Fundamentals of Hazard Vulnerability Assessments

Glenn: Hey everybody, welcome back to the podcast. we have a returning guest, familiar face with us again, ⁓ Stan from Fire and Life Safety Inc. Welcome back, Stan. Stan Szpytek: Glenn, it's super cool to be back with you and I'm ⁓ really excited about today's conversation.

Glenn: Absolutely. You know, you and I have been talking over the last few weeks, ⁓ and we'll get into the Garden Grove incident and some other, you know, ⁓ incidents happening across the country, but we've been talking about hazard vulnerability assessments. And, you know, I I'm not I'm not completely sure that everybody truly understands the importance of a HVA, they play into the your larger emergency operations plan, and then also how they play into even greater than that.

your continuity of operations plan, ⁓ you know, once something has happened and similar to the Garden Garden Grove incident, when you're displaced for three, four, five, six days, what does that look like from a from a company standpoint? How do you continue your operations? So I think we're gonna have a great conversation today just about about those topics, about the importance of it. And that's probably where we'll start is the importance of a hazard vulnerability assessment.

⁓ we spend quite a bit of time in healthcare, but I think the conversation is is bigger than health care. Would would you agree with that? Stan Szpytek: A hundred percent, you know, regardless of the regulatory environment, when it comes to good, ⁓ solid emergency planning, disaster readiness, ⁓ need to know the facts, you need to know the hazards, you need to know the perils that are out there. And if you don't know what you don't know, you can't plan effectively for unexpected incidents like ⁓ Garden Grove incident.

I think for context. You know, you should probably give our audience a a quick overview 'cause we're gonna reference this a whole lot. So let's talk about what happened and then how it impacted not just long term care, but the entire community. Glenn: Yeah, absolutely.

So a couple of weeks ago in Garden Grove, California, ⁓ there was a large potential for a large chemical leak. Also an explosion, a bleve, boiling liquid, expanding vapor explosion, which essentially means right, we have a pressure a large pressurized vessel, something's inside of it, and there's a potential of it having a catastrophic explosion, ⁓ it could be deadly and detrimental. ⁓ but the unfortunate thing was within that ⁓ vessel was a highly corrosive and highly toxic and highly highly dangerous chemical.

I I won't name it because to be quite honest with you, I'm not a chemist and and it was a ⁓ it was a complex name and the name of it's not important. But what's important is to understand and know that it had the potential to cause ⁓ a lot of devastation. And when we talk about this event, I think one of the the most concerning things was when you look at clips of it, and maybe I'll try to insert some clips of it in this podcast. as the incident commander for that incident gave very few options of how this was gonna resolve itself.

of the options was it was going to ⁓ and explode, causing catastrophic devastation, fire, potential loss of life, so on and so forth, ⁓ led to the evacuation of the immediate area and surrounding areas. The other option was it was going to slowly leak out. causing potentially an environmental hazard on top of the health hazard and associated risk surrounding that. So this was a ⁓ I believe a aircraft manufacturing facility and they were making plastics.

I think this chemical was to a part of the process of making some plastics, is is what that was. So luckily for that incident, the those two outlooks, ⁓ neither one of took place. what took place was ⁓ the the pressure the the vessel was able to depressurize through that actual leak itself through the through the crack itself ⁓ and that it was they were able to introduce or it was going through a process to be able to harden ⁓ and actually hardened itself ⁓ and that is how they abated ⁓ that ⁓ that that that hazard.

Stan Szpytek: And the consequence of this incident that has nothing to do with your long term care operation, the operation of your convenience store or daily life in your own home, had nothing to do with you, but just it was the proximity, this incident initiated an evacuation zone of fifty thousand residents. We seen anything like that ⁓ in United States ⁓ in a really long time. And what was was interesting was the ⁓ evacuation zone was right on the border of Disneyland, Knottsbury Farms, another amusement park in California, ⁓ motels, restaurants, strip malls, other manufacturing.

⁓ disruption that this caused over ⁓ a holiday weekend, at least in my opinion, Glenn, ⁓ pretty historic. ⁓ let's focus on our of care and services. ⁓ we know that And we don't have the exact numbers, but we know that there were long term care facilities, senior living communities, and properties that serve other vulnerable populations impacted by this incident. Glenn: Yeah, that area was deeply ⁓ populated with long term care facilities of various types, ⁓ like you mentioned.

