2-1-1 Disaster-Related I&R Best Practices

2-1-1 Disaster-Related I&R Best Practices

Compiled by Jonathan Padgett,

May 24, 2010

Plan ahead
Create a detailed business contingency plan and Emergency Operation Manual (EOM) if you don’t already have one.
If you don’t know where to go or what to do if your agency is evacuated or destroyed, your Information & Referral system—however developed for disaster—will be effectively useless.
Train and drill your staff on these disaster contingency plans. Make sure they understand where and how the agency will continue operations even in the wake of a major disaster.
If possible, partner with local and state governmental entities.
Get to know your area’s Offices of Emergency Preparedness.
Seek to get 2-1-1 added to any city or state disaster plan.
One of the reasons things went so well for Louisiana 2-1-1 during the hurricanes of 2008 is because of our close relationship with the state.
Not only will your disaster related info and resources be the freshest and most relevant if you know how and where to get it, but your 2-1-1 system will be well positioned for overall growth and funding. The role 2-1-1 plays in a disaster is crucial to any community, and governmental collaboration is a great way to get the word out about what we do during times of disaster.
Build or purchase a web based Disaster Related I&R interface (see II below).
If the disaster is more than minor (i.e., affecting relatively few people in your community), you must be prepared to switch your Disaster Related I&R interface entirely over to the disaster appropriate software interface in short order.
You will regret any delay.
Train your staff on yourDisaster Related I&R interface ideally well before any disaster occurs.
Be sure that at least several staff members know the system well enough to train volunteers during the acute phase of a disaster.
Write up an MOU with a sister agency (or agencies) to potentially share the burden of disaster I&R in need.
If you are a part of a 2-1-1 statewide system, convince all regional 2-1-1 agencies to use a single web-based Disaster Related I&R interface in the lead up to, during and after a disaster.
This can and will take training and coordination for statewide 2-1-1 folks.
Seek out out-of-state 2-1-1 agencies that use a single web-based Disaster Related I&R interface.
If you have the luxury of anticipating impending disaster, do not hesitate to make the switch from your regular Information & Referral system to your Disaster Related I&R interface.

