Troy Harris developed the college’s wildfire response plan, which is credited with saving the lives of students and employees in the Tea Fire of 2008, as 100 foot flames fed by 70 mph winds devoured eight campus buildings and over a million square feet of campus landscape—with zero human casualties. More than 200 neighboring homes were destroyed, including 15 owned by faculty members.
Some 800 people hunkered down in the gym as the fire encroached with 10 feet of the walls. The gym shelter had been mobilized within 25 minutes and the flames arrived not long after everyone got safely inside.
This experience underscored that planning pays off. As Troy undertook to augment the college’s plans to include other key hazards (notably earthquake and pandemic) he had a Eureka! moment upon realizing that emergency plans should—and could—be correlated with planning standards using a novel web approach.
Troy has a long history of innovation. He was a prime mover behind a software system developed in 1980 that continues to evolve and now serves over a hundred specialty businesses. In the mid-90’s he created The User-Friendly Bid approach to procurement processes, and twenty years later was still getting invited to present on that topic.
More bio here.
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