I do know that w when in the early hours of this, you and I were texting back and forth. You were asking me, with us being close network partners, ⁓ you know, whether I had visibility to it and whether I had communities ⁓ that directly impacted. Come to find out, we were not impacted, but I had a community in southern Orange County that was receiving evacuated residents. So that's gonna go into this conversation as well.

So yeah, a lot of people, we don't know the numbers yet. I'm sure at some point we will find out. But I don't know that anybody impacted was prepared or ever considered the potential of evacuation due to some catastrophic release from that facility. I think what happens is so often for businesses that are required to conduct hazard vulnerability assessments or security assessments or any type of assessment for their community or for their business that they run, ⁓ they focus on what happens inside the walls, right?

They focus on, this could happen to us. We might have a fire. What if we had an active shooter, armed intruder? What if maybe a vehicle ⁓ ran into the building because, you know, there weren't bollards near the parking space in between the parking spaces in the buildings.

We think about things like that. What if there were a flood? ⁓ but we don't think about the the community at large, outside of the the confines of our community. So I think that's where the biggest lesson learned was for for this incident.

Stan Szpytek: Mm-hmm. Yeah, you and I were really charged up by this event, so much so that we we wrote a a joint article that was published in McKnight's Senior Living that's really ⁓ that really talks about the same things that we're talking about in this discussion. ⁓ And know, hazard vulnerability assessment or analysis, as you pointed out, is a regulatory requirement, but more importantly, it should always be considered ⁓ a best And while ⁓ it is that Something a half mile, a mile, two or three miles or more away from you won't impact your operations.

When an event like this happens, it becomes your reality. ⁓ mean, think about it. You go down the freeways or the highways or the interstates or ⁓ parkways, whatever you call them in your region the country, ⁓ and see the warehouses and you see them going up ⁓ one after Do we know? What volumes of dimethyl terrible and other hazardous materials are in those tanks and in those buildings?

The point is this: you don't really need to know the specifics of the the quantity and the type, but your emergency plan based on your HVA ⁓ is going to predicate one of two things. Should I stay or should I go? ⁓ the last thing, Glenn, I think ⁓ operator should be is taken off guard when that alert or that evacuation order comes in. Now certainly you've had experience in Southern California and where you operate your communities with wildfire.

⁓ even with a wildfire, you get a little bit of notice. Or for the folks that are in ⁓ coastal regions of the country, you deal with hurricanes ⁓ advanced warning all the time. But why is the HVA so important? to identify risks right in your neighborhood like this manufacturing plant.

Glenn: Yeah, you know, you hit on these no notice versus notice events. And the HVA gonna help you determine that, right? It is a tool. No matter what tool you use, there's multiple HVAs out there.

templated tools, most of them are free of charge ⁓ they all look and feel a little bit different. but you know, the whole goal is right to sit down, I believe as a team, not in a silo, not as an individual. ⁓ You're the director. Stan Szpytek: Right.

Glenn: And maybe you're the maintenance director and you're responsible for you know emergency preparedness, you should not be completing that hazard vulnerability assessment ⁓ on your own. That should be as a team. So if it's in a long-term care setting, ⁓ should involve nursing, that should involve maintenance, that should involve security, that should involve culinary, that should involve admin. We can go on and on and on.

And it doesn't matter what business sector you're in, it should involve key players. from every business sector or unit within that ⁓ within that that that company. And 'cause everybody has a different ⁓ mindset or view on what may be important or dangerous or a consideration for them. Would you agree with that?

Stan Szpytek: I do, and you know, there's also a factor that ⁓ needs to be weaned out of the process because some people just don't want it to happen. And there is that concept of optimistic bias. Okay, we get it, but what's the likelihood? Historically, it's never happened before.

But I think about an incident in Pennsylvania not too long ago where it was a manufacturing plant, it was a chocolate factory, ⁓ had a major explosion. And ⁓ it impacted the operations of ⁓ the entire community. Evacuations were required, ⁓ trained derailments and so forth. But we want that collective impression of more than just one person.

