 It's CaliMA's great pleasure to partner with a number of emergency responders and agencies to bring to you the first pet fair, pet preparedness focus event to prepare the citizens of California for any disaster and their furry family members. My name's Tina Walker. I'm the Chief of Media Relations and Public Information for the California Emergency Management Agency. And your speakers today will include Kim Centovich, that's K-I-M-S-E-N-T-O-V-I-C-H. The Pacific Division Senior Vice President of Walmart. Next is Pat Denon, P-A-T-D-E-N-N-E-N. He's our Interim Southern Region Administrator for the California Emergency Management Agency. We also have Karen Arms, K-A-R-E-N-A-R-M-E-S. Karen is the Deputy Regional Administrator for FEMA Region 9. We have Dr. Karen Halligan, K-A-R-E-N-H-A-L-L-I-G-A-N. She's a Veterinarian with Los Angeles Chapter American Red Cross Board. She'll be providing an animal CPR and first aid demonstration during our press conference. We also have Gary Durian of the L.A. County Fire Department and that's G-A-R-Y-D-U-R-I-A-N. He's here with an urban search and rescue trained K-9 unit and they'll also be providing some demonstrations during our press conference. And now without further ado, it's my great pleasure to hand the press conference over to Kim Santevich. Thank you, Kim. Well, thank you very much and thank you everyone for being here today. One of the things that Walmart prides themselves is being here and being committed to the communities. We live in these communities. We have kids that go to school in these communities. Our families are here. So our associates are very proud to be part of today's event. And I think we as Walmart also are very proud to be here and have our emergency response center that we have able to help our company react and be one of the first on the scene to help during an emergency. We've shown this in many different times. We've been there for hurricanes. We've been there for floods. We've been there for earthquakes. And we are extremely proud to be second year involved in the great shakeout. So this coming Thursday at 10.15, we are going to have every store in California, and actually we've expanded it to several other states in the area, participate in the great shakeout with over one million Californians to make sure that we are ready for if, not if, but when the big one comes here in California. So today is especially important for us. I think one of the things that you see is often overlooked is the pets that we have. These are folks that are part of the family. And we talk about taking care of families and taking care of communities. Pets are when you talk to folks about their families, they often spend extra time telling you about their dog, their cat. I happen to have two bunnies and two hamsters. So those are the folks that provide that emotional support for families, emotional kindness and are there. And they're the ones that often have the most telling pictures when you see earthquakes, whether they've been hurricanes or earthquakes or times of disaster, are the pictures of them being left behind and the families being concerned about them. So we're really excited to bring some extra attention to the preparedness, not just for the families and the children and the folks that walk in our stores, but also for the ones that they love and the pets that are in their families. Today, you know, often people wonder, why are we in front of the pharmacy when we could be in front of the pet department? But we actually also offer pet medications, which again is another important thing. You can fill not just the prescriptions for your families and save money, but you can fill your pet prescriptions and save money. So we like to make sure that folks, you know, have that ability to do that. Their emergency supplies were usually one of the first people open so that people can get those things and get back on their feet with things that they need when there's an emergency. So today we're going to spend some time being able to show you not just how to get your family ready, but how to get, you know, make sure you're ready for your pets, have extra food on hand for your pets, but also for your family ready to eat, flashlights, food, you know, extra blankets. I mean, there's all kinds of things that you just don't think about having. And I know it's been a big deal for me in doing these events last year. And this year is how do I make sure my family is ready? And I know many of you are thinking of those same things. You don't want to think about needing it, but you know that it's something that you need to think about. So we're very excited to be here. We're very excited to be part of today's event. And, you know, we're really, really hoping that everyone here. We're we're very appreciative of the support we're getting from the state and all of the agencies that have been involved in this. And we're really excited for the great shakeout on Thursday. So make sure that wherever you are, you are participating and helping out to teach folks about how to be prepared. Thank you. And I'm going to turn it over to Pat Denin. Thank you. It's a great opportunity to be here today. And I have to underscore what we just heard about the importance of taking care of our pets. You know, pets are an important part of our lifestyle. In fact, 60 percent of households in the United States have pets. That even exceeds the number of households that have children. There's a human animal bond that's special and powerful with our pets. Animals provide companionship and they augment the senses of sight and sound for our special needs communities. They also provide expanded capacity for our search and rescue, our canine and