The Chester County Multi-Jurisdictional Hazard Mitigation Plan was completed to identify hazards that endanger the health and safety of the Chester County community, jeopardize its economic vitality, and imperil the quality of its environment. The second purpose of the Plan is the development of strategies for avoiding or minimizing Chester County’s vulnerability to these hazards. Periodically, the County’s Hazard Mitigation Plan is updated to accurately reflect current and future hazards in order to better identify measures for mitigating these hazards.
The 2021 Hazard Mitigation Plan Update planning effort was conducted through the coordinated, cooperative effort of several local governments, including the City of Chester, Town of Fort Lawn, Town of Great Falls, Town of Richburg, and Town of Lowrys, and County officials with assistance from the Catawba Regional Council of Governments. The Mitigation Planning Team has also made every effort available to solicit public input regarding updates to the Hazard Mitigation Plan, including providing the draft for public review and critique, holding a public forum, and encouraging the public to take an online survey.
The Chester County Hazard Mitigation Planning Team has conducted detailed studies to identify the hazards threatening the jurisdictions of Chester County and to estimate the relative risks those hazards pose to the community. This information has been used by the Planning Team to prioritize its planning efforts to assess the vulnerabilities of Chester County’s critical facilities to the impacts of future disasters involving those hazards. With these vulnerabilities pinpointed, the Planning Team has worked to identify, justify, and prioritize specific proposals for projects and programs that will avoid or minimize these vulnerabilities.
Implementation of this plan is essentially through implementation of the proposed projects included in the plan, and with each implementation effort, the Planning Team will continue to help make the participating communities more resistant to the human and economic costs of future disasters.
This plan will continue to be updated and expanded in the future as funding becomes available to ensure it addresses changing conditions in the participating jurisdictions, experiences with disasters that occur, and any changes in the characteristics of the hazards that threaten the involved communities. This updating process and future editions of the mitigation plan will also be used to continue to inform and involve the general public and other interested groups, encouraging full participation in making the community more resistant to the impacts of future disasters.
The Chester County 2021 Hazard Mitigation Plan Update draft document has been submitted to FEMA for review. After FEMA’s review, the draft plan will be submitted to the governing bodies in Chester County for adoption, and the public is invited to attend the adoption meetings.
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