Inside Bay Area - Nonprofits join to plug holes in disaster response

Inside Bay Area - Nonprofits join to plug holes in disaster response: "Nonprofits join to plug holes in disaster response
By Michele R. Marcucci
Article Last Updated: 02/05/2007 03:23:04 PM PST

When a disaster strikes, nonprofit agencies are typically the ones to provide its victims shelter, food and other necessities.

But here in the Bay Area, they haven't gone far enough to plan for the worst, or to figure out how to best communicate with the public agencies and private companies coordinating their own responses.

Today in San Francisco, six regional nonprofit agencies and the city's emergency managers pledged to plug the holes in their disaster response efforts by creating a coordinated assistance network.

The pledge will make San Francisco one of just six American cities undertaking such efforts. And it could lead to additional planning efforts around the Bay Area, one person involved in creating the network said."