Help
Your preparedness plan
Our emergency preparedness and Blockwatch guide has three checklists and a contact card you can fill in as you go. Signed in, they are saved to your account as your preparedness plan, private to you, with a household plan added and a paper copy to print for your emergency kit.
Watch: Your preparedness plan
1 minute 41 seconds
Chapters
Read the narration
- This short video shows you how to make your household’s emergency preparedness plan on the Normandy Park Police Foundation’s website.
- Anyone can read the guide and tick its checklists. With a free account, your plan is saved, and you can print it.
- Start with our emergency preparedness and Blockwatch guide, on the Blockwatch page.
- It covers your Blockwatch province, securing your home, your emergency supply kit, earthquakes and power outages.
- Tick each step as you do it. Here, we’ll tick water and food in the emergency supply kit.
- While you’re signed out, your ticks are kept only in this browser, on this device.
- To keep them, choose Sign in to save them to your account, and sign in. We’ll use a password; an emailed link works too.
- Back on the guide, we ask before adding anything from this browser to your account, because on a shared computer it may be someone else’s.
- Choose Add them to your account.
- Your whole plan is one click away: choose Open your preparedness plan.
- It holds the checklists, a household plan and your contacts. Each step asks for what it names, and your answers save as you type.
- Here, we’ll write down a meeting place right outside our home.
- Choose Print my plan for a paper copy to keep with your emergency kit.
- It starts with a page you can read at a glance: where to meet, who to call, and where your shutoffs are.
- You’re all set. Your plan is on your account page any time, under Emergency preparedness.
- Questions? Look for Help, or Contact, at the bottom of every page.
- Thank you for supporting the Normandy Park Police Foundation.
In short
- Anyone can read the emergency preparedness and Blockwatch guide, tick its checklists and fill in its contact card.
- Signed out, what you tick and type stays in this browser on this device and is never sent to us. Signed in, it is saved to your account, so it is there on any device.
- Your plan adds a household plan, from meeting places to insurance, and room for what each step asks you to write down. Print my plan prints it all for your kit.
- Your plan is private to you: it isn’t shown to the Foundation’s administrators or sent anywhere else. Downloading the guide as a PDF needs a free account.
Step by step
Tick the checklists and fill in the contact card
- Open the guide. Anyone can read it, signed in or not.
- Tick each step as you finish it. There are three checklists: the six critical steps to securing your home under Secure your home, the supply kit under Build your emergency supply kit, and storm preparedness under During a power outage. Each one counts how many steps are done.
- Fill in the contact card under My Blockwatch contacts: your details, your province’s contacts and the people you would call.
- Choose Print my contacts to print just the card for your kit: phones and the internet may be down when you need it.
- The line under each list and under the card says where what you entered is kept: in this browser, or in your account.
Save your plan to your account
- Near the top of the guide, under Save your plan to your account, choose Create a free account or Sign in to save your plan. You come back to the guide afterwards.
- Signed in, everything you tick and type on the guide is saved to your account as you go. The line under each list says Saved to your account.
- If this browser still holds ticks or contact details from before you signed in, that list or the card asks first. Add them to your account copies them in and clears them from this browser; Not now leaves them where they are.
- When you add contact details, any entry your account already has is kept, and only the empty ones are filled in from the browser.
Fill in your whole plan
- Open your preparedness plan: choose Open your preparedness plan on the guide, or Start your plan or Open your plan on your account page. You need to be signed in.
- It starts with the Household plan: meeting places, an out-of-area contact, ALERT King County, your ways out, smoke and carbon monoxide alarms, a fire extinguisher, insurance, photographs of what you own, medical and mobility needs, pets, and practicing the plan.
- Then come the guide’s three checklists and your contact card, the same ones the guide shows.
- A step asks for what it names: “Choose two meeting places” has room for both, and “Know your utilities” for where each shutoff is. Type your answers under each step; a few take a date, such as when you last tested your alarms.
- Answers save as you type and when you leave a box. An answer that is also on the contact card, such as your out-of-area contact, your insurance or your veterinarian, changes in both places.
- Your account page shows how far along you are.
Print your plan
- On your plan page, choose Print my plan, or use your browser’s own Print command.
- You get a paper copy for your kit. It starts with the emergency numbers and At a glance: where to meet, who to call, your Blockwatch province, your shutoffs and safety equipment, and health and pets. Then come the household plan, the three checklists with their tick boxes and your answers, and your contact card.
- Anything you left empty has a line to write on, so you can finish it by hand.
- To print only the contact card, choose Print my contacts on the guide.
Download the printed guide
- Sign in, then choose Download the PDF guide near the top of the guide: all 14 pages (15 MB), with the province map, the HELP and OKAY window sign, and a contact list to fill in by hand.
- Signed out, that panel offers Create a free account and Sign in to download instead; either brings you back to the guide.
Good to know
- Signed out, your ticks and typing stay in this browser on this device only and are never sent to us. Another browser or device starts empty.
- Signed in, your plan is saved to your account, not to the browser, so it is the same on every device you sign in on.
- We never copy what a browser holds into your account without asking, list by list, because on a shared computer it may be someone else’s.
- The household plan and the answers to each step are kept only in an account, on your plan page. The guide shows the checklists and the contact card.
- Clear the ticks empties one list, and Clear the form, then Clear everything, empties the contact card. Signed in, that deletes them from your account, and it can’t be undone.
- Your plan is private to you. It isn’t shown on the public site or to the Foundation’s administrators, it’s never sent to our email system or anyone else, and it’s deleted with your account. The privacy page says more.
- Every PDF on the site needs a free account, the guide’s included. Reading the guide on the site never does.
- In an emergency, call 911.
Questions and answers
Keeping your plan
Do I need an account to use the checklists?
No. Anyone can tick the guide’s checklists and fill in its contact card; without an account they stay in that browser. An account keeps them on every device, adds the household plan and the answers each step asks for, and prints it all at once.
I ticked things before I signed in. Where did they go?
They are still in that browser. Once you sign in there, each list and the contact card that has something your account doesn’t offers to Add them to your account. See Save your plan to your account.
Who can see my plan?
Only you. It isn’t shown on the public site or to the Foundation’s administrators, and it’s never sent to our email system or anyone else. You can clear any part of it at any time, and it’s deleted with your account. See the FAQ.
How often should I update my contacts?
Your plan page suggests every six months. After you do, print a new copy for your kit.
The guide
What’s in the guide?
It is the web version of our printed guide: how Blockwatch is organized, what to watch for, securing your home, a supply kit for 7 to 14 days, what to do during an earthquake and after the shaking stops, power outages, where to get alerts, and a contact card to fill in and print.
Is the household plan in the printed guide?
No. The household plan is on your plan page only. The guide, on the site and as a PDF, has the three checklists and the contact card.
Do I have to join Blockwatch to use the guide?
No. The guide and your plan are for any household. To join your province’s Blockwatch, start on the Province Finder.
If something goes wrong
The messages you may see, word for word (“…” stands for a part that changes), what they mean and what to do.
- “We couldn't save your last change.”
Your last tick or answer didn’t reach your account, usually because the connection dropped.
What to do: Choose Try again beside the message. If it keeps happening, reload the page.
- “We couldn't reach your account, so for now your ticks are kept in this browser.”
You are signed in, but your plan couldn’t be read just now, so this browser keeps what you tick until it can.
What to do: Choose Try again. Once your plan loads, anything this browser kept is offered to your account.
- “This page was opened for a different account. Reload it to see your own plan.”
The account signed in now isn’t the one this page was opened for, so we didn’t save to it.
What to do: Reload the page. You then see the plan of the account that is signed in now.