MARSHALL – Minnesota Department of Public Safety’s (MnDPS) recently appointed Director of Homeland Security and Emergency Management (HSEM), Joe Kelly, visited Marshall Thursday to discuss the roles of incident commanders, emergency managers, elected officials and senior community leaders in a time of crisis or disaster.

“Today’s a special day because we relish the opportunity to help train and prepare these officials,” Kelly said. “They really have an important role for how things unfold, and I give all my compliments to the communities that were represented here.”

Close to a dozen community leaders from cities in Lyon County, including Cottonwood, Garvin, Minneota, Lynd and Ghent, were in attendance for the session. The only representatives from Marshall were City Administrator Ben Martig and Director of Public Safety Rob Yant, and Emergency Manager Tammy VanOverbeke was the lone county representative.

“We’ve never had this before. There’s only a few counties in the state that have done it so far,” VanOverbeke said of the new program. “When you can bring in somebody that walks the walk and talks the talk like Joe does, I think it’s huge that he can come down to our counties and do this.”

“This is a class and an exchange that really is very important because in disasters and emergencies, some of the most critical players in whether things go well or don’t go well are elected officials,” Kelly said. “Mayors, county commissioners, city council members and senior appointed people… those folks have a whole lot to do with the success or failure of how well things go during an emergency and how well things go when the community starts to recover.”

Kelly, who was appointed director of HSEM just last week, served as deputy director for four years before becoming the leader of the HSEM team.

“It feels great,” Kelly said of his new position, “and I have a nice four-year mentorship and apprenticeship under the previous director.”

Kelly grew up in Olivia and before his work with the MnDPS, he served in the Army and National Guard for over 30 years where he performed a lot of disaster response and support duties.

“There’s a lot of commonality between emergency management and managing incidents in military operations,” Kelly said. “And the command structure. The military has very similar structures for trying to maintain order of an event and getting things done.”

Kelly talked about how cities and counties should react and respond to disasters, how they can declare emergency situations and how they can be helped by either federal or state disaster programs. He looked back on last summer, when 37 counties in Minnesota were part of a federally-declared state of emergency following heavy rain and flooding.

“The storms from last year, including nearly every county in this corner of the state except for Lincoln County, that was a federally declared disaster,” Kelly said, and trends show that disasters and emergencies will continue to arise. “In Minnesota over the last 10 years, we’ve had a federal disaster declared every nine months.”

After an emergency, cities and counties can be left to foot the bill for debris removal, reconstruction and other emergency protective measures.

“It costs you guys a lot of money, and there is help,” Kelly said. “There are state and federal programs that will help you pay for the damage.”

The state assistance program is new to Minnesota. During the 2014 legislative session, a new bill was passed to help aid counties in emergency situations when their damage and expenses don’t meet federal standards.

Kelly said that to qualify for federal disaster assistance, a state must meet a damage cost threshold, and a county must reach a damage total of $3.56 or more per capita to be included in the state’s federal assistance plan. That amounts to roughly $92,000 in damage for Lyon County to be eligible for federal assistance. Seventy-five percent of funding is then provided by the federal government, and the remaining 25 percent is paid by the state.

Now, if federal assistance is not available, counties may now apply for state assistance in instances where the cost of damage exceeds $1.78 per capita, or roughly $46,000 for Lyon County. The state then pays 75 percent and the county pays the remaining 25 percent, as similar to the federal program.

“We now have a program that helps if a county has uninsured damages to public infrastructure, and it’s tied to an event with an emergency declaration,” Kelly said.

“Our mission is to help Minnesota,” Kelly said. “To put your community back together and get back to normal.”

Kelly plans on holding more sessions similar to the one held in Marshall yesterday across the state.

“It’s one of my top priorities… because if we just stay in St. Paul, we won’t reach the people we need to reach,” he said.

“Emergency managers, first responders and people like them have a job to do and senior elected and appointed officials have a different job to do, a different role to play,” Kelly said. “They need to both understand and appreciate what the other does and support each other. That’s how the system is designed to work.”