In the basement of the Onondaga County Civic Center sits the county’s emergency operations center.

On Tuesday, it opened for the fist time since 1999 in response to the coronavirus outbreak.

“Our emergency management team is doing a great job and prepares for events all year long, now we know what the event looks like and how we can specifically adapt and put together the teams,” said Onondaga County Executive Ryan McMahon. “But there’s a lot that goes into this that you just don’t think about.”

It brings and keeps key decision-makers into one room, including first responders, healthcare officials and representatives from other essential services. It has everyone together streamline the county’s response to the COVID-19 crisis.

“That’s what we’re all doing and we’re all planning for,” said McMahon. “You know, we’re figuring out how we can starve out the virus and at the same time keep the necessary infrastructure in place to keep our community functioning and functioning well.”

McMahon said the county is in mitigation mode. He expects the number of cases to rise.

“This is a new phase in this,” said McMahon. “People are probably going to know people who are in a quarantine because someone is sick. And that’s a new level of fear in the community. We knew we would get here. The next few weeks we gotta get through it. And that’s why we are extending ourselves the way we are as a community to help us get through it. And we will get through it.”

McMahon says the emergency operations center helps keep data — and not fear — at the forefront of decision making.