Using Incident Commend System (ICS) to plan community health assessment forums: Riverside County, CA

Riverside County, California is home to 2.2 million residents and one of the fastest growing counties in the United States. It is geographically large, spanning more than 7,200 square miles with many distinct cultural and geographic communities. In pursuit of accreditation through the Public Health Accreditation Board (PHAB), the Riverside County Department of Public Health (DOPH) embarked on an ambitious goal to conduct multiple community forums and meetings throughout the County to collect information on health needs from as many representative populations.

In order to facilitate efficient planning and productive meetings, the DOPH Accreditation Steering Committee decided to use Incident Command System (ICS). ICS is a systematic tool designed for the command, control and coordination of emergency response and DOPH has successfully used it to coordinate response and recovery efforts to public health emergencies. An ICS subject-matter expert from the DOPH Public Health Emergency and Response branch was appointed as incident commander. She coordinated weekly section chief meetings and briefed the Accreditation Steering Committee on developments.

DOPH staff were assigned section chief (Finance, Operations, Logistics, Planning), Liaison and Public Information roles based on their day-to-day functions. The Logistics and Planning Sections were further divided into units to assign staff to coordinate community meeting and staff schedules, presentation design, outreach plan and more. In addition to the successful coordination of more than 30 community forums throughout Riverside County, using ICS gave DOPH staff an opportunity to practice emergency response roles and helped DOPH fulfill PHAB accreditation prerequisite and domain requirements.