"As the city spins up its emergency operations center, they notify county, and county spins up their operations center so that if they (the city) get overwhelmed or the situation worsens, we can start sending our resources out there," he said. "We would also notify the state emergency management that we are activated."

Bennett noted that some emergency agencies, like fire departments, currently use ICS more often than others, and additional training is needed for those who are less familiar with it. That training will take place over the next year as the state moves toward complete NIMS compliance.

Utah Division of Emergency Services spokesman Derek Jensen said while the basic NIMS format is already in place in Utah, national implementation will be a big improvement.

"It really helps everyone be able to communicate a lot easier, and outlines very clearly what different functions need to be filled during a large-scale incident, whether it's a fire, a terrorist attack, or a disaster," Jensen said. "When you call in help from other states, they are able to jump in and start helping very quickly, because it's the same terminology, the same functions and the same processes that are used in their agencies."

Jensen said NIMS was used by FEMA to manage the response to the southern Utah floods and was highly effective.

"It's been great, because we know who does what, and what their approaches are, and who to go to with questions, and resources that we need for something," he said. "So it's made it really easy in this particular case to know what the process is and how it's supposed to work."

Tracy said he's pleased to see the system being implemented across the board.

"I'm just glad to see that it's been formally solidified, because it always made sense to us that we would run any kind of an event, either large, small, or multi-jurisdictional, under this premise," Tracy said.

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E-mail: mdecker@desnews.com