Pantano Christian Church Disaster Action Team Serves Tucson Through Preparedness
Pantano Christian Church’s Disaster Action Team serves Tucson by partnering with existing agencies and organizations. The team helps with disaster response, preparedness training, search and rescue support, and community safety education.
- Pantano Christian Church’s Disaster Action Team works within existing emergency-response systems.
- The team helps with food, shelter, training, communications, and search and rescue support.
- Tom Taylor says the ministry lives out faith in a nontraditional, service-focused way.
By Jennifer Taylor
Serving Tucson Through Disaster Preparedness
Some groups at Pantano Christian Church (Tucson, Arizona) reach the community through outreach or benevolence. PCC’s Disaster Action Team serves Tucson by working to keep its citizens safe.
The team, which formed several years ago, is led by Tom Taylor, a retired lieutenant for the sheriff’s office who serves as the church’s director of security and emergency services.
“We didn’t try to create something new,” he says. “We partner with existing agencies and organizations to work within their systems. That’s how you get by the yellow tape so you can help.”
Because of this collaborative perspective, the “DAT” can provide help in times of disaster, such as floods, fires, major power outages, dam failures, and terrorism. The team provides food and shelter for disaster victims, conducts preparedness training, and even supports search and rescue teams. A branch regularly shares information with school classes and PTA committees, and DAT even offers an amateur radio class so members can learn to communicate with other response groups.
A Faith-Based Ministry in Action
Although the group’s focus isn’t evangelistic, Taylor says it’s often part of the experience.
“We’re not all Christians or Pantano members, but we all attend the DAT meetings and social gatherings,” he says. “And every group we work with knows we’re a faith-based ministry. We’re living out our beliefs in a nontraditional way.”
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Jennifer Taylor, one of Christian Standard’s contributing editors, lives in Nashville, Tennessee. Read her blog at https://christianstandard.com/
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