our emergency responders throughout the state and throughout the country. And we'll hear from more of our canine teams here in a minute. But how many of us today would openly admit that if your family was in an emergency event and your animal was trapped, how many of you would risk your own life to save your pet? And I know for a fact that I have smoky the fire dog that I would do anything to protect smoky. You know, it's oftentimes it's a sense of stewardship that can create problems for yourself when you're trying to protect your pet. But just think about it for a moment. What would you do in a catastrophic event? And let's just say as an example, you're at home. There's an earthquake. There's a fire, a flood. First thing you do is you check your own safety. You check the safety of your family and friends. But what if you're at work? You check on your co-workers. But then your mind immediately goes to where's my pet? Is my pet okay? Where's my bunny and my hamster? Where's my dog? Where's my cat? Is the animal okay? Did the animal flee out of fear from its own home? Is it injured? And you know, oftentimes an injured animal is scared, becomes very aggressive. And do you have the capacity to contain your pet while you then attempt to evacuate? And understand that emergency responders have an obligation to care for service animals. But the primary responsibility to care for a pet lies with you, the pet owner. The lack of preparation could often leave you separated from your pet if you're evacuated or in a shelter scenario. Or even worse, in the time of a wildfire, if you're not prepared and your pet's not prepared, you may not have enough time to leave if the fire's advancing to the point where you weren't prepared to leave when it was time to go. So just a few things to think about before disaster strikes is develop a family emergency plan that includes your pet, ID your pet so you can identify it later and know where your shelters are in your area. Know where they're going to take your pet if you're displaced. Also build a preparedness kit for your pet. Pet first aid kits are available. They're on display here today. You also need to have a kit that's got five to seven days worth of food. You need to provide water. You need to have your leash and your muzzle. You need to have some kind of container to keep your pet in if necessary. Toys for your pet and back to Smokey. Smokey has a suitcase, a little wheeled suitcase that's fully packed and ready to go at any moment. It's because anytime we want to go somewhere that kit goes with us and he's prepared probably more than we are for seven days. So when you prepare for disaster for your family, please include your pet. You can empower yourself to become more self sufficient as long as you know that that pets protected as well as your family. But most importantly, we know that the quickest and easiest past to recovery is if you know your pets are safe. So thank you. I appreciate the opportunity to be here today and I'd like to introduce Karen Arms, the deputy regional administrator for FEMA Region 9. Thank you and good morning, everybody. And thank you, Walmart for having us here for what a great preparedness event. Looking around, this is what we at FEMA call the whole community. We have the private sector. We have federal government, local government and and you citizens all coming together to talk about preparedness. And in this case, a really important topic of pet preparedness. The most of our families, many of our families include pets, mine included. I've been a long time pet owner and lover for years and years. Right now, I have just adopted a cat named Sox. So I'm getting ready or have become ready for Sox. I've traded out the dog food for cat food and have my own preparedness kit and and it's so important for us to do that. Unfortunately, in some of big events in the past, we have seen a large number of pets being left alone or stranded. And there's no definitive numbers. But after Hurricane Katrina, some 8000 pets showed up at the shelters. And obviously, the shelters were quickly overwhelmed. There were some studies done after Hurricane Katrina as well that indicate that almost 25 percent of pet owners would choose not to evacuate if they were asked to if they couldn't take their pet with them. And a large percentage of them have no had no idea in the survey, they didn't know where they'd bring their pet, where they could evacuate to. Should they have to evacuate? Now, obviously we don't have hurricanes down here in Southern California or in California, typically, but we have plenty of other disasters, fires, floods. We have earthquakes, of course. And so there may be a reason for us here in California to have to evacuate. And you should really consider making sure that your family preparedness plan also includes planning for your pet. The reality of Hurricane Katrina for our organization led to some legislation in 2006 that passed that's referred to as pets. It's the Pets Evacuation and Transportation Standards Act. And it's legislation designed to ensure that state and local emergency preparedness planning addresses and integrates the needs of individuals with household pets as well as service animals following any major disaster or emergency. So following a major event, the PET Act authorizes FEMA to provide support, care, rescue, shelter and some essentials for individuals with household pets as well as service animals. So it's really major progress in terms of the legislation, but legislation alone isn't going to take care of our pets. We need this whole community pet preparedness. So readiness is definitely a shared responsibility. As Pat mentioned, there's several steps that