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6.1. D. - Page 1 <br /> RE PO RT <br /> To the Honorable Mayor and City Council <br /> From the Cit Mana er <br /> May 21, 2012 <br /> SUBJECT <br /> The San Francisco Bay Region Automatic Aid Agreement for Maritime Emergency <br /> Response <br /> RECOMMENDATION <br /> Approve by motion the City of Redwood City's participation in the San Francisco Bay <br /> Region Automatic Aid Agreement for maritime emergency response. <br /> BACKGROUND <br /> In cooperation with the United States Coast Guard ("USCG"), the Redwood City Fire <br /> Department is one of twenty (20) fire departments that can respond to maritime <br /> emergencies in the San Francisco Bay Region. The City of Redwood City ("City") is <br /> comprised of 34.6 square miles and has over 15.2 miles of water way on the San <br /> Francisco Bay. Each year, the fire department responds to approximately 10-15 <br /> maritime emergencies that occur within its primary area of responsibility. When <br /> responding, the Fire Department utilizes a 19 foot rescue boat with very limited <br /> firefighting capabilities that is staffed by firefighters and paramedics, who operate out of <br /> Fire Station 11. The Fire Department also responds to requests for mutual aid from the <br /> USCG and other public safety agencies. <br /> Examples of the emergencies responded to include: medical emergencies, boat fires, <br /> water rescues, boats that have run aground and other emergencies on the water. In <br /> many of these emergencies, additional assistance was needed from surrounding <br /> jurisdictions to help respond to and/or mitigate the incident. <br /> In February 2010, the USCG and fire departments that respond to maritime <br /> emergencies recognized the need to establish an automatic aid system throughout the <br /> San Francisco Bay Region (specifically the California counties and adjacent waters of <br /> San Francisco, San Mateo, Santa Clara, Alameda, Contra Costa, Marin, Sonoma, and <br /> Solano inclusive of all municipalities therein east of the Golden Gate Bridge and west of <br /> the Antioch Bridge on the Sacramento River.) They also recognized the benefit of <br /> sending the closest marine units to incidents to minimize response times to the <br /> emergency scene even though they might cross jurisdictional boundaries. <br /> While multiple federal, state and local response plans establish general procedures for <br /> emergency preparedness and response, they lack specific, integrated asset policies, <br /> procedures or protocols to assure a complete, seamless and rapid response to a <br />