You know, Glenn, you and I do a lot of mock survey in the communities that we work with. And it's not uncommon for me to look at the HVA when I'm assessing levels of readiness and I ask about the committee that worked on the HVA the maintenance director will go, well, I just filled it out. It's not a checklist process that should be filled out by one person. I think our audience is getting this.

We're stressing this ad nauseum. It needs to be done ⁓ in collaboration with key players in the communities. Glenn: Yeah, you know, and I think to add on to that, it's not just if if you're required to complete one as healthcare and long-term care are, ⁓ not just doing it to check a box. We're doing it to help ⁓ our entire emergency operations plan.

You can't have an emergency operations plan without first identifying the hazards that are most likely to occur ⁓ within or nearby or impact. your facility. You just can't. so ⁓ nothing wrong with with using there's a lot of different ways to put a plan together.

Whether it's a templated plan, well you gotta still take that templated plan ⁓ and sure you customize it to your operations, to what is most likely to happen to you. Yeah. Stan Szpytek: Yeah, or I use the term operationalize it. Operationalize that plan so it's yours.

Glenn: Absolutely. You have to make it yours. You have to make it a living breathing document. And how we do that is starting with the hazard vulnerability assessment.

you know, some changes from the healthcare perspective have come and th they'll apply to other industries as well. ⁓ know, we used to look a few years back and you just identified your top three to five hazards. Now it's your top ten hazards. You need to really look at more comprehensively ⁓ your top ten hazards.

just last year ⁓ I set down different life safety surveys and four different skilled nursing facilities with different life safety surveyors ⁓ and I and I think you had this similar experience as well with some of your clients ⁓ is the the thing they were focused on was aircraft emergencies. And if you couldn't show in your hazard vulnerability assessment that you would at least considered an aircraft emergency occurring, then you were getting a deficiency for not having a compliant emergency operations plan.

And that came on the heels of, I believe, ⁓ a plane crash in a Pennsylvania long-term care facility. It was right on the heels of that. Stan Szpytek: Yep, yep. And you know, Glenn, I'm interested what your perspective is.

We're talking about the importance of not siloing the process to an individual or even just two individuals. It needs to be a committee. What about outside resources? Reaching out to local county emergency management, a representative from the fire department, you know.

I was a fire prevention officer, I was a fire marshal, but it appears that the term today that we see in the fire service, where if people do the role that I did as a fire marshal, the focus is on community risk reduction. So what about reaching out to those people ⁓ the Orange County Fire Authority or the Chicago Fire Department or ⁓ Fort Lauderdale Fire and Rescue? are they quick to respond? And I know you're gonna say that's variable, but what's the importance of ⁓ involving outside perspective as well?

Glenn: I know, not I think. I know that they want to help. You can get to the right person. So often when I'm talking to facilities and they'll say, Hey, did you collaborate or reach out to your local emergency responders?

⁓ we can't get a hold of them. Well what do you mean? They're Stan Szpytek: That's 'cause they're that's 'cause they're reaching out to the fire station down the street, which is the wrong place to go. Glenn: Right.

The wrong place to go. There's somebody in that community risk reduction department like you mentioned about that is sitting behind a desk willing and able with the expertise to come in and help you out. And they want to, right? These folks want to.

And I think it sends a a powerful message to them as well. Like, ⁓ these folks take this seriously. They take it seriously. We want to partner with them.

They want to be, they wanna be prepared. We wanna know what their prepared to to to take care of and conversely they want to know what we're prepared to take care of so when something happens how can we collaborate together and work together ⁓ to to have the best possible outcome so those resources are there you just have to pick up the phone make a phone call if you don't get to the person the first phone call which you probably won't wheel gets the grease keep calling you're going to get to that to that person and they're more than happy to come out and walk the facility with you and they have the firsthand knowledge as well of outside of your gates hazards may exist and they may open your eyes to a lot of things.

