Welcome And Incident Setup

Tom Mueller 0:09

Hi everyone and welcome back to the Leading in a Crisis Podcast. On this podcast, we talk all things crisis management. We like to hear stories from leaders in the front lines of crisis communications. I'm Tom Mueller. Thanks for joining us again today. Always a pleasure to have you with us. Quick reminder: if you want to email the show, drop me a line at Tom at LeadingInacrisis.com. On the show today, we're going to take another look at the major chemical incident that happened out in Orange County, California recently. Our guest today is Greg Barta. Greg is lead PIO for the Orange County Fire Authority. And Greg found himself in the hot seat recently as lead PIO for that major chemical leak and evacuation incident. Our conversation with Greg was so interesting that we've decided to break it into three podcast episodes. So you'll have this episode plus two others where we really do a deep dive with Greg into what was happening in that JIC and in the local communities. So you'll recall that incident over Memorial Day weekend involved a storage tank that had some kind of a thermal runaway reaction going on in it that civil authorities there decided required the evacuation of multiple communities around that industrial facility. In fact, there were somewhere between 40 and 50,000 people evacuated into shelters and hotels, et cetera, around that incident. So huge communications challenges around that for the PIO team and for the unified command. So Greg Barda is with us to share some of his experiences working as lead PIO for that. Greg, welcome to the podcast.

Greg Barta 2:12

Thanks for having me. You have a great podcast. I've listened to many episodes and very impressed.

Tom Mueller 2:18

Awesome. Thank you for that. We'll take that as a recommendation. Okay.

Staffing A Holiday Weekend Response

Tom Mueller 2:24

So Greg, this was uh this was a black swan incident that you and your team uh were working over this thing. Um talk to me a little bit about just getting started on this, right? Um we knew there was a little bit of a fit and start uh with the evacuation orders, but if we start from Friday when the evacuation went into full swing, uh it's a holiday weekend, right? What was staffing like? Were you did you have enough people to sort of staff up and start communications quickly or did the holiday get in the way?

Greg Barta 3:04

You know, great question. I I would say the holiday did not impact it, but getting enough PIOs, if we're talking purely comms, I don't want to say it's always an issue, but it kind of is, right? Because so for our agency, we have three full-time shift PIOs. So we follow the same shift schedule as the rest of our operations personnel. Um, we're all fire captains with the agency. And to supplement our staffing in the PIO section, we have what we call um backup or part-time PIOs. So they're not assigned as full-time PIOs, but they've gone through the training and we can recall them if needed. The challenge with that though is oftentimes they're working on engines or trucks and getting them there as fast as I certainly would like them there. It's not always the easiest task. Um, that was the case on this incident. So for a while, for about I got called in at about four in the morning. Um there were two of us there for a good, ooh, probably six to eight hours, um, along with our boss, our chief of staff. So three of us kind of working the problem uh as we waited for additional PIOs to arrive. Um, as far as the holiday weekend, that didn't really impact us in the PIO shop um or the rest of operations either. So that was the good news.

Tom Mueller 4:24

Yeah, absolutely. Because and you know, when we talk about planning and preparation, it seems like, you know, and it's Christmas Eve or it's the day before Thanksgiving when something like this happens. And you know, so such a difficult event for Garden Grove and surrounding communities to deal

Choosing A Video First Strategy

Tom Mueller 4:45

with. Um of the things I noticed, Greg, in the response here was that it was really video driven as far as the communications go. And uh I it's more so than I've seen with other major incidents. I'm curious, you know, kind of your philosophy. Was that a conscious decision to go mostly videos? You had the unified commander, the incident commander out there doing those videos and just radiating credibility, you know, when doing those things. So, was that a conscious strategy for you going in?

