A proclamation recognizing Carolyn Bluhm for her service in emergency management coordination for the City and County of Denver.
Okay. I see tonight that we have no presentations and there are no communications. I'm not tall enough to see this lecture, but we do have two proclamations this evening. I am going to call on Councilman Ortega. Will you please read Proclamation three, five, eight? I would be happy to do this. Thank you. Council in proclamation number 358 recognizing Miss Carolyn Bloom for her service in emergency management coordination for the city and county of Denver. Whereas Carolyn Blum, Emergency Management Coordinator for Denver's Office of Emergency Response and Homeland Security, is retiring after 11 years of service to the city and 30 years in emergency management. And. WHEREAS, for over 11 years, Carolyn developed and coordinated what is now called the Denver Ready Program for Emergency Disaster Outreach and Preparedness Training. And. Whereas, Carolyn has encouraged engaged with several Denver commissions and agencies, including the Commission for People with Disabilities in the Commission on Aging. And. WHEREAS, Carolyn conducted over 450 educational seminars, interviews, presentations to help people in Denver and across the country to plan, prepare for, and respond to emergency events. And. Whereas, Carolyn and her team of instructors at Denver Community Emergency Response Training, otherwise known as Sert, taught basic emergency preparedness skills to over 6000 people. And I know at least two of us have gone through that training on this council. And. WHEREAS, Carolyn represented the city and county of Denver at local, state and national conferences to share the success of Denver's emergency preparedness programs. And. WHEREAS, Carolyn received her Master Continuity Practitioner Certification and National Americans with Disabilities Act coordinator certification. And. WHEREAS, Carolyn received numerous honors, including Employee of the Year by the Denver Commission for People with Disabilities Community Preparedness, hero or hero, as some of us call it, from FEMA and champion of change from President Barack Obama. Now, therefore, be it proclaimed by the Council of the City and County of Denver, Section one, that the Council of the City and County of Denver commends Carolyn Blum and thanks her for her years of extraordinary service to Denver, making citizens safer through emergency preparedness and community outreach in Section two that the Clerk of the city and county of Denver shall affix the seal of the city and county of Denver to this proclamation and that a copy be transmitted to Carolyn Glen. Thank you, Councilwoman Ortega. Your motion to. Adopt. I move for the adoption of proclamation number 358. Thank you. It has been moved and seconded. Comments. Councilwoman Ortega. Thank you, Madam President. I am honored to bring this forward. I have had the pleasure of getting to know and work with Carolyn, whom I consider to be a friend. I really appreciate all the extraordinary, extraordinary work that you have done in the city. You know, we do the proclamation every year encouraging people, taking advantage of the training and trying to help the public understand the importance of that. And for folks who have done that. When you are in an emergency, you just kind of go into into first gear and you know what to do. And so for people who have never done this training, they're just kind of sitting around waiting for the emergency responders to show up. And, you know, they're over at the epicenter of the incident dealing with the problem. And it's going to be a while before they come to take care of you. So the more you know and the better prepared you are, the better off you and your families are going to be. And and Carolyn has done just an extraordinary job in outreaching to communities. The work with our disabled community has been amazing as well, including all the different organizations in our city and making sure that where we have places, whether it's a group home, setting a nursing home, you know, a day facility, that that facility knows what they need to do in the event of an emergency, whether it's a tornado, a flood, you name it. They are being trained to be prepared to take care of their clients. So, Carolyn, I we're going to miss you. Thank you for your work with the city and the Office of Emergency Management and Homeland Security. And I hope that you will stay in touch. And I just wish you all the best and good luck and good luck and God bless in your retirement. Thank you, Councilwoman Ortega. Seeing no other comments, Secretary. Madam Secretary, please call the vote. Ortega. I. Flynn I. Gilmore. I Cashman can eat. Lopez. I knew. Madam President. I. Madam Secretary. Count the votes. Sorry. One is missing. Great. Eight eyes. Eight eyes. The proclamation is adopted. Councilwoman, I take it you have somebody