AUGUSTA (AP) – The state’s 16 county emergency management agencies are hoping to tap a spirit of volunteerism that’s swept across Maine in the wake of Hurricane Katrina as they look for ways to bolster their small staffs.

Even before Katrina delivered a devastating blow to the Gulf states, Maine’s state and county emergency management agencies were assessing their strengths and weaknesses. One weakness is staffing at the county level. Some counties have staffs of only one or two people, Tim Pellerin, Lincoln County EMA director, said Wednesday.

“Our staffing is very minimal at best,” Pellerin said at a news conference at state MEMA headquarters during which a map showing Hurricane Rita’s trajectory toward Texas was ominously projected on an overhead screen. “Staffing at our level is an immediate need.”

Since Katrina struck, numerous Mainers offering a variety of skills to aid hurricane victims have contacted Maine Emergency Management Agency headquarters in Augusta, but MEMA has no organized program to dispatch willing volunteers to where they are needed most, officials say.

MEMA Director Art Cleaves and his county counterparts said they would like to channel that willingness to serve to local and county agencies that respond to disasters in Maine.

“They’re absolutely open to accepting volunteers,” Cleaves said during a break in two-day meeting between state and emergency management officials.

Some Maine counties have not missed opportunities to corral volunteer workers. York County EMA Director Bob Bohlmann, noting that “volunteerism is at a high now,” said he’s got 100 people donating their time to work for no pay with his southern Maine agency.

In addition to light EMA staffing at county and community levels, directors’ self review found a weakness at an even more local level – within households. Pellerin said more families need to prepare and store disaster survival kits include water, medicines, flashlights, batteries and other items that would become essential.

Pellerin said there’s a need for better communications between local EMAs and their county counterparts. He also stressed the importance of communications from household to household, and neighborhood to neighborhood.

On the positive side, the review found good planning and response procedures for the state and county agencies. Despite “drastically” expanded duties since the 2001 terrorist attacks, Pellerin said the agencies would be ready to spring into action in the event of a disaster.

“Overall, we are prepared for disaster, both manmade and natural,” Pellerin said.

The state has received $63 million in federal homeland security funding since 2003, with 80 percent of the total going to municipal and county EMAs, Cleaves said. Some of the state’s efforts to respond to new threats, such as 62 decontamination stations spread throughout Maine, have gone largely unnoticed by the public, Cleaves said.

On the Net:

Maine Emergency Management Agency, county directory: www.state.me.us/mema/county.htm