Disaster Plan Draws Both Praise, Skepticism : Security: Police say Lockwood Grid System could create ‘fortress mentality’ in response to civil unrest. But Encino residents have shown interest.

As Linda Lockwood sat watching the televised images of chaos that followed San Francisco’s Loma Prieta Earthquake in 1989, she felt a calling.

“I sat there wondering if my sister was on that bridge,” said the Hancock Park design consultant, referring to the collapse of portions of the Bay Bridge, “and it was just too scary, too close to home. I knew there needed to be a plan.”

Since then, she has developed a neighborhood disaster-preparedness plan she says can be used in any emergency. Lockwood has zealously peddled the plan in schools, churches, police stations and PTA meetings from the San Fernando Valley to South-Central Los Angeles.

“It’s important to understand that people all over this city are scared--rich and poor,” she said. “They all want some security.”

In the simplest terms, the Lockwood Grid System shows neighbors in a six- to eight-block area how to form a self-sufficient community in the event of a natural disaster or--after adjustments following last year’s riots--civil unrest.

The plan has won praise from high-ranking safety officials. So many people have called over the past few weeks asking about the plan that she’s begun measuring her telephone messages “by the inch.”

But while the National Guard awarded Linda and her husband, Simon, Medals of Merit for their food-distribution efforts during the riots last year, police say parts of the Lockwood plan could be dangerous as a verdict draws near in the second Rodney G. King beating trial.

“She came up with a good idea, especially in a case where emergency response is slow, such as an earthquake,” said Bayan Lewis, a deputy chief with the Los Angeles Police Department. “But in this case, I don’t think the necessity for this plan exists.”

What bothers Lewis most is a recommendation that people assemble “staggered barricades” that give their neighborhoods the appearance of being blocked off, but allow enough clearance for slow-moving safety vehicles. The barricades would be composed of trash cans adorned with official-looking signs reading, “No through traffic” or “Do not enter.”

“If used wrong, it could create a community with a fortress mentality, and people could get hurt,” Lewis said. “What happens to the poor guy who comes up to one of these barricades and doesn’t know the password?”

But despite the reservations, people have been attracted to the sense of security the system promises.

As Deputy Chief Mark A. Kroeker tried to allay fears with guarantees of police protection at a meeting of Encino residents last month, he made a passionate plea against any type of vigilantism, including the partial barricading of neighborhoods.

But after the meeting, a group of people gathered around Simon Lockwood, asking how they could get ahold of the plan.

The Lockwood Grid System also has its staunch proponents, barricades and all.

“I think it’s an excellent plan. It’s simplistic and it’s not obtrusive,” said Stuart Garrison, a National Guard officer. “It offers people a methodology to form a community again.”

Garrison said the plan complements safety officials’ efforts.

“People have been sitting back on their laurels, whining and waiting for someone to do something to them or for them,” he said. “What she is trying to do is give people a sense of community back.”

Residents begin the Lockwood program by filling out a questionnaire to show how many people are living in the home, their ages and occupations, and what kinds of tools and facilities are available.

Resources are pooled and responsibilities delegated to teams organized by the following tasks: search and rescue; repair and cleanup; medical; food, water and shelter; education and child care; fire and crime control, and animal care. A color-coded grid, denoting locations of the various teams, is drawn up. Everything is controlled by a central command center, an idea Lockwood said she borrowed from the Los Angeles Fire Department’s seven-week Emergency Response Training course.

The Lockwoods say their plan, which has evolved since 1989 at an estimated personal cost of about $15,000 and thousands of volunteer hours, has been scrutinized by fire, police and public works officials as well as representatives of the National Guard and Red Cross. While there is little question that the plan has been widely distributed, the Lockwoods are unable to say how many people have embraced it.

“That’s something you just don’t know until it happens,” said Simon Lockwood. “No one knows until you see the news reports and things start happening, what people are actually going to do.”

John Shaughnessy, a community organizer for the West Los Angeles Community Organization, says his neighborhood is definitely prepared to put the plan to use.

Neighbors in the few blocks surrounding Nora Sterry Elementary School on Corinth Avenue have printed copies of the plan in English and Spanish and agreed to use the school as a community meeting place in case of unrest, Shaughnessy said.

They have also used the plan’s model for pooling resources and delegating responsibilities.

Ironically, the sense of security the plan instilled in his group prompted members to vote against implementing the controversial barricades, Shaughnessy said.

“It helped us make a rational choice,” he said. “We voted against barricades.”

But for the 20 people who are prepared to follow the plan, he said, there are 100 more who are familiar with it.

Sherman Oaks resident Karyn Palmer falls into that category, she said sadly.

“If I had two weeks off I could do one hell of job with this plan,” said Palmer, chief field deputy in the office of Councilwoman Joy Picus. “But it takes someone who’s got a lot of time to pull it off.”

Palmer, who opened her home to about 50 neighbors when Simon Lockwood presented the plan, said after the meeting she is confident she and her neighbors could implement the plan “in some fashion” in an emergency. “We give people some options,” Simon Lockwood said. “Who knows if they’re going to follow them?”

Laroy Hilburn said he first met the Lockwoods and heard about their plan at Zoe Christian Fellowship Church in South-Central Los Angeles, about a mile from where last year’s riots began.

He said what appeals to him most about the Lockwood plan is that it addresses logistics problems beyond the fire and violence that characterized the uprising.

“Besides all that, we had no power,” Hilburn said.

“I remember the despair that gripped the neighborhood. People didn’t know what to do. We’re trying to make sure this doesn’t happen to us again.”

Hilburn said he is working with the PTA at a local elementary school and with various neighborhood block clubs.

“We’re trying to prepare ad hoc, quickly,” he said, “hoping that we won’t need anything.”