I sincerely believe that the last six months in Montana has been foundational for my life and career. In late July of 2022 I got a call to work on the Montana Flooding as an Interagency Recovery Coordinator (IRC) Specialist. I specifically worked as a liaison between the IRC team and the Community Planning and Capacity Building (CPCB) team. After eagerly waiting to work within the agency for some time, I was happy that this position led me to make a real impact within the communities effected by this disaster. During my deployment I created various surveys and documents to insure that internal and external stakeholders were moving towards a similar mission. I also used gis and open source data to educate my team on impacted communities and talk directly with state and community members during the entire deployment. I learned a lot throughout this process but one of the most valuable things I learned was the importance of timing on the system itself. The second I landed in Montana I expected to see immediate results but I was quickly taken back when I learned the true process. The reason long term recovery takes time is because we want to make sure the communities need and want the work we have to offer but we also want to make sure we are creating strong relationships between all stakeholders. Applying this process to our work allowed us to create different projects and documents that will be in the works for months and years to come. One of the highlights of this deployment was a Resource Recovery Symposium that was held at the tail end of my time in Montana. This symposium featured speakers from six different sectors: Economic & Workforce Development, Impacted Infrastructure, Local Government Recovery Planning, Housing, Agriculture & Natural Resources, and Housing. On top of that, the attendees came from over 130 different sectors, non profits, local universities, and more. The best part is that we stayed within the mission of strengthening local relationships while generating long term projects that focuses on resilience and preparedness. After years of working towards a goal to help communities after disasters I'm happy to end this one leaving the impacted areas better than when I found it. Looking forward to the next. #longtermrecovery #gisanalyst #communityresilience #planning #disasterrecovery #mitigation #economicdevelopment #resilience
Congratulations, Sawyer! Proud of your accomplishments and can't wait to hear what comes next!
Tom Forrest
1y
Thanks Sawyer, passing this along to folks here in NM.
Jack Fording
1y
That’s awesome, Sawyer! Congratulations!
Business strategist. Network connector. Program facilitator. Philanthropy Advisor. Economic Development liaison
1yYou were a great team member and I hope to have the opportunity to serve with you again, my friend! Thanks for your hard work!