BY Nebraska National Guard | January 26, 2021
MGN
COLUMBUS, Neb. – The Nebraska National Guard continues to support the Department of Health and Human Services-led statewide response to the ongoing novel coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic and is now assisting by administering COVID-19 vaccinations to eligible non-military recipients on a voluntary basis. Guard members helped administer the first doses of the vaccine to more than 700 local residents Jan. 21, 2021, in Columbus.
The mission comes on the heels of a nearly year-long effort in which Nebraska Soldiers and Airmen were called upon to assist local and state officials in responding to the COVID-19 pandemic in many different ways, including COVID-19 mobile testing teams and support to local food banks.
Libby Finochiaro stood on a porch when she was about 9-years-old, watching a small white tornado hit a red barn.
Finochiaro is the new emergency response coordinator for the East-Central District Health Department and jumped into the job in August before the fall surge began in earnest. But, that tornado is what started it all.
âThat was my trigger for being interested in weather and disasters,â Finochiaro said.
Finochiaro is a Midwesterner who grew up in Kansas City, Missouri, before moving to Papillion in 1999. That year she was going into the sixth grade.
She lived in Papillion for 21 years and moved to Columbus in early October.