Let’s Prepare to Help One Another

It will take a very long time to recover from the terror of Sept. 11, and it may well take years to be victorious over terrorism. In the meantime, Americans wait with a sense of determination but also fear and a sense of vulnerability.

One antidote is taking action--thinking and doing something about the possibility of danger here. What help us--particularly as the neighborhood councils that are being formed throughout Los Angeles get up and running--is taking on the task of emergency preparedness training.

Los Angeles has one of the best programs in the country for training residents about what to do in an emergency. Heaven knows we have opportunities to put such training to use, given our susceptibility to earthquakes, fires and mudslides.

But the training does much more than that.

It brings neighborhoods together to identify those who may need help and those who have resources and talents to provide it. It helps people learn about their own homes, such as where the gas outlets are and how to turn them off. It helps families identify what it takes to prepare their own emergency supplies.

Preparing for emergencies is not so dire an activity. It provides a reason to get to know our neighbors, and nothing is a greater builder of community than knowing that you can care for one another should the occasion arise. Practicing triage and basic first aid and figuring out where to store community supplies add to our sense of confidence.

Given the state of the world--and our own geological frailties--getting together to protect ourselves is among the most useful activities in which the city’s new neighborhood councils could engage. Emergency preparedness isn’t controversial. It builds solidarity. And it enables neighborhood councils to demonstrate one of their most important functions: fostering a sense of community.

Focusing on preparedness would be a step toward demonstrating commitment to the nascent neighborhood councils by giving them the impetus to map their communities to see what needs and resources they have. The sad fact is that in a serious emergency, the odds are that most of us will be on our own. Fire and police departments are likely to be occupied many miles away.

We are living in a dangerous time, partly because we do not know the perils we face. We need to do is what we can do, and what we can do is prepare ourselves as individuals and--more important--as communities to face whatever the future brings. The new neighborhood councils can help with that.