Greg Barta 5:23

Yeah. So simple answer is yes, it was a conscious strategy. Let me give you a little backstory. So obviously, the incidents that we deal with on a large scale often are the brush fires out here. And we've had quite a few um in Orange County that we at OCFA, our incident management team comes in and we manage. And one of the communication tools we often use is we try to do a couple videos a day with the IEC or the ops chief to provide to provide updates. And early on in this incident, we kind of had a little padwell between myself, my counterpart, Sean Dorn, who's one of our other, he's a terrific PIO, one of our other shift PIOs, and then our boss, our chief of staff. And we talked about strategy. And one of the things that I suggested and I wanted to really implement was these videos getting utilized to provide updates to the community. We all agreed, and that was one of the first things we did. If you remember, I think our our first you know, post was at about 11 o'clock noon on that Friday, and we had our fire chief, um Chief Covey, the IC, all there speaking, and we kind of started implementing that strategy moving forward. We felt like it was a great way to get those messages out that we wanted to deliver and really you know put our face forward and let the community see who's running the incident. And then we also really tried to utilize subject matter experts. So if you looked at the videos, we had um the Orange County Health doctor, she was speaking in one. We had um AQMD, the you know, experts on the environment speaking. So we tried to give those subject matter experts, as well as our you know, hazmat branch director, to kind of explain what was going on. Why obviously the biggest question is why am I still evacuated? When can I go home? So we were trying to really really relay that message of it's a serious situation, here's what's going on, um, through the lens of the subject matter experts.

Tom Mueller 7:25

And it was so highly impactful, just the way you manage that.

Credibility On Camera Builds Trust

Tom Mueller 7:30

Now, it looks to me like one of the things you're really blessed with there in Orange County is you have some pretty good incident commanders there and chiefs who do pretty well on camera and who are very good at expressing empathy and care and concern for people. Not every agency or company has that. How how much of a difference do you think that makes having you know the incident commanders who can get out and be credible on tape like that?

Greg Barta 8:06

I mean, the simple answer is it's a huge difference. And I I think that honestly helped on this incident. We've gotten a lot of feedback from a lot of major agencies across the country, and they were all um impressed with the communications. And I'm not saying that to toot like my horn or our section's horn. Um, to be honest, I give most of that credit to Chief McGovern, Chief Covey. You know, they did a phenomenal job in in front of the camera. And what I'd really like to say is we have the ability to um have a teleprompter. They can read off a teleprompter, and I think anybody can tell with those videos, they weren't reading off a teleprompter. Those were natural without, I mean, there was a little bit of talking ahead of time of hey, what messages do we need to deliver? What do we need to make sure the community is aware of? But there was nothing scripted, that was all authentic. It was all from you know, Chief McGovern, Chief Covey, uh from the heart, if you will. Um, and I think that resonated with the citizens. And, you know, one of the things, every day at the command post, we have, you know, for those of you out there that aren't aware, we have what we call a cooperator meeting. And our liaison officer, you know, he orchestrates that and puts that on. And myself, Chief Covey were involved. And the feedback we got from the politicians and you know, school officials, everybody that was impacted, it really resonated with them those videos. And if I could backtrack a little, one of the really good things about those videos is when we post them to social media, the news grabs those, and they, I mean, it was across you know, news agencies across the country, those videos we were posting. So it kind of accomplishes, you know, two birds with one stone, if you will, in that we're getting the message out we want, and it's giving the media what they want. But I could not be more impressed and more or more appreciative of Chief McGovern's Chief Covey. I mean, both of them, it was okay, what do you need? When do you need it? And I I mean, from a PIO standpoint, you know, on these instants, we have to get instant commander approval to release information. There was no issue with that. Uh, I mean, I, Chief Covey, I walk over to him, I sent him a text, whatever it took, he, yep, we're good, you know, or you know, let's modify this, you know, let's change this word. It was instantly we were able to craft our messaging um and get it signed off rapidly. And I don't think I can remember one time where Chief McGovern or Chief Covey turned down an interview request. Obviously, there were times where we knew based on what was going on operationally, they wouldn't be available. But if they were available, they were willing to do every interview. So, I mean, kudos to them. They I think they did a tremendous job getting the messaging out there.

