The Chattooga County Community Emergency Response Team has added 16 new members following a training class held recently in Summerville.

The class was held at the Chattooga County Community Resource Center on Eleanor Avenue and provided residents with training designed to help them assist their families, neighbors and professional emergency responders when disasters or other emergencies occur.

The Community Emergency Response Team, commonly known as CERT, is a FEMA-supported program that provides ordinary citizens with basic emergency-response skills.

Training includes disaster preparedness, fire safety and suppression, basic medical operations, light search and rescue, disaster psychology and team organization.

The addition of 16 members significantly expands the number of locally trained volunteers who can potentially assist when emergency-response resources are stretched thin.

CERT volunteers are not intended to replace firefighters, law enforcement officers, EMTs or other professional responders. Instead, they are trained to work within the limits of their training and provide assistance until additional professional resources are available.

The program can be particularly valuable during widespread emergencies such as tornadoes, severe thunderstorms and flooding, when emergency personnel may be responding to numerous incidents simultaneously.

Chattooga County’s CERT volunteers have already been called upon locally. During flooding in Summerville in April 2025, CERT members assisted emergency personnel when three people became stranded by floodwaters.

The local program is coordinated through Chattooga County Emergency Management, headed by Emergency Management Director Pamela Vaughn. The county says its emergency-management operation works with public-safety agencies, elected officials, nonprofits and government agencies in preparing for and responding to disasters. Chattooga County

Residents interested in future CERT training or learning more about the program can contact Chattooga County Emergency Management at 706-857-3400, option 2.