Emergency Preparedness
Emergency Preparedness professionals utilize SparkMap’s Community Needs Assessment and Map Room to build plans for emergency prevention, response, and recovery grounded in data-based understandings of their community-specific vulnerabilities and resources.
Emergency Preparedness with SparkMap’s Community Needs Assessment
I lead a team charged with determining emergency management capabilities and needs across our state to ensure proper resources are ready in the case of disaster. We rely on information received from the county and national level to determine our populations’ emergency preparedness. Because we don’t have the time or resources to aggregate these data, we began using SparkMap’s Community Needs Assessment. Being able to examine data on population age and density, lack of reliable transportation, poverty levels, food access, air and water quality, and healthcare workforce availability all in one pre-made report has already helped us better identify areas where need for emergency resources are the greatest. I wish we’d known about SparkMap sooner!
–Joyce P., Deputy Director of State Emergency Management Department, Premium Subscriber
Emergency Preparedness with SparkMap’s Map Room
The civic center my city used as an emergency shelter was demolished, and its replacement was not set to be completed for two years. My team took this as an opportunity to reassess our sheltering assignments completely to align with our shifting population. We used SparkMap’s Map Room to view FEMA’s national risk index and city-level visuals of our population density, housing vacancies, areas with high numbers of elderly citizens, areas with low walkability, and significant portions of households without reliable transportation. With these maps, we created new sheltering recommendations.
Since upgrading to SparkMap’s Pro subscription, we also use the Map Room to upload our emergency sheltering locations onto maps. Great visual aids for presentations and our website.
— Samarth V., Executive Assistant – City Emergency Preparedness Team, Pro Subscriber