Earlier this week, a colleague e-mailed me and asked to send him some ideas on how I thought a Community and Regional Resilience Institute community using the Community Resilience System would recover from a tornado. I thought it made sense to give him a description of the environment within which the community would be conducting their tornado recovery. This is how I think a CRS community would be positioned for response and long-term recovery:
A CARRI community would have assessed its vulnerabilities, catalogued its assets and determined which assets were most vulnerable, which could/should be restored first and identified the gaps for which outside resources would have to be requested well before the tornado. This would have been done by all parts of the community — individuals and families; local government; small and large employers.
A CARRI community would have a well planned and well rehearsed communications plan for getting information to all of its citizens based on a collaborative use of all the resources available to the community rather than just government. The information provided by such a coordinated plan would be useful, relevant and trusted.
A CARRI community would have well-established, trusted, community networks based on the full fabric of the community (government, private business, faith-based, associational) and those networks would have been proven through collaborative planning and continuous interactions before the catastrophic event. The community would also have similar networks developed with other communities within its region. The time to meet your neighbor (individual or community) is not post-disaster.
A CARRI community would have a vision for a post-disaster community and a plan based on that vision. The vision would be accepted by the community as a basis for action. Because time is critical post-event, this vision and plan would help the community rapidly recover in a manner consistent with their long-term vision, goals and interests.

