Am I insured for this risk? I’ve added insurance here rather than in a separate step because I believe insurance is part of the planning process. Now that you know your risks, ask yourself if your existing insurance policies cover you for damages due to those risks. You can get insurance for many hazards such…
Category: Emergency Response
Make Your Plan Part 4 – Week 2
Part four of making the plan looks at communication: What is my family/household communication plan? For our communication plan, we need to have a list of all important numbers such as those of family members, doctors, emergency services, hospitals, schools, and possibly employers. This list should be kept in paper format by all household members and…
Make Your Plan Part 3 – Week 2
The third part of making a plan is to consider and plan for potential evacuations: What is my evacuation route? Like the sheltering part of your plan, the evacuation part will be dependent upon each type of disaster. Most likely an evacuation outside of your home and neighborhood will be triggered by direction from your community to…
Make Your Plan Part 2 – Week 2
In this next part of week two, we need to figure out our plan for sheltering: What is my shelter plan? The Ready.gov site advises us to consider where to take shelter if we receive a warning or believe we are threatened with an emergency. The local plan we looked up last week might have listed some…
Make Your Plan – Week 2
Now that we are aware of our risks, this week we are going to make our own disaster plan. This week will probably require the most work of all because there is so much to think about and plan for. Fortunately for us, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) has created a few resources to…
Are You Prepared for the Next Disaster?
We often hear from emergency response professionals that right after a disaster it may be a few days before anyone can assist us and during that time we may need to rely on ourselves to survive. So having everything in place ahead of time can ensure we make it through a disaster and that our…
National Institute of Building Sciences Updates Mitigation Savings Ratio
On January 11, 2018, the National Institute of Building Sciences released their Natural Hazard Mitigation Strategies: 2017 Interim Report. This document reports an update to their 2005 determination of a mitigation benefit cost ratio of 4:1 where “for every $1 spent by FEMA on hazard mitigation, it is $4 in future benefits.†The new study has…
Emergency Management Event in Illinois
This week the Illinois Emergency Services Management Association (IESMA) is hosting its annual conference in Bloomington/Normal, Ill., from April 30 through May 2. According to the association's website, "the annual conference brings together local emergency managers from throughout the State of Illinois for various training opportunities, as well as to conduct the business of the Association. Additionally, statewide mutual…
WATERCON2014
This year I am fortunate to again have the opportunity to attend WATERCON in Springfield, Ill.It's amazing how every year the conference offers so many great sessions, and the exhibitors always have such interesting displays and information. In addition to attending sessions and talking with vendors, I'll be posting as much as I can on several…
Winter Weather Safety – Resources for Braving the Storm of 2014
Central and eastern sections of the U.S. have experienced snowfall and in some areas record cold over the last day or so. In a few locations, the temperatures have been so low that it has become dangerous to even be outside. However many government workers who provide essential services like police, fire, and snow removal still…