Emergency Preparedness

 Peachland Ward Family,

We love and pray for you, and desire for your spiritual and temporal well-being and safety. 

In the wake of the last few weeks of fires in Southern California, we invite each of you to counsel with your family to prepare and practice a simple plan of what to do if you receive an evacuation order, but also, to take the opportunity to consider and prepare for other major emergency situations that provide far less warning, such as an earthquake. “If ye are prepared ye shall not fear” (D&C 38:30). Plan now so that you can act quickly if the need arises. 

Some basic wildfire evacuation preparedness: 

1. Have a 24/72-hour “Go bag” - medications, food, clothes, water, emergency kit, and other essential items

2. List of other items you want to make sure you take if the evacuation gives you a few extra minutes to pack a few items, such as important legal and/or identification documents, a few cherished memorabilia/photos, etc.

3. Know your neighborhood emergency plan, evacuation routes, and destinations

4. Keep your vehicle gas tanks close to full, phones charged up, etc.

5. Some other resources for wildfire preparedness are here, at this link 

Some basic earthquake preparedness:

1. 72-hour bag

2. A pair of shoes and a flashlight near bed

3. Know how you’ll protect yourself during an earthquake in your home, place of work, car, and other places you frequent - and practice

4. Set a communication plan, with an out of state contact whom the family will also check-in with, if possible

5. Designate a meeting location and plan, with a 2nd and 3rd option, if your home becomes uninhabitable

6. Some other resources for earthquake preparedness, at this link

Our ward emergency plan has two methods in place to help care for the safety of all our ward members:

1. If normal lines of communication and transportation are functioning: Ministering program. Call and text your ministers and those you minister to. Share your situation and plan and communicate any needs. Those will be relayed and assistance will be sought where possible. Check on each other. We should reach the 1 and the 99. 

2. If normal lines of communication and/or transportation are NOT functioning: Block program. This is a geographically based program whereby the ward is broken into geographically-based “blocks” with a “block captain” who will strive to check-in on each household in their “block.” The Emergency Preparedness leaders are refreshing our neighborhood “block” lists for our “block captains” (originally launched a year or so ago). In the absence of a visit from a block captain, and/or to proactively reach out to check-in on others nearby, within the LDS Tools app, go to directory, find your name, and within your record, touch the map and you can see other members of the ward (appear as orange dots on the map) - in case of an emergency, you can stop-by ward members in your neighborhood to make sure they’re okay.

If you don’t have it already, please install the LDS Tools app for ready access to contact information of ward members. You’ll need your member record # if you’ve never logged-in to your church account - your member record # is on your temple recommend, or a ward clerk can assist in providing you with your #.

In case of an evacuation order, and assistance is needed, the church will most likely open the Stake Center on McBean as a gathering place. If the Stake Center is also impacted, we will provide guidance via text message or other available means of communication.

We will discuss and provide additional resources to the ward regarding emergency preparedness in the coming months.

May God bless and be with each of you as we care for one another.

Sincerely,

Peachland Ward Bishopric