Canada Highlights Emergency Preparedness Week

May 6 through 12 is recognized as Emergency Preparedness Week in Canada, with the 2012 theme of “Make a Plan.” The website www.GetPrepared.ca just unveiled a redesign with easier navigation and new sections on preparing children for emergencies, how to plan for pets and service animals, and using technology to keep in touch during emergencies. Canadians can visit the site to complete and download their own family emergency plan.

Also available is a mobile version of the website, m.GetPrepared.ca, which gives quick access from a mobile device on what to do during different kinds of emergencies. The mobile website also allows users to email a custom emergency kit shopping list from their mobile device.

Public Safety Canada publishes a wide variety of products aimed at helping citizens know the risks and get prepared for emergencies, including a 36-page Emergency Preparedness Guide and Pocket Guide to Emergencies.

The Minister of Public Safety encouraged Canadians to use Emergency Preparedness Week as an opportunity to “ensure we are prepared for any emergency situation that may occur. It is also a time for us to recognize those men and women on the front lines who work heroically to protect our families and communities from emergency situations.”

Canadians are encouraged to get more involved in their communities by talking to friends, family and co-workers about emergency preparedness, developing plans to be ready, educating others on the importance of emergency preparedness, and knowing the emergency response agencies in your community.

Emergency Preparedness Week is a national event coordinated by Public Safety Canada in collaboration with provincial and territorial governments and other partners, encouraging Canadians to be ready to cope on their own for at least the first 72 hours of an emergency. For more information on EP Week, visit www.GetPrepared.ca, and follow @Get_Prepared on Twitter.

Mass Notification “Toolbox”

Read our latest whitepaper now available for download. Our experienced VP of Operations, Mark Guidetti, has explored the numerous ways available to notify people (Sirens, Radio, TV, Telephones, etc.), and how each of them can be used as a tool for emergency warning. The combination of all the tools available resides in a “toolbox”, any combination of which is available for effective emergency management. Each tool has its strengths and weaknesses, and no one tool is perfect alone. After defining the “Perfect System” it becomes easier to select and understand the tools needed in the toolbox to ensure quick and efficient notification.

Every “tool” analyzed has its strengths and weaknesses and thus each has its own role to play during an emergency. For example, broadcast radio is a great means of emergency instruction and updates, but not necessarily first level notification because it requires the target audience to be tuned in at a specific time.

The strength of one tool can compensate for the weakness of another, such that at any time the combination of the tools in the toolbox can create the “Perfect System”.

Download the whitepaper here: http://www.rapidnotify.com/resources.html

Cities Embrace Social Networking

The University of Illinois at Chicago’s Institute for Policy and Civic Engagement (IPCE) recently published a research paper entitled “Civic Engagement and Local E-Government: Social Networking Comes of Age.”

The IPCE did a comprehensive analysis of the content on government websites in the 75 largest U.S. cities and 20 largest Illinois cities between March and May of 2011. Their research emphasizes the use of technology to enhance and inform citizen engagement, as well as to enhance and inform government decision-making and service delivery.

Among their findings, the IPCE reported that in 2011, social networks were much more common across local government websites than in 2009. Among the 75 largest U.S. cities, 87% used Twitter and Facebook and 75% had YouTube links. This marks a rapid increase of 250% to over 600% during the two-year period since the previous study.

Now as more local governments offer the opportunity for discussion through social networking sites, 6 city websites had hosted town hall meetings in the 2011 analysis, whereas none had done so in 2009. While the number of town hall meetings is still very small, together with the adoption of social networks, this may indicate a more general willingness among local governments to experiment with technology for dialogue with citizens.

The research paper raises some interesting questions regarding how the local governments are actually using these social media sites, asking if public discussions are actually occurring online. What remains to be seen is, how these sites facilitate discussions and what influence, if any, they have on public policy.

Read the full paper here:

http://www.uic.edu/cuppa/ipce/research.shtml

http://www.uic.edu/cuppa/ipce/CELocalEGovSMFullReport2012.pdf