Ready for Hurricane Season?

If you've been in South Carolina for any amount of time you know that we're on the verge of Hurricane Season. The season starts in June so we only have a few more weeks. To gear up for this, Hurricane Preparedness Week is May 20-26. That means it's the perfect time to make sure you are prepared. The first step, of course is to make sure you have a solid (up to date) plan in place for possible hurricane related disasters as well as other disasters that may occur throughout the year. The second step is to make sure staff are educated about your procedures. I've recently provided suggestions for a couple of libraries in the state and I'm happy to provide assistance if you need any. So, please don't hesitate to contact me. If you need to create a plan, update one or just want a little more awareness, here are some sites I've found that you might also find useful:

• ALA's Disaster Preparedness & Recovery Resources
• American Red Cross -- They provide a variety of planning resources for families and organizations. Also, if you contact your local chapter, they are great about providing various brochures for any training you might have on site.
• CalPreservation.org -- Site from California with a Disaster Plan Template as well as practical exercises you can try at your library.
• dPlan: An online disaster planning resource that allows you to create and customize a disaster plan. Lots of great suggestions for what to include and it's very easy to use.
• Library Support Staff.com -- This site has great resources for Disaster Planning & Book Preservation. Lots of other great stuff here for support staff. Definitely worth checking out!
• Sample Library Disaster Plans -- Compiled by the SEAALL Institute in April 2006.
• SCDAH Disaster Planning & Recovery -- Resources from the SC Department of History & Archives.
• South Carolina Emergency Management Division

Hope these help and, don't forget... We have an email you can use to report any disasters you have in your library. It is disaster@statelibrary.sc.gov. All emails from this account go to myself, the Director and our Library Development Director. We want to know if anything is happening in your library so we can provide assistance as needed. Of course, you can always give us a call or email us directly. If there's anything else you think we can do to help you guys, please let us know. Have a great day everyone!