Since September 11, the American Red Cross, a not for profit organization, has provided hands-on training for hundreds of Red Cross staff and volunteers by sending them to New York, Washington, D. C., Pennsylvania, and New Jersey to assist victims and families affected by the terrorist events, identifying and securing additional vendors to assist in the delivery of Mass Care, daily monitoring of available blood supply through the national Red Cross blood inventory management system, and publishing a multilingual domestic preparedness brochure, providing the public with some basic tips to prepare families and communities and to develop their confidence in how to respond. The American Red Cross is a standing member in the State Emergency Operations Center (SEOC) and the Illinois Terrorism Task Force (ITTF).

• The American Red Cross (ARC) has continued to educate the public to be prepared for a terrorist event, including developing a series of educational fact sheets, public information documents, materials, and brochures. Many of these types of information are available from all Red Cross chapters in Illinois and from our web site www.redcross.org.

• The American Red Cross of Greater Chicago has acquired land for the construction of a new headquarters and Disaster Operations Center to better coordinate our response to disaster incidents anywhere in Illinois. The Red Cross is providing space in its facility for use by IEMA and other state agencies as a forward command post in the event it is needed to support disaster operations in Northern Illinois. The American Red Cross of the Quad Cities has also built a new expanded facility to assist in the disaster response in the Quad Cities area.

• The Red Cross as a result of a grant from the Corporation for National and Community Service will deploy up to 20 full time Homeland Security specialists throughout Illinois. The VISTA specialists which will be based in Red Cross chapters in strategic locations throughout the state will assist in helping to educate the public on how to be better prepared for terrorism threats, and working with communities in the development, training and recruitment of Citizen Corps volunteers.

• The Red Cross developed and now staffs a 24-hour per day/365 days per year hotline (866) GET INFO for people seeking information about preparing for terrorism or those needing assistance following a disaster. The Center is staffed to handle multiple languages and Internet inquiries. Computer based reference materials are frequently updated to assist call takers in properly responding to inquiries including a chat room staffed to respond to those desiring to communicate in that fashion.

• The Red Cross has issued planning, preparedness and response guidelines to each of its units for Weapons of Mass Destruction/terrorism incidents and a also issued a model for chapter disaster response planning to all units in Illinois. This model includes suggested guidelines for chapter and blood region response to each level of alert of the Homeland Security Advisory System.

• ARC has reached agreement with the Metropolitan YMCA's and is having discussions with the Chicago Youth Centers to establish their facilities as volunteer registration locations following a major disaster or WMD/T event to prevent spontaneous volunteer congestion at the disaster site. This would supplement any Internet volunteer registration program. ARC staff will train these agencies staffs in techniques for interviewing volunteers and conducting skill assessments. In addition to these plans, the Red Cross is working with the City of Chicago and the Illinois Terrorism Task Force on methods to deal with the issues surrounding spontaneous volunteers that appear following a terrorist incident.

• ARC has established an agreement with an Illinois company that maintains over 4,000 phone lines and operators to serve as an overflow telephone emergency response center. Computer based reference materials are available to each operator to assist callers in finding the location of shelters or mass care centers or responding to inquiries about volunteer opportunities following a major incident.

• ARC serves as a standing member of the Illinois Terrorism Task Force and many of its committees and as the lead agency for Mass Care under the Illinois Emergency Operations Plan communicates with state human service agencies which support Mass Care efforts.

• The Red Cross is represented in the State Emergency Operations Center and participates in weekly briefings related to Homeland Security with key state agencies. The Red Cross also assigns a liaison to the FEMA Regional Operations Center in Chicago whenever it is activated. To assist in facilitating communications, ARC has designated a full time liaison with the City of Chicago 911 Center and the emergency management agencies of the Chicago collar counties. The Red Cross has an active working relationship with the City of Chicago’s Office of Emergency Management.

• A direct High Frequency radio link is established between the State Emergency Operations Center and the Red Cross National Disaster Operations Center to facilitate emergency response of additional assets to Illinois if needed.

• The Red Cross chairs the Illinois Voluntary Agencies active in Disaster (VOAD). VOAD is a consortium of voluntary agencies, which provide disaster relief and response, and facilitates coordinated response and planning among voluntary agencies. VOAD regularly meets to coordinate response plans and anticipated actions.

• The American Red Cross initiated and Former Governor Ryan signed legislation authorizing Red Cross certified disaster volunteers who are local government employees to have up to 20 days paid time each year to serve on disaster relief operations in Illinois. This supplements existing laws and rules authorizing State employees who are Red Cross disaster volunteers to have up to 20 days paid time to responds to disasters in Illinois or terrorism incidents anywhere in the United States.