Inclusive collaborative local emergency planning for and with individuals with disabilities: An online pilot training for public health and public safety emergency planners

Individuals with disabilities appear particularly vulnerable to the negative effects of natural and human caused disasters and emergencies, a susceptibility thought to be due, at least in part, to local (city, town and county) emergency planning deficiencies. Our presentation will describe a project to address these shortcomings via an online pilot emergency planning training program for local public health and safety emergency planners (Planners) nationwide, currently in development. The training curriculum incorporates an inclusive planning process and workbook guide previously developed and successfully delivered in MA. The workbook includes a disability community needs assessment checklist, emergency plan gap analysis checklists, priority setting and action plan development tools to aid in developing an inclusive local emergency plan. Six Planners will complete the pilot online training, review our planning process and workbook, and provide preliminary usability feedback before revision and implementation with 100 other Planners. Project evaluation will include an assessment of learner knowledge gains, motivation to conduct future collaborative inclusive emergency plan reviews, and usability and satisfaction with the training and workbook. The presentation will describe online training results obtained to date, and any comparisons to results from a prior MA in-person training project (results of which indicated that participants made statistically significant gains in knowledge and self-efficacy). We will describe the online training curriculum, our collaborative inclusive emergency planning workbook guide and planning tools, and share lessons learned from both the MA and national projects with relevance for public health and safety emergency managers, planners, responders, and the disability community.