Guest Speaker:  Mr. Geoff Burkart, CEO Guardian Centers

The Guardian Centers are in operation at the old Northrop facility in Perry and are a unique private-sector solution to an emerging and rapidly growing national problem - the lack of appropriate facilities to conduct meaningful, realistic, effective and large scale emergency response exercises involving multiple emergency response organizations, both civilian and military. As a private sector entity, Guardian Centers has the capability to meet any and all client needs and more.
 
To meet the nation's need, Guardian Centers are designed as fully operational, modern cityscape simulators that allow emergency responders to realistically test their ability to deal with real-world manmade and natural disaster situations. The defining national document for emergency response planning, the National Response Framework (NRF), defines eight scenario sets for which emergency responders must prepare, and 15 specific functional capabilities that they must possess to respond effectively. The Guardian Centers have been designed specifically to provide facilities for training and plan validation exercises that simulate all eight scenarios and test 14 of the 15 functional capabilities defined in the NRF (excluding only Long Term Recovery). Guardian Centers will provide a meaningful exercise environment for every participant in drills large, medium and small, from "boots on the ground" first responders to state governors and federal and civilian emergency response commanders in a functional Emergency Operations Center (EOC).