While we are anticipating the “end” of hurricane season, it’s a good time to take stock of our current situations–are our plans up-to-date?  Is it time to start putting a plan together for your library?  Do we need to squirrel away some extra supplies, like plastic sheeting or flashlight batteries?  We’re fortunate to have so many excellent resources available to help us in our emergency preparedness efforts, and here’s a reminder of two rich sources for guidance and some checklists to keep us on target:

SOLINET:  their site has been re-designed.  Go to the Resources section, the Preservation tab, then check out the Disaster Resources page, linked in the left side menu bar.  Very comprehensive information; I recommend a “shopping” approach if you don’t need the whole store.  Some interesting classes coming up, too…I’m taking the one on Risk Management in November.

NEDCC:  here’s the link to their page listing all the Preservation leaflets that are available from the site…scroll down on the page to Emergency Management to find their process for disaster planning as well as a “fill-in-the-blank” disaster plan.

Happy shopping!

I’ve just completed an update of our library’s Emergency Preparedness & Response Plan. (You can also find the plan, along with other sample plans, on the page above devoted to disaster plan templates and samples.) I think the organization is improved and more intuitive, there is clarification of the shelter-in-place procedures, and I added pictures, so that staff will readily recognize some of the places and features mentioned in the text. Some new sections: procedures for Active Shooter/Violent Incident, and a photo documentation of what our collection areas look like now, since we have just completed a major weeding/shifting project. I hope the new plan will be helpful, and please let me know if you have questions or comments about it.

While most of us wouldn’t consider our libraries to be businesses in the traditional sense, we do have some similar features and some shared needs, especially when it comes to planning for business/service continuity.  The Homeland Security website has an excellent “Plan to Stay in Business” list for businesses, and if you click on the Continuity Planning link from that page, you will find a more detailed list of activities to help you prepare for an unplanned service disruption.  Also available from the Continuity Planning page is their Sample Emergency Plan.  It is available in PDF format, which you can quickly fill out right there and then print.  Network members will have to do some adapting to make it fit their needs, but it is certainly a great way to help us think through what we need to do.  Everyone who has been in any of the training sessions already for the NN/LM Emergency Preparedness & Response Plan will recognize most of what is presented on the Ready.gov site, so the site is helpful as a review, also. 

On Tuesday, July 15, Dan Wilson presented an overview of service continuity planning to over 70 members of the National Network of Libraries of Medicine (NN/LM). The presentation was hosted by the Middle Atlantic Regional Office of NN/LM and was delivered via Adobe Connect. Topics included are risk assessment, determining core services and resources, strategies for maintaining services from a remote site, and protection of unique resources.

Click here to view the slides from Dan’s presentation.

Here’s an outline of what we talked about at the THeSLA meeting with regard to creating disaster plans for our organizations.  Rather than focus on creating a comprehensive plan, which is the result of following the “Susan’s suggestions” thread here in the blog, I thought it might be more helpful to become aware of some alternatives that are already available to us and will not require the time commitment involved in creating a plan “from scratch.”  So the “20 Tips” topic evolved into “Successful Strategies for Emergency Response Planning.”

1. Consider the scope of planning you will need for collections, your facility, people in your building, and for continuing your services.

2.  Assess risks that exist in your area (natural, environmental, human-caused, facility).

3.  Prioritize your collection for salvage:  determine what is irreplaceable or core to your collection, and what is essential to your patrons.  Order supplies for dealing with a “water incident,” particularly (see salvage companies/vendors links here on the blog).  See the NEDCC’s Preservation Leaflets for instructions!

4.  Identify your essential services and make plans to continue them during an emergency, both on-site and from a remote location.  Develop partnerships with other libraries  and remember the RML’s emergency number:  1-800-DEV-ROKS!

5.  Some templates and/or guides to creating your plan:

• dPlan:  maintained by NEDCC, provides templates for creating your plan, walks you through step-by-step, offers links to more information about risk factors, saves your input so you can work in small increments of time, creates a nice PDF document for you when you’re done.
• PReP:  COSA’s Pocket Response Plan can be easily customized for libraries.  It is available as a Word document or in PDF format at their site.
• SOLINET’s disaster planning guide:  offers a template, lists of resources for salvage companies and supplies, etc.
• in planning for safety of people, consult existing sources for appropriate procedures…your institution’s critical incident management site (the one for UVa), a university’s emergency response information, FEMA, Homeland Security, your state’s Emergency Management web site.

6.  Plan to update your plan regularly, at least once a year.  Re-assess your risk situation and make sure all contact information is up to date.

7.  Stay in touch!  Check the blog (this one!) frequently for updates, be aware of local circumstances that may have an effect on your planning.  Bookmark the NN/LM RML’s Emergency Preparedness web site and keep up with their planning.  If you have questions, or would like to make suggestions, please send me an email:  ssy2n@virginia.edu.  Good luck!

Here’s an outline of what we talked about at the THeSLA meeting with regard to creating disaster plans for our organizations. Rather than focus on creating a comprehensive plan, which is the result of following the “Susan’s suggestions” thread here in the blog, I thought it might be more helpful to become aware of some alternatives that are already available to us and will not require the time commitment involved in creating a plan “from scratch.” So the “20 Tips” topic evolved into “Successful Strategies for Emergency Response Planning.”

1. Consider the scope of planning you will need for collections, your facility, people in your building, and for continuing your services.

2. Assess risks that exist in your area (natural, environmental, human-caused, facility).

3. Prioritize your collection for salvage: determine what is irreplaceable or core to your collection, and what is essential to your patrons. Order supplies for dealing with a “water incident,” particularly (see salvage companies/vendors links here on the blog). See the NEDCC’s Preservation Leaflets for instructions!

