Provider: Upper Midwest Preparedness and Emergency Response Center

Course Description: This course tells the story of one community’s efforts to collaborate on improvements to its emergency shelter plans. You are invited to participate in these efforts, working with the county's Emergency Manager and other stakeholders to update plans last revised five years ago. As the story unfolds, you encounter questions asking you to identify relevant facts or to select the best course of action for making improvements to the planning process and its outcomes. Need help answering a question? Click on Help to see excerpts from publications included in the FNSS Resource Toolkit that comes with this training.

Time to complete: 1 hour

Learning objectives:

After participating in this scenario, learners should be able to:

• Identify FNSS-related gaps in shelter plans.
• Relate demographic information to a community’s FNSS-related needs.
• Adopt strategies for providing FNSS in mass-care settings.
• Partner with FNSS providers by means of MOUs and other types of agreements.
• Engage people with FNSS-related needs in shelter planning.

Target audience: Emergency managers, shelter planners, and other mid-level public health professionals responsible for community preparedness

Access at A Shelter Story: Integrating Functional Needs Support Services (FNSS) into Emergency Shelter Plans [1]

Download this information [2] (PDF format)

Course Description: Recent events have shown the need to reach everyone in the community, including those outside of the "mainstream". Must define these groups, locate them and ascertain how best to communicate with them. Some regions have done more on this than others. In wide-spread emergencies public health efforts must be inclusive. The goal is to make sure every member of the community understands the information needed to prepare, cope and recover from health emergencies.

There are five main sections in this course:

1. Risk Communication and Special Populations
2. General Strategies
3. Specific Strategies
4. Scenarios
5. Knowledge Bank

Time to complete: 1.5 hours

Learning Objectives:

On successful completion of this course, you will be able to:

• Describe four general strategies to effectively communicate risk to special populations
• Describe methods to identify and map special population groups and explain why it is important
• Utilize community leaders to assist in communicating risk to special populations
• Conduct pre-emergency planning to facilitate communicating risk to special populations
• Describe guidelines for media accessibility
• Utilize the following information about each of nine special population groups to avoid and/or solve communication problems during an emergency
  • Potential communication barriers
  • Best methods to deliver the message
  • Person(s) best suited to deliver the message
  • Any special technical or content issues to consider when delivering the message

Target Audience: This specialized course is intended for anyone responsible for communicating risk to special populations during an emergency situation. Prerequisite course for a basic understanding of risk communication: Don't Panic! Principles of Crisis and Risk Communication Scenario [3]

Access at  Risk Communication for Special Populations [4]

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Provider: EPlan, LLC

Description: A planning tool that contains helpful appendixes such as a Triage Help Tool, Pre-Registration Tool, Flowchart of Authority, Flow of Residents, and Shelter Registration Form

Access at Shelter & Mass Care: Fictitious County Emergency Operations Plan [6]

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Provider: California Department of Social Services (CDSS)

Course Description: This online document details the four primary elements in planning for care and shelter operations:

1. Designating a care and shelter coordinator and ensuring a mutual understanding with the local Red Cross on the dual partnership required for care and shelter operations.
2. Identifying those facilities to be used as disaster shelters and gathering the appropriate survey information and agreements.
3. Training the staff necessary to run the above facilities.
4. Ensuring access to the resources and services necessary to support disaster victims both at shelters and within the community. This includes a strategy for meeting special needs and a linkage with local CBOs that support vulnerable persons.

Access at Care and Shelter Planning Template [8] (PDF Format)

Download this information [9] (PDF format)