you can take and he outlined some. We have many that are also highlighted on our Ready.gov website, including many of the points that Pat made. There's also suggestions for you to have a pet care buddy system with your neighbor. Someone that you know can take care of your pet should you not be there or evacuate your pet. If in fact you aren't there and evacuations occur. And don't forget if you do that, of course, to make a plan on where you're going to reunite with that neighbor so you can also be reunited with your beloved pet. Building a kit, another suggestion is to have a photo of you and your pet just in case your pet is separated from you and you need to prove ownership. A lot of times they are able to get out of their collars with their tags and all of that. So that's certainly important as well. So I would encourage you to all go to Ready.gov and look at for pet preparedness tips there. Together we can ensure that our loved ones are taking care of in times of emergencies and disasters. And I know personally for my cat, Sox, I feel a lot better knowing that my neighbor, Mike, is going to take care of her when I'm out working that next disaster and I have my emergency kit for her and I think we're ready to go. So I hope that you all will be as well. And I also encourage you to look at all the fine material that's out here as well as please participate in Thursday's great shakeout. It's a wonderful exercise to make us all prepared. Thank you. It's my pleasure. I'd like to introduce Dr. Karen Halligan. Dr. Halligan is with the Los Angeles chapter of the American Red Cross. Thank you. Well, I'm going to speak from experience because I was in Katrina and the statistics are tens of thousands of animals died of starvation, drowning or disease of the 15,000 that we were able to save less than 15 percent ever got reunited with their owners. Now I have two cats, Kiki and Nathan, and I don't want them to be a statistic. And so I'm there's one take home message for you guys here from me today. And that is to have some form of ID on your pet. That is the most important thing you can do. And the Red Cross is taking it one step farther. Okay. We have these tags created by bark code. Help me home tag. It has a easy code on the back of it. You can take any cell phone and take a picture of that code and and text it, picture, text or MMS to 43588 and your pet's profile will come up on the cell phone instantaneously. If your pet has diabetes, that's important for us to know in a disaster, right? What medical problems, six phone numbers, anything you want somebody to know about your pet is going to come up instantaneously. That's going to revolutionize the way we handle pets in a disaster. And it's just so important. And especially for the cats, people, you know, none of the cats were tagged in Katrina and very few of the dogs. And if they were, it was illegible or the number didn't didn't connect to anybody. So I'm keeping it simple. I'm going to give you guys a CPR demo, but I just want you guys to go home and please tag all your cats and dogs. It's going to save their life. Okay. And I'm going to introduce Gary Durian. Places. Hi, my name is Gary Durian with LA County Fire Department. And I'm also part of our urban search and rescue team, which is California Task Force two. This here standing next to me is my partner tanker. He's one of our search canines and fire department. Yeah. Stay on the fire department. We have a total of 10 search dogs that are part of our task force and FEMA has a total of 28 task forces throughout the country. So whenever there is a disaster, whether it be a hurricane earthquake, anything like that, they have task force that are situated all over the country to come to the aid of the communities that need them. And besides that, we're one of L. County is one of two international teams that will deploy to disasters as well. We've gone to Haiti, Japan for those earthquakes there and brought in all of our equipment, our dogs and helped the people in those communities as well. So besides all the valuable information regarding your pets and how to keep them safe. Also, I don't think it's been brought up yet. A good way to idea him is to get the microchip insert inside the dog because if it has a collar, that could be taken off or somehow lost. But with that microchip, it's going to be in there and it'll just give you one more chance of getting your pet back after any kind of a disaster if you do get separated. Now, I'm lucky enough to have a partner that comes to work with me every day, goes home with me every day. In fact, he spends more time with me than my family does. He's a five and a half year old Labrador retriever. His name is Tanker and he's trained to find live people after disasters. So after buildings collapse from an earthquake, hurricane, anything of that nature, he's trained to walk through the rubble and in a matter of minutes could end up going over the remains of a completely demolished house and let us know if there's any live victims still in there. Whereas prior to having a tool like him, it could take a couple hours to search that one individual house. So it's there. An amazing, amazing addition to our team. And it's just so rewarding to be able to work with him, just being a dog. I'm a dog lover, obviously, but to be able to help the people after these disasters with him is just remarkable. So we have to make sure that we're prepared as well as far as if we're deployed to an earthquake area, whether it be here or elsewhere. We bring our own physicians with us that are trained to work on the dogs as well. One of our last deployment in Haiti, a couple of dogs had some minor cuts and bruises where they had to