Tom Mueller 10:46

Yeah, I have to echo that. Uh, and and I'm just amazed that you've got sort of that pool of leaders there who are so comfortable just standing out there and delivering, you know, those messages from the heart. Uh, you know, a lot of responses, boy, we spend a lot of time scripting comments or at least bulleting comments for the incident commander to use in an update. Um, we you know, at least getting key messages down for them. Uh but the you know, the incident commanders that you had at your disposal there didn't need any of that, did they?

Greg Barta 11:23

No, we're we're uh we're pretty lucky with them. So um, you know, a unique thing too, I think both of them, so Chief McGovern, our our fire chief, he spent the bulk of his career in Garden Grove. So that's where you know his career, uh a majority of it was spent. So he grew up, you know, as a firefighter in that city working, and then Chief Covey, so he's our incident commander on our incident management team. He's also the division chief that oversees Garden Grove as part of his responsibility area. So some really big ties for both of them to that community um as well.

Tom Mueller 11:56

Okay, so they know a lot of people in the community, and the impacts here probably felt personal to them as well, then. I'm sure. Yeah. Well, that was one of the highlights for me again is just the you know, the empathetic nature of those videos, and you could tell the the chiefs were concerned about their neighbors and were working really hard to make sure people knew they were doing everything possible to resolve this situation. And I think the fact, well, I'll ask you, the fact that you had them out front and talking, did that go a long way to sort of ease the community's fears as this was playing out, or at least help them feel they were informed?

Greg Barta 12:44

I think so. I mean, I guess the the real answer to that would be we'd have to take a poll and see, but I mean a lot of the feedback we got was was great. And you know, I I think if I took a step back and I look at something as I I live in Orange County, and and if I put my citizen lens on and take my fire department cap off, I mean I certainly want to hear from the person that's running the incident um and hear what's going on. So I think having Chief Covey as the incident commander speaking, and then you couple that with obviously such a unique, I mean, this is a career call for all of us, I think. Um I I'd go ahead and bet a large sum of money. I'm not gonna be on another incident, hazmat one quite like this. Um, and having some of those subject matter experts too, like Chief Freeman, he's our hazmat branch director, another division chief, and and getting him up there for the community to be able to hear from the individual that's overseeing the hazmat response, you know, component, I think that's huge too. So, you know, enabling the community to hear from the individuals that are devising the plan, uh, um, you know, enable to relate what's going on. I think that I think it was huge.

Tom Mueller 13:53

Now,

Talking Points And Fast Approvals

Tom Mueller 13:54

the um I was just thinking about the uh you know the planning P and the organising aspects of this. And I come back to just message development and the approval process. And you you mentioned that or you touched on the approval process. Uh how much uh how much actual writing of messaging or any of that did you guys do, or were you really just sort of I don't want to say winging it, but going following the chief's lead and and just uh delivering those same messages?

Greg Barta 14:32

So good great question. There were a handful of media advisories we sent out. Um so those were all obviously written documents that had to get um signed off on by Chief Covey. And then there were some other documents as well. For example, we had a list of talking points for all of our division chiefs to go to their various city council meetings um to speak on. And those talking points, um, I so I basically got what the police agencies you know had compiled, what AQMD, Orange County Health, and us combined it into one document and then took it to Chief Kobe for him and the other unified ICs to review and sign off on. Um, and then even a much simpler thing, but we made sure to get signed off on was so every day what we liked to do is tape a video message to coincide with the morning briefing that all of our operations personnel would get so that we had basically a brief that video that we could push out. And then what I would do is send my PIOs that I was having do the media interviews, send them out right after that video would come out. So it was kind of the messaging you're gonna go say is what was just already put out there. And what we did is created talking points daily that were living documents for our field PIOs to speak upon, and those were signed off by Chief Covey in the unified ICs as well. So um, as far as like actual written documentation that the public saw, uh, not as much as our media partners and more so internally that our folks were using to speak on. And obviously, very important that we're all speaking the same language and speaking the same messaging. And so we made sure everything was approved. It was getting released by our PIOs.

Tom Mueller 16:19

Yeah. Now tell us, uh, give us a little context about uh sort of the media attention that you were getting around the incident.