Stan Szpytek: Yeah. You know, here's an here's an example. ⁓ I was doing a hospital HVA ⁓ process assisting professionals at a hospital ⁓ a city I won't mention, but ⁓ was a large university at that ⁓ near that campus as well. And when we brought in outside resources from fire, they didn't everything, but they said, you know that big ⁓ multi story windowless building.

building that's on the campus. ⁓ well that is a vital component of national security and a and a a potential terror target. So you don't know what you know, ⁓ you don't know what you don't know until you collaborate internally and externally. Glenn: And You know, because of these because these documents, these hazard vulnerability assessments assessments, they're living, breathing documents, because of that, you can add things to them.

That's the that's I think a really important fact. So when you're collaborating with local outside authorities or if you as your a in your team identify something that's not on the list, maybe, you can add those things. That's that's okay. ⁓ and you should be going back and not only doing it just once and we're done, right?

We need to be doing this on an ongoing basis. I would say minimum of annually in healthcare per the regulation, but in addition, post incident. Once you have that incident, go back and review it. Do you think that's a best practice as well?

Stan Szpytek: ⁓ yeah, because the algorithm of most of those HVA tools factors in real-world experience. here's a a perfect example. ⁓ know, ⁓ give the HVA to the maintenance director, and one the probes ⁓ on the tool is pandemic. Now prior to 2018-2019, most of us didn't really know what a pandemic was.

⁓ And ⁓ Just about everyone is going to rate that low or not possible, which of course is inaccurate. That's why your clinical team needs to be part of the HVA process. But because on a worldwide basis, we all experience the pandemic, the algorithm of the HVA is now adjusted to show it as being a higher probability based on the historical evidence. And because of that historical evidence, know, the other thing I think we want to focus on is continuity of care.

⁓ continuity of care and operations during the pandemic, Glenn, was was tested ⁓ the limit. ⁓ live through it as an operator, I lived through it ⁓ a consultant, and ⁓ we lived through it as citizens, and we know that it really impacted our ability to provide all the services. while we're in the midst of a disaster that was focused on an infectious disease outbreak. But how do you maintain continuity continuity of care and services when you're displaced because of a potential catastrophic explosion at a place in Garden Grove, California?

Glenn: Yeah, you know, that's that's a a great ⁓ question. And think at the end of the day, one the lessons that was likely learned from that was the biggest issue with continuity of care or continuity of services was likely staffing, right? So how do we continue to get people to work to take care of these people? Because in a situation like this, people are displaced from their home, they're concerned about their family, maybe they have a fear of, you know, going outside and ⁓ you the chemical release happening and them not being with their family, you're likely gonna have staffing related challenges and issues.

That's a that's one of the considerations when we talk about continuity of operations. How can we continue to deliver high levels of care and services, no matter what business, healthcare, manufacturing, you know, whatever it may be, when we're impacted with, know, staffing challenges. How do we continue, you know, our our our revenue generating processes, you know, ⁓ from a from a business perspective. So what Stan Szpytek: How about how about supply line ⁓ challenges?

Glenn: The biggest issue we faced during COVID, right, was, you know, from continuity of operations and continuity of services was lack of appropriate essential PPE. You have folks telling you, you must wear this level of PPE. OSHA, state, Fed, like this is what you have to do, but I can't get that PPE. So how do we continue to ⁓ maintain our services and run our services without that without that ⁓ you know that that exist?

essential equipment? What redundancies do we have in place a supply chain, manufacturing, whatever it may be to be able to to support that? And you have to identify those things ahead of time. You have to have a team together that sits down and says, Okay, if this were to happen and we were displaced because of whatever incident, how would we continue to have staffing?

How would we continue to get supplies? ⁓ would we continue to pay people? How would we continue, you know, to to pay our bills. You have to consider all those things.

and Stan Szpytek: And the way you ⁓ the way you do that is you identify what are the essential services and essential staffing and succession of plan, identified in a good coupe. ⁓ in outside of healthcare, I think ⁓ identify it as more of a business continuity plan. But in NGOs, in government, in healthcare, I think it's continuity of operation planning that we see most commonly. Glenn: Agreed.

All this stuff plays into it. So we started with hazard vulnerability assessment, you know, that that that systematic tool that we can use as a as a team to go through, sit down. It may not be an hour process. This could be a multi it could be a multi-day process.