you'd like to do. Before bringing Carolyn up, I'd like to ask Brian Bratton, who is the director of the Office of Emergency Management and Homeland Security, if you would mind making a few comments. Gladly. Thank you very much for this honor. We're going to really miss Carolyn. She has done a phenomenal job outreaching to our community. One of those amazing parts is that she's adapted to the changing demographics within Denver. So well, looking at disabilities and looking at aging and also looking at language as potential barriers for access into that information and has done a phenomenal job creating over 30 programs that reach out to our community in different ways, at different skill levels, at different time. Commitments to ensure that the community is as prepared as they want to be. I will say my part to that is that our success in emergency management depends upon your preparedness as counsel and as residents. At the end of the day, we can offer everything, but we need to encourage people to continue to stay engaged. We will continue and expand these operations as Carolyn departs and we bring in somebody. To try to replace her. But it's going to be a long uphill. Battle for anybody who comes after. Thank you. Thank you. So as Carolyn is coming forward, yes, whoever comes in will have some big shoes to fill. But I think any of you who saw the news coverage when we had the fire in 18th Street just about two weeks ago, she was one of the very people that was out there helping all of the families who were displaced as a result of that fire. So, Carolyn, thank you again for all your service and the floor is yours. Not quite as tall as Ryan. Thank you, Councilwoman Taylor. And thank you for the council for passing the proclamation for me. There's been a lot of things that have happened over. The last. 11 years. And 12 years ago I made a statement. I need a bigger territory. And God. Blessed me. With Denver. And it has been. A great joy and honor to serve the people of Denver. As I go out on my new journey. But I do want to make sure that in the. Proclamation. There was mention of my instructors. There's no way that I could have done all that had been done without the volunteers of this great city, to this great city. And I want to name them one at a time. If you don't or if. You will, just give me indulgence. Start with Gary Friedman. He's the one who's. Been with me the longest. He's also. DHS. Department of. Human. Services. He works for. The city. And county in Denver and donates his time. Also back to Denver, Curtis Garrett, who. Works for the Department of Parks and Rec. He also was the chairperson for the people with disabilities. I took him to a conference in Washington. And emergency management beat him. And now he's one of our. Instructors. And program. Directors. We have Lee and Patti, which are I want you guys to stand up. And as I. Center Lee, Liam, Patti. Lambert if he has stepped in. He's a. Retired schoolteacher from DHS. For over 30 years. And he has stepped. Up. Into the role of the lead for this program in the high school program. We have over there. In in Bob and Dora. And he is retired from the city public works. And if you look at us, we're all boomers. So we're really. Pushing into the aging population. So we're keeping everybody busy. And then. Over there by. Bob. Oh, that's oh. In front of Bob is my husband, who is also one of our instructors. He volunteer. He was. He he will tell you he's volun told he retired three years ago and he's and I said, you got to go help Lee. So he's here. When that's not here is Dave Cook. He helped me start. This program from the beginning. He is here. Where is he? Oh. He's over there. Okay. Dave Cook. He was he was actually. The one that when I went into the hospital, stepped up and did not let any of our programs fail for the three months that I was out. I have amazing people around me, and I can't say enough about the folks who are here. And I thank you for the indulgence. But one of the other things that. I do have to say. Is thank you to my instructors and the people who. Participate. With us. But you guys have. Got a winner. One of the best emergency managers in this country is sitting right here in this room. You are very blessed to have Ryan and to be your emergency manager here in the city and county of Denver. Being around this business for 30 years. You see a lot of characters. Yeah. I can call. Ryan a character, but he's one of the. Best. Characters you'll ever find in this world for emergency management. And Councilman Lopez, thank you for being such a support over the years. Also, he came to a class a night in 2009 and Debbie came in. You know, it's just the. Support that this city has given us. To grow is second to none. Thank you. Can we also ask the staff who are here from OEM, if you would mind, standing as well? Yeah. Thank you all for what you do. Marilyn, thank you.