Coastal governments must prepare for hazardous weather. But isn't this task equally important for individual community members?
Most coastal governments have emergency management departments that prepare communities for natural and man-made hazards. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Coastal Services Center works with these emergency managers to identify risks and find ways to lessen the impacts of coastal storms and other hazards (see www.csc.noaa.gov/vata/).
A more challenging task is getting community members to make their own storm preparations. To address this issue, the Center partnered with emergency management offices in Florida's Brevard and Volusia Counties. They wanted to give citizens access to the same hazards-related information the professionals use so that families might become better informed and more prone to take action.
The team created a coastal hazards Web site located at www.csc.noaa.gov/rvat/. Visitors to the site can click on the "Hazards Locator Tool" link on the home page, enter an address in Brevard or Volusia County, and then watch as an on-line map zooms to that location and ranks its potential risk to four coastal hazards common to eastern Florida—storm surge, flooding, high winds, and erosion. This personalized information may entice the public to use the site and, once there, to take the information provided more seriously.
People can also use the site to find out how to protect themselves and their property from coastal storms. The site provides descriptions of different weather hazards, safety precautions people can take to prepare for them, and links to Web sites for more information. A link to the National Weather Service office allows users to check for current threats.
The Center recently unveiled the site to the project partners, and the response is enthusiastic. A brochure has been developed to promote the site, and emergency managers are sending this information to their constituents and using the promotional material whenever they interact with the public.
"This Web site is an important part of a national initiative to help coastal communities protect themselves from storms," says Russell Jackson, project lead from the NOAA Coastal Services Center. "We've found that the more site-specific we can make the data search, the more interest and action we get from the public. We hope they will use this information and join their community leaders as they try to protect themselves from coastal storms."
Creating a Hazards Outreach Tool for Your Community
Most coastal programs with minimal geographic information system (GIS) experience can create a Web site that will allow community members to easily determine their coastal hazards vulnerabilities. Please visit www.csc.noaa.gov/rvat/ and click on the hazards locator tool to see an example, or contact Russell Jackson at Russell.Jackson@noaa.gov should you have questions.
To create a site like this, you will need the following:
- Spatial data layers—base maps, hazard layers, etc.
- List of potential partners and stakeholders
- Mitigation plan or the beginnings of one
- Hazards and information about them (i.e., coastal erosion studies, storm surge zones)
- GIS software
