Emergency Preparedness Is Not A Spectator Sport!
Complacency Is Not An Option!

Scenes from 3 major disasters which took place from December, 2004 - October, 2005 devastating
communities including: the 11-nation earthquake and tsunami; the Pakistan earthquake;
and, Hurricanes Katrina & Rita on the Gulf Coast

With the vast reach and capacity of the Internet today, there are few excuses left for for being uninformed about emergency preparedness, individually as well as in one's own community. There are educational websites detailing what each state, city and local disaster preparedness organization is doing to assist and inform citizens about emergency preparedness. Much of what we have learned is due in part to the major disasters of the past few years. Disaster relief and emergency preparedness is a growing business in government and the for-profit and nonprofit sectors. It is being taken with more seriousness and urgency than in years past and it should be by you.

Individuals, families, local institutions and companies are finding it important to educate themselves. As most of us have been reminded recently with the vast destruction of the Asia tsunami, the Gulf Coast hurricanes and the Pakistan earthquake, we do not know what lies just around the bend. The Boy Scout motto, "Be Prepared", is more relevant than ever.

Operation USA knows from experience that large-scale disasters are not easy to respond efficiently to when there is a massive outpouring from donors and many groups all wanting (or saying they want) to help. In general, OPUSA recommends the following action steps to you, your family, foundation or company:

1) For your own disaster preparedness, assume (unfortunately!) that you will be alone for 3-5 days and identify what you'll need to survive that long before help arrives. When a major disaster strikes like it did in the tsunami, hurricane and earthquake, there will be millions in the same situation as you and their needs will overwhelm locally available resources. Assume governments will be slow to act (and re-elect those whose performance surprises you and merits your vote!).

2) To respond to disasters in other parts of the world, have a serious discussion with your family, co-workers and friends about what aspect of a disaster is important to you and which you'd like to support. Not everything is urgently needed right now or it may in fact already have been provided; some seemingly compelling needs may attract too much money and materials at the expense of longer term needs; and, some of the most important work may need support in the months and even years following a disaster.

3) Try to give locally to community foundations, local nonprofits or local chapters (only!!) of the larger relief groups in the impacted community or country. If this proves difficult (especially in the case of overseas disasters), carefully read a soliciting group's website to learn what kind of disaster assistance it provides, whether it has experience in the affected country or community and whether it has a track record of positive work in its field. www.charitynavigator.org or www.guidestar.org will give you financial data filed by each charity with the IRS but will NOT measure the quality of a charity's programs. A "Google search" using the charity's name will give you any negative or positive information put out about the charity that has been made public.

4) Maintain a critical eye for over-hype by charities. The groups which can buy media time or front page placement on websites may in fact be spending their donors’ dollars buying that space and not have much left over for the real work that needs to be done.

As well as being prepared in the event of an emergency or disaster, there is a great deal of information with regard to helping others who are in the midst of coping with an emergency and/or disaster. It is important to know about specific needs as this helps to prevent unnecessary collections or sending useless items that will only create problems on the receiving end.

Of huge importance is donating money or bulk amounts of new relief supplies or services to the right group in the impacted community. As mentioned above, it is important to research any organization to which you desire to donate in order to be confident that your hard-earned dollars actually get to those individuals or organizations who need help.

As our world has grown smaller, we feel closer to tragic events and they have the potential to adversely affect our lives. As your relief agency, OPUSA wishes to reach out and share valuable information about what we’ve learned from disasters so extensively reported on and to which Operation USA has responded on your behalf to for over 26 years in over 90 countries.

INTERNET RESOURCES

One internet resource for educating yourself about emergency preparedness in the state in which you reside is www.state.ca.us. The "ca" in the address is the state';s abbreviation [just insert your state's abbreviation into the web address to link to a state-specific site]. Once there, search the site for some of the following topics: Emergency Preparedness, Statewide Disaster Planning, Disaster Resources, and Emergency Preparedness & Response. Or, simply "Google" your state and "Emergency Preparedness". Any of these should get you information about what your state has to offer in the way of information on emergency and/or disaster preparedness & response.

Additional informative online resources include The Department of Health & Human Services, www.os.dhhs.gov; The Centers for Disease Control & Prevention, www.cdc.gov; Citizen Corps, a website for uniting citizens and their local communities for volunteer & emergency training opportunities, www.citizencorps.gov; and, www.hopecoalitionamerica.gov and www.ready.gov, which have valuable pre-disaster planning formats for you and your family to put in place for better preparedness.