Know what you’ll need in a 2-1-1 Disaster Related I&R interface
It should be web based.
Advantages:
You don’t have to rely on a single network that could be destroyed.
If you have a Voice Over IP phone system, a web based interface means calls can be taken from anywhere in the world with a fast Internet connection.
If you’re on a statewide system, all of your regional offices can use the regular I&R software package of their choice and still use this single, web accessible interface in times of disaster.
If the high volume of calls swamps your local or state 2-1-1 area, other 2-1-1s out of state may use the same Disaster Related I&R interface to assist with overflow calls.
Resource specialists may enter disaster related updates and resources from the field.
Should be robust technologically.
SQL Server based product is a good idea.
Hosting server should have the capacity and power to be used by dozens if not hundreds of simultaneous users without significant delays.
Should ideally have a very secure, identical (mirrored) server site many miles away from the original site just in case the system fails.
The programming itself should be well designed and as bug free as possible.
Should have qualified, dedicated, round the clock support service available.
During the acute phase of a disaster, problems crop up OFTEN at all times of the day and night.
Make sure your developer or future vendor has the staff resources to accommodate you, and get what you expect from support staff in writing!
Should contain at least the following tabs:
Intake sheets
With at least Caller Zip, Caller Need, Date/Time (automatic and manual) and General Notes fields.
Shelters
Whether opened or closed
Type (state, city, red cross, etc)
Purpose
Whether it accepts pets or not
Capacity
Current Population
Address
Directions
Special Populations field
Various notes and comments fields
General Updates
By community, county, parish or neighborhood
Anything from FEMA trailer talking points to home assessment information to curfew information
Ordered by default from most recently added to least recently added.
Local Assistance Centers
Address, Hours, Phone number, Assistance Available (mental health pros, Red Cross)
Important Numbers
Anything from local Sheriff to local EOP numbers
Resources
Indexed by AIRS disaster-related taxonomy
Contains all the usual resource fields ideally.
If vendor software, should link to “regular” resource database.
Candocument referred resources to call sheet records
Rumor control is also a plus. You’ll want to amend you handouts with that.
Should have at least simple reporting capabilities
Potential funders (including especially government officials) love after action reports—even relatively simple ones.
You can use these reports for quality assurance: to compare your overall call sheets filled out with overall number of calls answered.
Every section—from intake sheets to evacuation shelters—should have sensible data export capabilities in the event you need to share this raw data with another entity or system. Having comprehensive data export capability expands reporting capabilities far beyond the native capabilities of the Disaster I&R interface.
Should have administrative as well as resource specialist security settings
Ideally, a 2-1-1 agencyadministrator should be able to create an unlimited number of users per site.
Administrators should be able to add and delete fields or even activate and deactivate tabs.
For instance, not all community 2-1-1s (especially ones with a working 5-1-1) need to keep up with road closures. In which case a potential road closure tab would need to be deactivated.
There should be both regional and system wide administrator security settings to keep chaos from ensuing.
The dreaded “too many cooks in the kitchen” syndrome
Should be exceedingly flexible
Disasters come in many forms. Your Disaster Related I&R interface should be able to adapt to any disaster which comes your way.
Consider Hurricane Katrina, the California wildfires, the Cedar Rapids flooding, the H1N1 pandemic and the Gulf oil spill. Not all disasters are created equal and you may be asked to track fields which are not “standard” to the software product you’re using.
Should be VERY easy to use and train folks on.
If the agent or resource specialist functionality is too complex, one of the major points of having such a disaster-related tool is rendered moot. Additional functionality at the cost of basic usability is not worth it.
You may end up training hundreds or more volunteers on the interface. Be aware of that as you build or analyze a piece of disaster related I&R software.
Consider developing a simple, disaster-related I&R training manual and video before a disaster. Have all regular staff read the manual and sit through the training. When disaster strikes, the training materials will be ready for your volunteers.
Should be specifically geared towards disaster and ONLY disaster
Non-disaster functionality (e.g., the ability to dump a whole, pre-disaster resource database into the Disaster Information & Referrals Interface) can disrupt usability and system focus.
The more non-disaster functionality the system has, the more complex it becomes, the harder it becomes for the user, and—finally—the more apt the user is to stop using the system altogether.

Make sure the information flowing into your system is groomed, updated and deleted in a timely fashion.
In the days and weeks during or following a disaster, it is easy to become overloaded with information—and records (especially community and governmental updates) become stale almost immediately.
Assign trained resource specialists to constantly review and groom data as needed.

Remember: any Disaster Related I&R System interface is temporary by design.
As call volume decreases, more and more calls may fall into a standard I&R category.
If your local health and human services aren’t completely wiped out (as in New Orleans post-Katrina), you will probably go through days or even weeks of using the Disaster Related I&R System interface concurrently with your regular Information & Referral System interface.
There are at least a couple of vendors that have recently added disaster related I&R functionality to their existing products. While this is a positive development, these new modules should be assessed based on I&R disaster best practices to see if they have the minimal functionality and usability.
For the rest of us not using these amended products, you can expect the acute phase of the disaster to bleed slowly into the recovery phase of the disaster (which will resemble normal 2-1-1 operations more than the frenetic, chaotic pace in the days during and following the disaster).

Consider using a Disaster Related I&R software product that experienced 2-1-1 agencies outside of your area are using
Remember—when and if your area experiences a major disaster—using the same Disaster Related I&R interface as out-of-area 2-1-1 agencies gives you the capability of overflow your (possibly massively increased) calls.
Moreover, using the same Disaster Related I&R interface as other 2-1-1 agencies throughout the country means you may be able to help other areas impacted by disaster with overflow calls.
Contact Information
Jonathan Padgett, 2-1-1 DRT Emergency Manager
Email:
Phone: 504-897-4877 (w), 504-251-6650 (c)