4. Identify your essential services and make plans to continue them during an emergency, both on-site and from a remote location. Develop partnerships with other libraries and remember the RML’s emergency number: 1-800-DEV-ROKS!

5. Some templates and/or guides to creating your plan:

• dPlan: maintained by NEDCC, provides templates for creating your plan, walks you through step-by-step, offers links to more information about risk factors, saves your input so you can work in small increments of time, creates a nice PDF document for you when you’re done.
• PReP: COSA’s Pocket Response Plan can be easily customized for libraries. It is available as a Word document or in PDF format at their site.
• SOLINET’s disaster planning guide: offers a template, lists of resources for salvage companies and supplies, etc.
• in planning for safety of people, consult existing sources for appropriate procedures…your institution’s critical incident management site (the one for UVa), a university’s emergency response information, FEMA, Homeland Security, your state’s Emergency Management web site.

6. Plan to update your plan regularly, at least once a year. Re-assess your risk situation and make sure all contact information is up to date.

7. Stay in touch! Check the blog (this one!) frequently for updates, be aware of local circumstances that may have an effect on your planning. Bookmark the NN/LM RML’s Emergency Preparedness web site and keep up with their planning. If you have questions, or would like to make suggestions, please send me an email: ssy2n@virginia.edu. Good luck!

Dan’s presentation: http://www.slideshare.net/dtw2t/t-he-sla-presentation1107

Dan and I attended the ANCHASL (Association of North Carolina Health and Science Libraries) meeting in Raleigh on Friday, June 15 (click here to see the program).  The meeting was held in the beautiful Andrews Conference Center at the Wake Area Health Education Center.  Robert James (Duke University) is the president of ANCHASL this year, and had organized the meeting, which was well attended by both academic and hospital librarians.  In addition to the North Carolina members, a hospital librarian from Lowell, Massachusetts attended, as well as Beth Wescott from NN/LM.  The program for the day included a short business meeting for the organization, but otherwise focused on raising awareness about disaster preparedness and educating attendees about writing disaster plans, developing contingency plans for maintaining services, and salvaging collections.  The meeting featured informative and entertaining speakers on several different aspects of disaster preparedness and emergency response.  The information presented engendered some very productive discussion and questions.  Here’s a list of the speakers:

• Mark Schell, Durham County Emergency Management, on working with first responders and emergency managers 
• Robert James, Duke University Medical Center Library, on writing a library disaster plan.  As part of his presentation, Robert outlined use of the Heritage Preservation’s Disaster Wheel, and distributed copies of the wheel to all participants.  He also referred to the Field Guide published last summer by Heritage Preservation.
• Walter Cybulski, NLM, on salvaging water damaged collections
• Angie Santiago, of the  Contingency Planning Association of the Carolinas, on service continuity planning for medical libraries
• Dan Wilson, chair for the SE/A RML Emergency Preparedness Task Force, on how the RML can provide support to health sciences libraries in emergency

The Getty Conservation Institute wrote a workbook called “Building an Emergency Plan:  A Guide for Museums and Other Cultural Institutions,” in 1999.  The publication is now out of print, but a free PDF version is available from their website.  It is very well organized and thoughtfully written.  Check out page 2 of the Introduction for an impressive table of disasters that have occurred to cultural institutions around the world in the past 20 years. 

Suggestion #3: Start a shopping list for Disaster Supplies: as you write procedures, start a list of supplies or special items you will need for emergency response situations. Your library will own much of what you need already (plastic sheeting, duct tape, paper towels), but you will most likely need to order or buy other items. Our Comprehensive Disaster Plan includes two supply lists: the main list shows where emergency response items are stored, and how many are in our inventory. We set aside a space in a storage room on the main floor of the library for designated emergency supplies, and labeled them so that they wouldn’t be used for non-emergency purposes. In researching “disaster supplies,” we found that several companies offer packages of emergency supplies especially for libraries. We ordered several of these and stored one with our other emergency supplies on each floor of the library.

The second list contains “Shelter-In-Place” (SIP) supplies. These are stored in the area we have designated as our SIP site. This list is much shorter and very basic, but also very important. It includes a radio that is powered by a hand-crank mechanism rather than requiring batteries, and also has a flashlight. There is a self-charging flashlight plugged into one of the outlets in the room, and also a telephone. The supplies also includes a first aid kit, duct tape and plastic sheeting to seal off the room, and list of emergency contacts within our institution. For the details, please see our Comprehensive Disaster Plan.

Suggestion #3: Start a shopping list for Disaster Supplies: as you write procedures, start a list of supplies or special items you will need for emergency response situations. Your library will own much of what you need already (plastic sheeting, duct tape, paper towels), but you will most likely need to order or buy other items. Our Comprehensive Disaster Plan includes two supply lists: the main list shows where emergency response items are stored, and how many are in our inventory. We set aside a space in a storage room on the main floor of the library for designated emergency supplies, and labeled them so that they wouldn’t be used for non-emergency purposes. In researching “disaster supplies,” we found that several companies offer packages of emergency supplies especially for libraries. We ordered several of these and stored one with our other emergency supplies on each floor of the library.

The second list contains “Shelter-In-Place” (SIP) supplies. These are stored in the area we have designated as our SIP site. This list is much shorter and very basic, but also very important. It includes a radio that is powered by a hand-crank mechanism rather than requiring batteries, and also has a flashlight. There is a self-charging flashlight plugged into one of the outlets in the room, and also a telephone. The supplies also includes a first aid kit, duct tape and plastic sheeting to seal off the room, and list of emergency contacts within our institution. For the details, please see our Comprehensive Disaster Plan.