Natural disasters like tornadoes and floods cannot be avoided. Chemical spills, explosions, train accidents cannot be avoided.

But we can plan for the unavoidable, and that was the purpose of a meeting held Thursday evening at Iowa Central Community College’s East Campus.

Webster County Emergency Management Coordinator Dylan Hagen has partnered with JEO Consulting of Omaha to make such a plan entitled the Webster County 2026 Hazard Mitigation Plan.

The meeting was attended by Fort Dodge Police Chief Dennis Quinn, Supervisor Austin Hayek, Emergency Management Agency commission members and people representing nearly every town in the county, including fire chiefs, council members, and mayors.

Becky Appelford a senior planner for Hazard Mitigation with JEO, presented a three-point plan on why a community should participate: to gain eligibility for FEMA mitigation grant programs, to identify strategies to identify to reduce your communities’ risk to hazards and disasters and to build relationships with your community and region that foster resilience across the geographic area.

Appelford then fielded questions often pertaining to specific concerns raised by town officials. Questions were encouraged as this was the first of several meetings regarding mitigation.

Risks and vulnerabilities in each community will be addressed in future meetings. Citizens are encouraged to talk with their elected officials about hazard mitigation. Older people living by themselves are seen as vulnerable.

Hazard mitigation before and after a disaster will be discussed at the next meeting on July 23. For more information, check out the project website at https://jeo.com/webster-county-ia-hazardous-mitigation-plan.