* SitRep Toolkit (Multi Jurisdiction - Template)

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1	SitRep Toolkit (Multi Jurisdiction)
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38	Credits:
39		Special thanks to the:
40		Wyoming Office of Homeland Security, The Blue Cell, The American Red Cross,Wyoming All Hazard Association, various beta testers who helped build this tool, and many others.
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44	Questions, Feedback, Customization, or Comments:
45	Please contact the creators Creators@WePrepare.org for customization, access, questions, feedback or comments. Happy Trails!
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53	Premise and Concept:
54	When disasters happen, it is critical that we (as emergency managers) as rapidly and accurately as possible "gain-tain" (gain and maintain) our situational awareness (SA) to help frame the incident. This helps us get proper information in front of decision makers during a time-critical incident. This means that we're better able to provide scarce resource prioritization to address the priorities of Life Safety, Incident Stabilization, Property Conservation, and Societal Restoration. It also allows us to best inform the public as well as tell the story to internal and external stakeholders. This tool was put together to best incorporate the situational awareness components of FEMA Lifelines along with the power of Google Sheets for maximum efficiency in delivering quality, standardized SA products. It is primarily designed to help emergency managers maximize their scarce time during an incident by "simultaneously making products" and reducing the chance of error through duplicate data entry/product creation. NOTE: Data collection is vital...but CANNOT take priority over the response. Data collection efforts should be staffed as quickly as possible with your resources. That said, keep in mind, if you're at the "EOC," it may be difficult to get the information you need from the field, particularly during the "initial attack" phase of the incident. You may need to send a "liaison" to the field to help collect data if necessary. Keep in mind that we need the data, but don't "play 20 questions" when time is of the essence. Data collectors should use common sense and prioritize collection efforts to maximize time available for resources without becoming overly burdensome. Don't let data collection efforts be a barrier or slowdown getting resources/help to those in need.
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56	A lifeline enables the continuous operation of critical government and business functions and is essential to human health and safety or economic security.
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58	Priority - Life Saving
59	Effort - Stabilization of Lifelines
60	Purpose - Root Cause Analysis, Interdependencies, Prioritization, Ease of Communication
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62	Instructions:
63		Precursor Items
64	1	Click "File," then "Make a Copy." You can then add it to your own Google Account.
65	2	Share (Green Button in top right corner). Select who you would like to have what level of access (viewer, commenter, editor) by adding their email addresses.
66	2a	You can add tab level permissions by clicking the small down arrow at the right of each tab along the bottom, then select "Protect Sheet." This functionality allows you to lock/unlock sheets with individuals to help ensure nothing is inadvertently deleted. For example, you may assign "edit" level permissions to a particular county official to hel pkeep their information up to date.
67	2b	As a general rule, all tabs except for the Green, Orange, 209 Group and Planning P tabs are "locked" but you can unprotect them with the same drop down on each tab.
68	2c	If you have an inadvertent "deletion" or change to any of your work, you can click "File" and "Version History" to restore a copy of your previous work.
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70		Data Collection:
71	-	You can collect information via open source locations (social media, traditional media, etc).
72	-	You can set up (via Google Forms) a "citizen science" sort of survey to start capturing damage information and scope out the disaster damage. This obviously will need to be vetted in a more formal "PDA" process, but works well to get the data collection started and inform immediate response actions.
73	-	You can (through training and exercise) prepare various first responders/public works/CERT/SAR groups to be able to help go out and capture data.
74	-	You can also put in information via the traditional "interview" style process where a "higher headquarters" EOC element calls local jurisdictions to gather information against the shared (and pre-circulated) template of questions.
75	-	Or...you can use the drop down on each of the "local jurisdiction tabs" and select "Protect Sheet" then put in the affected local jurisdiction POC's email address and have them keep their particular tab up to date.
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77		Next Steps:
78	1	Go to the Data Entry tab
79		Situation Unit Leader:
80	2	Populate the data in Lines 2 - 55 with the "evergreen" information that should be fairly static throughout the incident. Each day, you'll need to update the Briefing Date and Next Briefing Information, but the rest should remain largely the same.
81	2a	If you are assigning the "data entry" of sub jurisdictions to the individual POCs in the field, you can hit the Green "Share" button in the top right-hand corner, enter their email, select "edit" and hit "send." You will also need to go to their individual tab and select "Protect Sheet" then add their email to editor, so that it locks the tab so other field level users do not inadvertently "overwrite" a neighbor's data. This same permissions level can be added to EOC users if needed so that the interviewer can only edit their assigned information.