get a couple stitches. So, you know, they get hurt just like the other firemen and they're able to get patched up and go right back to work. So it's very, very rewarding. Actually, all of our dogs on LA County Fire Department were donated through the National Disaster Search Dog Foundation. The trained dogs, they find them in shelters and rescues. So most of the dogs in this program were rescued themselves. They have the right qualities. They get trained. Then they get paired up with firefighters throughout the country to be able to help and pay back and rescue other people. So they are the National Disaster Search Dog Foundation is doing amazing things for fire departments all throughout the country to help our country be prepared for any kind of an earthquake or a disaster. So once we get outside, we'll be able to show a quick demonstration on how he finds people. But when he does locate a victim, since he's not able to really tell me, hey, you know, I found somebody over here, we have a different way of him alerting. So tanker. And so he'll give me a bark like that and all of his training is toy related. So when he's looking for somebody, see it, he thinks that once he finds him, he's going to be able to get his toy. And that's one of his favorite things to do. So if you get outside, we'll be able to show a little bit more of that. But again, thank you for Walmart for bringing us here to be able to talk to the community on disaster preparedness. Now I'd like to introduce Aaron Reyes. Good job, tanker. Hi, everybody. I'm Aaron Reyes. I'm a deputy director for the County of Los Angeles Department of Animal Care and Control. And on behalf of our director, Marsha Maeda, welcome. She's got a previous commitment and couldn't be here this morning. I'm not going to be long winded. I did hear I was going to focus on identification today because within our sheltering system and we have six animal shelters in the County of Los Angeles, plus a pet adoption center in the Antelope Valley. And we're the largest in the United States. Over 90% of our animals that come in to us day to day have no identification whatsoever. Yet these are the most amazing little animals you'll see. Cats and dogs, they respond. I mean, they're just like tanker here. There's somebody's pet that got away, but they have no identification. And I can't stress that enough. And I heard microchip. That is the best investment. Don't be afraid of a microchip. It's a little rice size device that is easily implanted. Dr. Halligan can talk more about that. It's cheap. Everybody does it. But when your pet gets away from you, this is how this is how we ask your pet their name. They can't talk yet except for, you know, Tanker can when he wants his toy, but they can't talk yet. So we don't know where they belong. We have to scan them. Tags sometimes come off of your dogs and cats. It is the law that your dogs and cats need to be licensed and have their tag. So don't forget that. OK, keep that on there. But I am an advocate for the microchip because it can't be removed. It's permanent. So I was thinking about, you know, knowing that I'm going to be up here with everybody today and all the talking points are going to be covered. I just wanted to just kind of share a perspective. Somebody mentioned Hurricane Katrina and everybody remembers those images. And, you know, we don't have, I mean, we sometimes get some flash flooding, but nothing like you saw in Hurricane Katrina. But what I remember most on seeing the news, there was a lot of live action cameras out there. And I remember seeing this gentleman walking with his dog and water was it was chest high. And this was a lab mix, probably a dog a little smaller than Tanker. And so he had the dog up like this and he took it at one point and just put his head on the dog and held him real tight so as to comfort the dog. But, you know, I asked myself, I wonder if that dog is providing comfort for him. And this is how we how we how we view our pets. Our pets are family members. And when it comes to planning, listen, it's really simple with planning. If you're having a party at your house, a gathering, a get together, you think about it. Don't you? What are what are we going to? How many people? What are we going to have? Blah, blah, blah, this and that. OK, you plan for it. Now, we have to think about and plan for a disaster. It's not a good thing to think about. It's scary. Nobody wants to think about it. Think about no electricity, no water and I mean, just no electricity and no water is scary enough. But, you know, we may have some structures that are collapsed in a big earthquake. You know, God knows what could happen. But please do the planning. I understand. I read that that Kalima's got some disaster preparedness kits for pets that are going to be given away today. Walmart's got everything you can possibly need. If you have a trash can in your garage, just just designate one and keep all your stuff inside there. Don't forget your identification for your pet. That is the single most important thing you can do for your animal. Now, here's one last thing to think about. Should we have a severe earthquake here in Southern California and the experts say that we're going to? It's not if it's when. Our officers are not necessarily going to be able to deploy immediately into the community. Here's the reason why. We've got over 2,000 pets in our sheltering system in the county of Los Angeles that need care, that need help. So we have got to tend to those animals. And just because there was an earthquake or some other major disaster, that doesn't mean animals at a shelter need to be or deserve to be euthanized. We need to stay at home. We need to tend