Residents in St. Clair County are still working to recover from the winter storm that swept across Alabama last Tuesday that area meteorologists failed to predict, leaving people stranded, cars abandoned along the interstates and students forced to spend the night at school.

Now St. Clair County officials are in the initial stages of working to improve winter weather preparedness in the event of future storms.

On Tuesday the county’s Emergency Management Agency (EMA) staff hosted a county-wide meeting for county officials, members of local law enforcement and emergency response teams to discuss the effectiveness of responses to situations created by the storm, what worked, what did not and possible solutions for emergency situations.

Ellen Hanes, director of the St. Clair County EMA commended officials on the joint effort made by every county agency.

“St. Clair County has historically had a can-do attitude,” Hanes said.

The EMA wanted to ensure several issues were addressed among officials including communication efforts, the effectiveness of working equipment and means of transport, issues school officials faced, the setup and efficiency of storm shelters, medical emergency response and information sharing.

“Every time an event occurs, communications is the number one problem, and technology is always changing,” Hanes said.

During last week’s storm the EMA’s frequency did not work and St. Clair County dispatch was flooded with an overwhelming number of calls by people asking about weather and road conditions, making it difficult for dispatch to address some emergency – related calls.

“We answered 500 additional incidents on Tuesday,” St. Clair County Central Dispatch Administrator Bill Richvalksy said.  “On a normal day we answer about 250 calls.  All of our lines were tied up.”

St. Clair County Commission Chairman Stan Batemon suggested the possibility of having a phone line in central dispatch for outgoing calls only and creating a recorded line that provides callers with up-to-date information regarding current road and weather conditions.

The EMA primarily shared information using social media outlets like Facebook and Twitter.  EMA employees said posting picture on Facebook and Twitter was the most effective way for people to understand the severity of road and weather conditions.  Social media proved to be the quickest way to spread information.

“If you don’t use social media, you’ve got to learn how,” Chairman Batemon said.

Legally, the EMA is not allowed to tell people roads are closed.  However, they can use the term “impassible.”

“But a picture says a thousand words,” Hanes said.

Owner of WFHK radio and the new FM station 94.9 The River Adam Stocks said he and his staff remained on the air for more than nine consecutive hours, answering phone calls and providing an open mic for community leaders to share information.

“Most agencies came on air at least once,” Stocks said.  “When people hear that voice, it’s immediate recognition.”

Stocks encouraged officials to use the radio as a tool to spread information quickly in emergency situations.  “We’re not about pumping the station.  We’re about trying to help.”

School administrators in St. Clair County were also quick to find solutions to help students get home during the storm.  When snow began falling, many administrators and teachers were in Springville attending a spelling bee, so Pell City Superintendent Michael Barber and St. Clair County Superintendent Jenny Seals relied on community efforts to get teachers back to their respective campuses.

Barber said the primary concern for educators was the safety of their students.  Buses did not run that day, and school officials made the decision to hold student that might have made it home okay, but may have been stranded outside their homes because no one was their to meet them.

“We had 125 mad parents call within the first hour,” Barber said.  “After that we stopped counting.”

But Barber believes efforts made by administrators, teachers and the community were successful in providing for the safety of students.  Little Caesar’s provided pizza to feed students.  Wal-Mart and the Red Cross provided blankets and other items.

“Those services worked,” Barber said.  “We didn’t have to ask for one volunteer to stay over night.  No one had a melt down because they could not get home.”

Seals said St. Clair held high school car riders once they realized the roads were bad so as not to put the safety of young drivers in jeopardy.

“Pell City looked apocalyptic,” Barber said.  He acknowledged that releasing all students at the same time generated a large amount of traffic, and he plans to look at ways to address that problem in the future.

Four Red Cross shelter were set up in the county, giving stranded residents a safe place to go until the storm passed, and churches and other organizations established several impromptu shelters.

“I don’t believe we could have done this without the help of impromptu shelters,” Chairman Batemon said.

The county plans to look into finding ways for municipalities to set aside more money to help fund stronger EMA services and share transportation resources more efficiently to do things like get hospital staff transported to the hospital others where they need to be in emergency situations.

“I realize some municipalities are stressed for money, but don’t let those things hold you back,” Chairman Batemon said.  “Let’s not let a few thousand dollars in the budget mess you up like that.”