This Citizen Corps News Digest is provided by FEMA's Individual & Community Preparedness Division to highlight community preparedness and resilience resources and activities recently announced by federal agencies and Citizen Corps partners.

CERT Basic Training Participant Manual in Braille and Screen Reader Versions

The National CERT Program continues to promote CERT training for all audiences. In addition to the recent release of the low vision and Spanish versions of the CERT Basic Training Participant Manual, we are pleased to announce the release of the Participant Manual in Braille and PDF screen reader versions. Each version includes the same content as the standard version Participant Manual—the nine units of the course and 13 hazard annexes.

Please access the screen reader version of the Participant Manual on the national CERT website, https://www.citizencorps.gov/cert/training_mat.shtm#screenreader .

Local CERT program coordinators/managers can request copies of the Braille version of the Participant Manual. Please call the FEMA Distribution Center at 1-800-480-2520 or email FEMA-Publications-Warehouse@dhs.gov . Use Publication Number P-856 and Catalog Number 11189-2 to order the Participant Manual (four volumes in Braille). Please be sure to allow 6 – 8 weeks for delivery.

For additional tools for communicating with all audiences, including people with disabilities, please visit the FEMA Office of Disability Integration and Coordination Preparedness Resources web page .

Sincerely,

National CERT Program

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DHS and FEMA Updates

Give the Gift of Preparedness this Holiday Season

This holiday season, one of the best gifts you can give your loved ones is the gift of disaster preparedness. Giving emergency supplies to help build a disaster supply kit and having an emergency communications plan can go a long way to ensure that your family is prepared for any emergency.
A list of possible gifts that may assist in disasters includes:

• Disaster kits for homes, offices and cars (first aid kits; food, water and prescription medications for 72 hours, extra clothing, blankets, and flashlights)
• NOAA weather radios with extra batteries
• Enrollment in a CPR or first-aid class
• Smoke and carbon monoxide detectors
• Fire extinguishers (for the kitchen, garage, car, etc.)
• Foldable ladders for second-story escape in a fire
• Winter car kits (emergency flares, shovels, ice scrapers, flashlights and fluorescent distress flags, jumper cables)
• Pet disaster kits (food, water, leashes, dishes, toys, and carrying case or crate)
• Battery powered lamps

Emergency supplies are important, but it is also essential to discuss what your family will do in case of an emergency. This year, consider at least one of these gift ideas. You just may save the life of a friend or family member. For more information and preparedness tips, please visit Ready.gov and FEMA.gov.

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Whole Community and You

Over the past year or so, FEMA has engaged many of its emergency management partners – including local, tribal, state, territorial representatives; academia; nongovernmental organizations; community members and the private sector –– in a dialogue on a whole community approach to emergency management. Based on these many meaningful and substantive conversations, FEMA synthesized what it has learned, and published A Whole Community Approach to Emergency Management: Principles, Themes, and Pathways for Action on its website. This document reflects some of the successes of a whole community approach across the country. We share this with you today in an effort to enhance the resiliency and security of our Nation through the whole community approach.

As always, FEMA will continue to support a national dialogue to exchange ideas, recommendations, and success stories, and we encourage you to continue to send feedback about the whole community document and approach to FEMA-Community-Engagement@fema.gov.

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Release of New “If You See Something, Say Something Campaign” Spanish-Language PSAs

Secretary Napolitano this week unveiled new Spanish-language Public Service Announcements (PSAs) for the department's "If You See Something, Say Something™" public awareness campaign during a roundtable meeting with Hispanic law enforcement groups at the White House.

The PSAs are aimed at reaching out to the Spanish-speaking public to encourage them to report suspicious activity to local law enforcement. The new campaign of radio and television Spanish-language PSAs inform viewers about how to notify authorities regarding potential threats. The PSAs will be distributed to Spanish-language television and radio stations across the country in California, Colorado, New York, Arizona, New Mexico, Florida, Texas, Washington D.C. and Puerto Rico. The PSAs are available for viewing at www.dhs.gov/IfYouSeeSomethingSaySomething.

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FEMA Stresses Preparedness as we Reflect on the 200th Anniversary of the New Madrid Earthquake Events

Last Friday marked the 200-year anniversary of the first event of the New Madrid Earthquake sequence, which is considered to be most powerful quake-series the U.S. has ever experienced. According to the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), during 1811-12, the central Mississippi valley was violently shaken by a series of three earthquakes above a magnitude 7, and up to 200 substantial aftershocks. Today, a similar risk still exists across the nation including within the New Madrid Seismic Zone, which includes Alabama, Arkansas, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Mississippi, Missouri and Tennessee. The 2011 East Coast earthquake and the recent Oklahoma earthquake illustrate the fact that it is impossible to predict when or where an earthquake will occur, so it is important you and your family are prepared ahead of time

Would you know what to do in the event of an earthquake? How can you prepare yourself, your family, and your community for a possible earthquake? For the answers to these questions, and many more, visit the Ready.gov website.

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Citizen Corps Partners and Affiliates Updates

CERT Basic Training Participant Manual Now Available in Braille and Screen Reader Versions

The National Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) Program is pleased to announce the release of the CERT Basic Training Participant Manual in Braille and in PDF screen reader. Each version includes the same nine units of course content and 13 hazard annexes as the standard version of the Participant Manual. These two releases also compliment the recent announcement of the low vision and Spanish versions of the CERT Basic Training Participant Manual.

Local CERT program coordinators/managers can request copies of the Braille version of the Participant Manual by calling the FEMA Distribution Center at 1-800-480-2520 or emailing FEMA-Publications-Warehouse@dhs.gov . Use Publication Number P-856 and Catalog Number 11189-2 to order the Participant Manual (four volumes in Braille). Please be sure to allow 6 – 8 weeks for delivery.

The screen reader version of the Participant Manual can be accessed directly through the National CERT website .

For additional tools for communicating with all audiences, including people with disabilities, please visit the FEMA Office of Disability Integration and Coordination Preparedness Resources web page.

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Seeking Input on a New and Improved Approach for Mapping Flood Risk Around Levees

As part of its ongoing efforts to reform and strengthen the National Flood Insurance Program, FEMA has been working with members of Congress and other stakeholders to revise its process for mapping the flood risk of communities and families living behind levees. FEMA's goal is to improve the way it maps this flood risk so families have more precise information when making decisions about how to protect their homes and properties.

FEMA has worked extensively with stakeholders, technical experts and the public on this new approach and continues to seek comments from stakeholders and the public on this proposal. This public comment period is open until January 30, 2012. For more information about this proposed approach to help communities demonstrate the degree of protection a levee may provide to the surrounding communities, please visit the federal register. The full blog is also available online: Seeking Input on a New and Improved Approach for Mapping Flood Risk.

And as FEMA continues to work to improve its flood mapping process, families and businesses are encouraged to better understand the flood risk they face within their own communities and take steps to protect themselves and their homes against a potential flood. Steps can include flood proofing techniques to mitigate flood risk to their own homes, supporting good land use and building codes in their communities, developing a family communications plan, putting an emergency kit together, and investing in flood insurance. We encourage families and businesses to learn more by checking out http://www.floodsmart.gov/.

The National Office of Citizen Corps
FEMA Individual & Community Preparedness Division

FEMA's mission is to support our citizens and first responders to ensure that as a nation we work together to build, sustain, and improve our capability to prepare for, protect against, respond to, recover from, and mitigate all hazards.

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FEMA Major Disaster Declarations Update

Alaska Severe Winter Storms And Flooding
Major Disaster Declaration number 4050 declared on Dec 22, 2011