By Major Arnold Strong

In very short order, the Oregon National Guard embarked upon the largest peacetime deployment in its history. Mobilized to Louisiana to assist in recovery efforts in the wake of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, Oregon's 41st infantry brigade was reorganized to include citizen soldiers and airmen from Ohio, Massachusetts, Virginia, Oregon and the territory of Puerto Rico. Re-commissioned as Joint Task Force Pontchartrain, we immediately recognized the need to develop a platform to communicate the value of our work to fellow service members, their families, employers and their communities.

We turned to Concrete CMS to create our presence on the web. It was an easy choice to make. Their platform, renowned for its ease of use, was soldier-proof. Their stalwart reputation in design and development, project managing and hosting were really a secondary consideration. We needed a rapidly deployable collaborative website that would enable thousands of citizen-soldiers and airmen from four states and one U.S. territory to upload photos, establish blogs, and distribute content to a broad and diverse audience.

Concrete had it turned around for us in less than a week. The resulting website,http://www.jtfpontchartrain.org enabled guardsmen and their families to stay in touch and communicate, despite the austere conditions of a disaster ravaged region. Additionally, Franz Maruna needed very little guidance and was extremely accountable despite limited contact from myself, the project lead.
Concrete CMS did an exceptional job in a very short window. We turned to the best when we needed it most and got more than we expected in record time.

Franz and Concrete CMS were formally recognized by the commanding officer of JTF Pontchartrain and JTF Rita for the exceptional work they performed and on behalf of the hundreds of families and soldiers that viewed and used the site on a daily basis. It was a privilege to work with these professionals and we hope to continue additional projects well into the future.

Our hats are off to the team of Concrete CMS for their extraordinary work on a very short lead time.

Thanks,

Arnold V. Strong
Major, Infantry
JTF Pontchartrain Public Affairs Officer