to our own facilities and tend to our own animals. However, we will be responding as needed out into the communities, particularly with brush fires. We are out there at the command centers with brush fires quickly and horses have to get out quickly. We have a lot of experience with that, but I'm referring more specifically to an earthquake. We may actually have facility damage at our facilities as well. So no one will be turned away. You come to us with your pet, you come to us with a found pet. If you remember the Whittier earthquake or the Northridge quake, dogs were on the freeways. They had no, they were so scared they just ran and they were all over the freeway system. So people were kind enough to stop and pick them up and bring them into the local animal shelter. No one will be turned away. We will work together in a major disaster to take care of our four-legged friends and our two-legged friends. So on behalf of the County of Los Angeles Department of Animal Care and Control, thanks for having this event today and thanks for having me here. About the microchip, I just want to talk about the microchip. Microchips are great. My cats have microchips, but the problem with the microchip is not all scanners read the microchip that's implanted. Lots of dogs and cats have been killed in the shelters and they've been microchipped. What happens is you're supposed to put the microchip under the skin right here, right? And most people do, but the microchip migrates. It can come out. It can go down here. And in an earthquake, you have thousands of people running around. You don't have the right scanner. Someone's quickly scanning. They're going to miss that microchip. I like microchips. It's a great second form of ID. My cats are 10 and 12 years old. They've gone outside. They've never had their collar fall off or come off. If you fit them with the right collar, they're not going to fall off. So yeah, the two forms of ID, but the microchips will get missed and we don't have a scanner that reads them all. So I just kind of wanted to share that so everybody's on the same page. And then I'll be doing CPR on my little dummy animals over here. Thank you, everybody. And thank you, Aaron, for joining the press conference. We appreciate it. This, oh. Oh, sure. Okay, this is $10. No, no, no, no. Oh, right here. Okay. All right, so this is $10. And a collar's, what, 10, 15 bucks? Implanting a microchip can be anywhere from $25 to $50. Then, wait a minute. But wait, there's another cost with the microchip which a lot of people forget. You got your cat or dog microchip, right? Woo-hoo. No, because then you have to go on and pay another fee to register your pet. With the Red Cross Bark Code tags, it's included in the $10. There are no additional fees. You can go on and change the information anytime you want. And it doesn't cost you anything. So we're going to say add another 25 to register the pet. Re-explain, yes. Okay, so with the Red Cross Help Me Home Bark Code tag, there is a easy code on the back. Can you see it? Any cell phone that's capable of taking a picture, you can scan it if you want, but you don't have to have the app and you don't have to scan it. We made it very user-friendly. You take a picture of that easy code, all right? And then you picture text it or MMS it to 435-88. And within a minute, your pet profile that you've created online comes up, six phone numbers, reward information, veterinary information, email information, anything you want, first responders, to know about your pet that could save them. You know, if your pet bites somebody and it's an earthquake and we don't know if it has rabies, what could happen to that pet? We might have to look for the brain for rabies. You know, we're talking disaster situation, you guys. It's crazy. I was there. I was in Katrina and it changed my life. So all those pets right now, they need you to be prepared because it's gonna make the difference between life and death for them. You know, I don't know the unified system is coming because it's about this, unfortunately. It's not about the pet sometimes, but with the Red Cross it is. You know, I guess it's state regulated, is it? Or I don't really know. These companies come out, they make the chips. ASPCA has a chip and this company has a chip and so everyone's like, oh, great, I'm gonna... I guess that's it. Still put that in. Yeah, if I may just real quick on the microchip. Yeah, it is, it's developing. There are a couple of frequencies out there, the 125 and the 134. Dr. Halligan is absolutely right. It's important if you bring an animal in, just here's a scenario. You bring an animal in, I found them running loose on the freeway and they scan them. Ask, is that a universal scanner? Universal scanner. Everybody should have a universal scanner, but it is an evolving and growing industry and it is privatized and hence there you have the problem. But a universal scanner and a microchip in your pet, that's the answer. Plus this, I'm gonna try this thing out though, by the way. I'm gonna get my phone and try that out. Yeah, try that. I'm gonna text it right now. It's great. Tanker has one. Tanker has one. Right, Tanker, you're protected. We're gonna find you, huh? Okay everybody, that concludes the formal press conference for our media partners. If you're interested in doing sidebar interviews with any of our speakers today, please hang tight. We're gonna take a group picture really quickly and then they'll be available to do interviews individually with you. And if you have any questions regarding our representatives, we're all manned with business cards. I'm Tina Walker. I have staff available. If you have additional follow-up questions for any...