Maybe you only have half hour a week as a team. So week one this is gonna maybe maybe a four week process. Week one we have half hour. Week two, we have another half hour.

We're just gonna sit through, we're gonna Going to take manageable bites out of this thing and we're going to get it done. Because once you do that heavy lift the first time on an ongoing basis, the lift is not as heavy. so you have to do that heavy lift the first time, you have to make it more than just a compliance tool, you have to make it a living, breathing document. Once can do that, then we can go into building our emergency operations plan.

But one thing we didn't talk about also as we kind of wrap this whole thing up is ⁓ you that HV. Stan Szpytek: Love it. Glenn: That has your vulnerability assessment, that helps guide you. It's your guiding document for drills as well.

Now we know what drills we need to focus on. Because if we said that wildfire, earthquake, earthquake, active shooter, armed intruder, and flood were our top four, let's say, well, we know that we're gonna focus on throughout the year, we're gonna make sure we focus on those from a drill perspective and a staff education perspective. perspective as well. So I think that's a important thing to consider as well with HVAs.

Stan Szpytek: So as we wrap this up, why don't you talk a little bit about ⁓ the EOP, the emergency operation plan, and the COOP need to be synergized and work together. That was one of our features in our article in McKnight's that the two work in concert with each other, the EOP and your continuity of operations plan. Glenn: Yeah, you know, I I don't want to say they're one and the same, but but they need to mirror each other. they are two separate documents, but they have to mirror each other.

The core concepts in your EOP ⁓ to again then transition over to your continuity of operations plan. ⁓ you mentioned it earlier, you know, you need to identify those things. You need to identify what what those considerations are. You need to identify the likelihood of them, and then ⁓ you need to identify what are the most important.

important services we need to continue. And those those two things go hand in hand within within the development of of these plans. And I think so often communities stop their emergency operations plan. Maybe they have an emergency operations plan and they think that is also gonna be their guiding document on how they would continue operations to something, you know, go on for multiple hours, multiple days, could be multiple weeks, ⁓ like COVID.

it multiple months, multiple years. that is not what it is. It's a separate document. And it doesn't have to be overly It doesn't have to be overly complicated.

You just really have to consider. ⁓ You have consider and talk as a team early again ⁓ about what things are, how they play together. And ⁓ They need to compliment each other to work. Stan Szpytek: Yeah.

So let's wrap up with resources. I know that of the state healthcare associations, like the ones I'm affiliated with in California ⁓ Arizona, we've developed ⁓ templates for emergency operation plan, plans for COP. Both Arizona and California have got a great ⁓ continuity of operations plan template ⁓ available for because everything that we've produced is grant funded. ⁓ So it's out there for anyone.

Glenn, how about Asper Tracy and other federal resources that are out there? Glenn: Yeah, Asper Tracy is another great one. one that ⁓ always some that I point folks towards as well. ⁓ easily accessible ⁓ online as the Kaiser tool.

We hear a lot about the Kaiser tool out there. ⁓ it's another free resource. there's a ton healthcare coalitions, local healthcare coalitions, ⁓ have a lot of resources out there as well to be able to point for folks towards. So it doesn't have to be daunting, it doesn't have to be overwhelming.

The resources are there. It's just a matter of taking the time, identifying your hazards, and going through that, going through that ⁓ through that resource ⁓ and that tool to customize it for your needs. That is the foundation an HVA. Not to water it down, not to dummy it down, but we just wanted to have this conversation to get people thinking about the importance of it.

Stan and I are both here to you know help companies through this process. this is one of the service offerings that we we both ⁓ have within within our companies and within our network partnership as well. So never hesitate to reach out if we can be of assistance with the development with drills with just ⁓ linking you up with your local emergency responders sometimes that's the biggest hurdle is getting to the right person so there's a lot of resources out there and ⁓ I just appreciate your time and your expertise stand it's always fun to sit here and talk shop ⁓ you know like we talked about earlier are we gonna do this scripted nope we don't do things scripted we we we we jump on and we have a conversation about what this looks and feels like.

Stan Szpytek: Yep. Always good working with you, Glenn. Glenn: Absolutely. Well, thank you, man.

I appreciate you and I I'm sure we'll get together again soon to talk about another topic.