82	3	You will need to enter data into Lines 57-66, the general/overall lifeline status as well as the Bottom Line Up Front (BLUF) information that will tell the overall story of what is happening. This should be a wrap-up summary and about a paragraph in length addressing the 5 Ws.
83		GIS Specialist:
84	1	Lines 67 through 72 are used to make the maps. There are three lines (67, 69, 71) that can be used to put a "basemap" into the Orange mapping tabs.
85	2	If you use the Orange mapping tabs, you can make edits to the basemap by dragging the drawings over the map image to tell the story. You can also double click on a symbol/label to edit the drawing. You can add additional symbols/labels by clicking "Insert, Drawing" and then making your edits.
86	3	When your maps are complete, either in another program (e.g. ArcGIS, Google My Maps, something else), you can take a picture/screenshot of the "final" map. These are then inserted via "Insert, Image, Image in Cells" into lines 68, 70, and 72.
87	4	The final maps are then carried over into the presentation documents to best tell your story with geospatial products in concert with the other information.
88		Assorted Situation Unit Personnel:
89	1	Lines 75-84 are used to add context to your incident. These can be delegated to your PIO, "Interviewers," maintained by the SITL, or other incident personnel. They are designed primarily to provide information of a contextual nature and generally are images. The captions can give context or attribution to the photos.
90		Incident Meteorologist:
91	1	Similar to the GIS information above, the IMET or whoever is covering on weather should build their "image" elsewhere or take a screenshot from another source and use the "Insert, Image, Image in Cells" to tell the weather story.
92		Finance Section Chief/Cost Unit Leader:
93	1	Lines 88-92 are designed to help tell the Finance side of the story. The light purple shaded areas can be used to change the questions depending on the needs. For example, local "Individual Assistance" (IA) or Small Business Administration (SBA) may have use in some of the data, or a local emergency manager. If you are not using a particular question, either (a) leave it blank, (b) delete the question on Line 87 to make the change throughout the toolkit.
94	2	Line 91 is designed to capture any cost related information that will not be reported elsewhere by a sub-jurisdiction.
95		Resource Unit Leader:
96	1	Lines 93-98 are designed to tell the story of deployed resources. You can use the light purple shaded boxes to change the categories if necessary (e.g. Public Works, Law Enforcement, etc) by broad buckets.
97	2	Line 96 is designed to type in any resources deployed that will not be reported on a sub-jurisdiction report (e.g. state/National Guard/federal resources). If/once they are being counted/reported at the "local" level, be sure to remove them from Line 97 to avoid over-inflating numbers.
98		General Notes
99	1	Note - For context images, weather, maps, etc - these can be "screen grabbed" with the "snipping tool" or something similar and then "Save As" to create an image. If they are already an image (e.g. a photo that was sent in) you can find them on your computer and "upload" them. If they are online and already an "image" you can right click on the image and select "Save Image As...". Once you have your image captured, "Insert, Image, Image-in-Cells" can get it into your cell.
100	2	Note - if you need to "return" down a row inside a cell Alt+Enter will do a "character return" for spacing needs
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102		Printing
103	1	In order to print, it generally works best with tab-by-tab printing as opposed to workbook printing.
104	2	Select the tab you wish to print, hit "Ctrl+P" and then "Next" in the top right corner.
105	3	If you notice pagination issues based on the length of inputs, you may need to add/delete rows from the tab above/below the page breaks to make them line up correctly (it should work, but just in case).
106	3a	- You can also fiddle with the page breaks in the print menu to drag them around to make items fit.
107	4	The Red and Blue tabs are designed as printables - several of them have the recommended paper size on the tab name, but any can be printed in booklet (half 8.5x11) up to Plotter size for wall hangers in the EOC or briefing room. The Green Tabs can also be printed for more specific information on a particular jurisdiction.
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109		"Tomorrow" Information
110	1	You can use the toolkit to tell the story over time. This means that you only have to "load the main data" once and then can add updates day-over-day.
111	2	Go to the Trends Over Time and copy "today's" data into the proper date column. Select the top to the bottom of Column C. Right Click and Copy (or CTRL+C), then go to the top of the appropriate date and Right Click, Paste Special, Values Only (or CTRL+Shift+V)
112	3	To make a copy for "yesterday" click on "File, Make a Copy" - make sure to click the checkboxes for "Copy Comments" and choose where to "archive" today's copy as yesterday's data.
113	4	By "archiving" a copy instead of "making a copy for tomorrow" you are able to have people stay editing on the current link and not have to worry about folks inadvertently updating old records.
114	5	We would recommend that you come up with an archival naming structure and file naming convention (e.g. YYYYMMDD_EventName_FinalVersion). This also serves as a back up and documentation record should you need it at a later date.