Managing Huge On Site Media Demand

Tom Mueller 16:29

Uh, because you know, we see a press conference being held, you know, at the command post, uh, and then uh, but you don't really get a sense for how many cameras are standing out in front of that gathered uh crowd with you fronting it and managing the press conference uh on behalf of you know all the agencies, the elected officials uh who were there. So uh how yeah, how would you gauge the on-site media presence and interest?

Greg Barta 17:00

To be honest, it was the biggest on-site media interest I've ever seen. Um, we've had quite a few big brush fires. This one, so what was unique and also a challenge is obviously everybody is excluded from that evacuation zone. So the media they weren't able to do what they normally would do on a brush fire or even a big structure fire where they can get moderately close, get good video footage, they can get different vantage points. They were pretty much relegated to being at the command post. So they were all there with us pretty much 24-7. So kind of unique in that regard. And then the interest was just so great. I mean, it was, you know, one of the top or the top national news story um for a few days there. So one of uh one of our multimedia specialists who helps us set up for press conferences, he had made a comment to me. He goes, Wow, this is the biggest press conference we have ever had. Um, that second one we did. And it was pretty overwhelming if you just looked how many people were standing up there with us. It was it was a lot.

Running A Nine Speaker Press Conference

Tom Mueller 18:04

Um I think I counted nine speakers uh at that press conference, which uh I I'm not a big fan of those, but as as incidents drag on, you just get more and more elected officials who just want to be a little visible and you know express their reassurances for their constituents, but it's all an opportunity. So what was it like sort of corralling all of those cats running about there then, Greg?

Greg Barta 18:37

So as far as the nine speakers goes, to be honest, I've got to give every one of them credit, they were great. So, like you said, if I'm sure if if we had it our way, there would have been, you know, five speakers. But obviously, you know, the politicians, they need to speak, and like you said, that they're important, you know, their messages are important, and you know, it's good. People might listen to them that aren't listening to us. So, you know, I I I do think it's valuable to have them there. Yeah, as far as the number, that's obviously debatable. We all probably have our own opinions on how many, you know, we would like to have. Um, so what we did is when we finally figured out the number was gonna be nine, um, you know, and that decision was not like obviously mine. That was a big group of people having discussions, and you know, and I will say there was definitely more people that wanted to speak than did speak. Um, so you know, when we got it to the nine, I ended up conducting a pre-speaker briefing. So we had eight of the nine of them. Um, we took in a trailer. The only one that wasn't there at that time was uh Senator Schiff. So obviously, you know, hit his schedule is is much more impacted than the rest of ours. Um, so you know, he obviously partook, but was not in the pre-speaker briefing. And everybody in the briefing was, to be honest, I couldn't have been more pleased with with how well they all cooperated. Everybody kind of, I don't want to even call it ground rules, but we just went over the flow of how things would go. There were zero issues, um appropriate questions were asked, and and everybody really, you know, towed the line as far as what you know their area was, what they were gonna speak on. Flipping gears a little bit though, obviously you saw there were a lot of people standing up there. I mean a lot. So you know how that is, it kind of turns into one of these things. There were multiple cities involved. So, how do you tell one city they can't have somebody up there or can't have their whole city staff? So it just due to the nature of how many cities were impacted, um, it obviously grew with the presence of people standing up there. Um, so I don't know. I think we had about as many people standing up there as we did cameras on the other side.

Tom Mueller 20:43

Okay. And and you could tell it was a wide angle shot to get everybody in back there. But you know, to your credit and to their credit, the flow of the press conference was quite smooth. And uh you I think it shows the fact that you did a pre-brief with them all, gave them the context and the flow, uh, and then it did seem to go pretty pretty straightforward there.

What Comes Next In The Series

Tom Mueller 21:10

And that's gonna do it for this episode of the Leading in a Crisis podcast. Thanks to Greg Barta for joining us, and thank you for being with us as well. On our next episode, we'll continue our conversation with Greg and learn more about his experiences running the PIO team for that GKN chemical incident in Orange County. We'll see you on the next episode. Take care.