I am guessing that SAR certification or regulation is somewhere on the
radar in Iowa and if not it seems as that STAR1 <http://www.star1.org>
is leading the way for SAR standardization within your State. Several
States already have SAR regulations in place at the State level and
numerous counties throughout the County already have them in place.
There is a SAR unification research project taking place within FEMA
Region III Below are some comments to help explain what's happening on
our response area.
The State of Virginia is one of the few States that have a formal Search
& Rescue review, testing and approval process in place. The review and
testing is under the strict supervision of the Virginia Search & Rescue
Council (VASARCO) <http://www.vasarco.org> Although Virginia has their
own SAR standards, they will accept the (organization) NASAR SAR
standards as an equivalent. The fact remains that regardless of which
SAR training a State accepts, it must be some type of formal training
(as both Una and Jorene stated earlier).
Since our team has a SAR MOU Virginia and is a registered MSAR resource
with Maryland, our team members have the choice to use either NASAR or
Virginia SAR standards, although we do require all teams to pass the
NASAR SAR Tech-III written exam as the minimum knowledge base (the
official ST-III test can be taken online). All search teams within this
MD and VA must also hold NIMS/ICS IS-100 and IS-700 certification (our
team requires all members to also hold CERT certification).
For Virginia, once a SAR Team passes the VASARCO standards and testing,
the Council then forwards the entire application process and testing
results to the Virginias Department of Emergency Management (VDEM) with
a recommendation for approval. The application is reviewed by VDEM
(State) Officials and then a formal memorandum of understand (MOU) is
written by the Virginia Attorney's General Office for a legal MOU
agreement. SAR teams that have a MOU with VDEM are then placed EMAC
<http://www.emacweb.org> roster. " Through EMAC, a disaster impacted
state can request and receive assistance from other member states
quickly and efficiently, resolving two key issues upfront: liability and
reimbursement." Note: EMAC is now used by all of 48 continental States.
The below are the SAR standards that the State of Virginia recognizes
(available online at the VASARCO website):
Effective January 1, 2008 the State of Maryland with fully implement a
similar SAR Team process as what is used in Virginia that will be
administratively operated and maintained by the Maryland Nature
Resources Police (MD-NRP) and co-sponsored by the Maryland State Police.
The MD SAR review/application process is similar in nature as what the
State of Maine currently has in place, except MD-NRP will be the sole
certifying entity. The MD SAR registry will then be dispersed to all
Counties within the State and to the Maryland Emergency Management
Agency (MEMA) who will list them their EMAC roster. I would be happy
to share the MD-NRP SAR Team application form with anyone who requests a
copy off-list <tomi.finkle@trotsar.org>.
In conjunction with the NASAR Fundamentals of Search and Rescue study
guide, the two books written by Kathy Roberts on Mounted Search & Rescue
are highly recommended as a resource guide. Please keep in mind, unless
basic MSAR typing is placed with the National Response Plan as a search
& rescue essential support function, there will be no need to mandate
any type of national MSAR standards, thus meaning MSAR will be
controlled/regulated at no higher than a State level. In essence MSAR
teams that are listed on the EMAC registry that hold some type of
minimum standard are the nearest thing our community (MSAR) has to a
national level standard. I would find it hard to image that an MSAR team
would be called to respond more than 500 miles outside of their FEMA
regional response area.
Tomi`
TROTSAR Mounted Team
Serving the Mid-Atlantic Region
www.trotsar.org
888-MSAR911 (24/7 emergency dispatch)