COVOST Mission

Team Update

The Colorado Virtual Operations Support Team (COVOST) was stood down and deactivated on July 1, 2019.  The team is no longer available for resource requests.

Mission 

The mission of the Colorado Virtual Operations Support Team (COVOST) is to support the State of Colorado and our local Colorado communities by providing increased situational awareness through the innovative use of social media and other online tools.

Vision 

The vision of the Colorado Virtual Operations Support Team (COVOST) is to provide the State of Colorado and our local Colorado communities a powerful and effective team of trusted agents whose mission is to provide increased situational awareness through an innovatively effective, efficient and elegant use of social media and other online or ‘virtual’ tools.

Values

The Colorado Virtual Operations Support Team’s believes in a strong values set for the members of the team. These values include:

• Integrity COVOST members will act in a manner that reflects the highest integrity – this includes behavior and actions taken in the real world as well as in the virtual world.
• Innovation COVOST members will engage the virtual world in an innovatively effective, efficient and elegant manner thereby offering the State of Colorado and our local communities the ability to fully benefit from the continuously changing virtual landscape.
• Partnership COVOST members will remain in close partnership with the State of Colorado (via the Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Management), its partnering agencies (Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office and Project EPIC) and the broader VOST and SMEM communities.
• Service COVOST members will remember that their primary responsibility is to support the State of Colorado and our local communities. In this vein the COVOST will never act alone but will always act out of service to, and in direct partnership with, the State of Colorado and any local community for which it may be activated to support.
• Accountability COVOST members will remain accountable for the information that they share or pass on. COVOST members will remain accountable to policies held by the State of Colorado and any local community that is being supported. The COVOST will likewise remain accountable to established public information and Incident Command System (ICS) best practices, rules and regulations

Archived Information

The team is no longer active or available for resource support.  We continue to share examples of the team's work for information sharing purposes only. 

Archived Membership Forms

• Registration Form
• Volunteer Services Agreement

Archived Activation Requests Forms

• Authorization Agreement and Delegation of Authority

The COVOST is a resource that can be activated to support your Colorado community during an active incident or during a pre-planned event. If you would like to request activation of the COVOST please read through the COVOST Handbook and complete the Activation Authorization form. An official request will also have to be submitted through WEBEOC. You can view the WEBEOC mission set here.

If you have any questions at all please contact Micki Trost at micki.trost@state.co.us.

Archived COVOST Missions and Services

Services offered by the COVOST are meant to enhance the capabilities and situational awareness of a sponsoring agency not replace them. A potential sponsoring agency should not look the COVOST as a primary resource but rather as a secondary and supplementary program.

The COVOST Manager may choose not to activate or deactivate the COVOST if it is learned that the COVOST is being used to replace existing agency personnel/resources instead of supplementing those personnel and resources.

The following are potential COVOST missions as recorded on the COVOST Activation Authorization Form:

• Situational Awareness 
• Emergency Messages 
• Online Rumors 
• Media 
• Key Community themes/members 
• Multiple Platforms 
• Amplify 
• Same platform amplification 
• Cross platform amplification 
• Archive 
• Agency official post archive 
• Community posts archive 
• Media posts archive

Questions

Have a question about anything?

Contact us at the Colorado DHSEM Strategic Communications

• Micki Trost at micki.trost@state.co.us  
• Twitter:  @COVOST
• Facebook: Colorado Virtual Operations Support Team