In fact, earlier on when we were talking about the Level 2s, even, I'm having conversations with the team about what it looks like if we need to move certain areas to a Level 3 and routes of travel is part of our conversation.
So density of population, and routes of travel for exit, have to go into the calculation about when do we issue that Level 3. So for example we've, we've certainly had fires that have impacted the McKenzie Highway. Obviously we've also had a number of fires that have impacted the Oakridge area. And the City of Oakridge has a higher density of population.
And so when we had the fire that did cause us to issue a GO NOW for the whole city, we had to do that with enough advance notice that the routes of travel were available to the folks to evacuate. And so, in that particular case, you know, I'd been having conversations with fire. They were telling me they, you know, they were getting a little antsy about it and, and honestly, initially I said, well, I'm not quite there yet. And then a few hours went by and they came back to me and we had another conversation. And, again, I have, I talked before about, the just the terrific Search and Rescue team that I have, that, Sheriff’s Search and Rescue manager, and, and, and supervisor are incredibly great resources for me during these.
And they had planned out, routes of escape for the City of Oakridge in particular, and the way that we should cascade the delivering of the message to try and have people exit in the most orderly fashion as we were having people evacuate the City of Oakridge. So obviously, because of the density of population, we had to give that notice farther in advance than we would have if it would have been a much smaller population.
So all of that has to go into the consideration of when we give these notices out. And, and again, I'm grateful I get to work with a great team to consult with on all of that.
Tiffany
So how do you decide when it's time to lift the evacuation status and level? And, and what are the finer points of returning a community to their homes?
Sheriff Harrold
Yeah. So it's interesting, you know, early on oftentimes the, the fire folks are sort of pushing or advocating to me to establish the higher levels. And then as soon as the higher level is in place, they get to experience me sort of pushing and advocating for when do I get to, when do I get to downgrade? I really want to downgrade. I want to get people back into their homes and so that's just that constant ongoing conversation that we have with the fire professionals.
Tiffany
Thank you so much. I think this is really interesting to a lot of people. There's so many complexities behind the scenes that I think no one really understands the number of agencies, the number of disciplines involved and that law enforcement and fire make those evacuation decisions, together.
So, as we're winding up the interview, just a personal question. What's the hardest part for you in this process, Sheriff? I mean, you've, you've talked about really taking ownership of the decision-making process when all is said and done, what's the hardest thing?
Sheriff Harrold
Yeah, I, I think that that's the hardest thing in that, you know, until I became Sheriff, I've worked in this office for a long time, I've always had a boss.
And so I could, I could take information in that recommended that I take a certain action. When push came to shove, I could call a boss and just check my thinking with them. And, so what the hardest thing since becoming the Sheriff, particularly in these events is, ultimately, when I'm in that room I am the decision-maker, and I recognize the huge ramifications that that decision has.
As soon as I make it, the team does a really good job of communicating it out, and it impacts a lot of people. It's a, it's a decision made in that point in time that impacts a lot of people. So that's definitely the thing that I would say I struggle with most and I guess I wouldn't say struggle with it, but it is the most impactful to me at the time.
I can't tell you how grateful I am to work with such great people. I can't imagine doing this job if I didn't get to work with such great people.
Tiffany
We're really lucky in this county. Thank you so much for your time today. Devon, I think this was a great show. Is it because we had a third person and it was the Sheriff?
Devon
I think that might be the secret, yes. No, thank you both. I hope that this was a good peek behind the curtain at how those decisions get made for people because when they are receiving those notices, rightfully, their attention is on what they need to be doing not on how that decision got made.
We will get to dive more into emergency alerts next time. How do those work? When do they not work?
I also want to take a minute to thank and give a shout-out to Oregon Department of Environmental Quality’s Green State podcast. Dylan Darling has been helping us with ours, especially on the technical side. I certainly did not grow up thinking I would need to become an audio engineer and so very much appreciate his help and I think that podcast is certainly worth a listen, as well.
So thank you, Dylan.
Tiffany
Thank you, Dylan!
Sheriff Harrold
Thanks, Dylan.
Closing
When It Hits The Fan is brought to you by Lane County Emergency Management and co-hosted by Lane County Emergency Manager Tiffany Brown and Public Information Officer Devon Ashbridge. Music is by the Love Gems. Many thanks to our listeners and guests. We are so glad you're here to help us create a more prepared community. You can find more information, including episodes and show notes, at LaneCountyOR.gov/fan.
Sign up to receive emergency alerts at LaneAlerts.org. The views expressed in this podcast do not necessarily reflect those of Lane County government.
