The Winooski River flows quickly in Montpelier but the capital avoided major flooding on Thursday, July 11. Photo by Juan Vega de Soto/VTDiggerThe Montpelier Commission for Recovery and Resilience is ready to hear how residents feel about its draft emergency plan, a first for the city.The commission, a public-private partnership created after the 2023 flood, talked with  residents, city officials and outside consultants to understand how the city could better prepare for the next natural disaster. The result is MAPLE, or the Montpelier Action Plan for Local Emergency. Jon Copans, the executive director of the commission, said a key goal of the draft report was clarity. The commission is hosting a meeting Thursday night to discuss its proposals.  “​​A stronger clarity of who does what at these times of community-scale emergency really would serve our community well as we think about what might come next,” he said. Among the main sections of the report are designations of the type of city operations and communications needed in an emergency and who is responsible for establishing them. The report also outlines how outside organizations like nonprofits and even everyday Montpelier residents can contribute to emergency preparedness and short-term recovery. During the 2023 flood, Montpelier saw an outpouring of volunteer efforts to clean up homes and businesses and distribute aid. Copans said the report was an opportunity to make the community “hub” model a permanent feature of disaster response.“We don’t want to leave those sorts of things up to chance as we think about future events,” he said. READ MORE The report also contains a few recommendations that Copans said would be up for discussion — such as the hiring of a full-time emergency management director. Although the additional expense could be a tough sell, Copans said the “multifaceted” nature of emergency response justified a full-time position. “​​Our sense is that adding some capacity within the city to really have an eye on this ball in a permanent way feels like shrewd investment as we move forward,” he said. Another gap highlighted in the report is the lack of a backup emergency operations center. During the storm, emergency management personnel in both Montpelier and Barre were forced to evacuate the cities’ police departments when they began to flood. Ultimately, though, Copans said the decision to add a new center was “pretty much a municipal responsibility and consideration,” rather than the work of the commission.Copans said he hoped the report would help prevent the 2023 flood being forgotten as the city enters another stage in its long-term recovery. Copans is not the only one with that concern: A recent statewide audit found that Vermont failed to meet many of the recommendations of its 2018 hazard mitigation report, leaving the state vulnerable to additional flood damage. It’s human psychology to be “forward-facing,” Copans said, but “it’s imperative that, in fact, we not forget, that we keep this sort of memory and experience alive as a community, because it means we have the motivation and wherewithal to do things to avoid future events.” The meeting is set to take place at Montpelier High School at 6:30 p.m. Thursday, with a Zoom option available through the commission’s website. Read the story on VTDigger here: Montpelier commission has a draft city emergency plan.