So it's time to get started.

Welcome to the resilience committee meeting.

Today is September 18th.

In Council Chambers, we have Councilmember Julian Ramirez, staff from Councilmember Kamen, Councilmember Jackson, Councilmember Thomas, Mayor Pro Tim Castax Tatum, Councilmember Peck, Councilmember Alcorn, and Councilmember Castillo's offices.

Thank you all for being here.

Let's see if we can lower this.

Lower that.

Today we've got three presentations.

We're going to lower the podium so we can see you.

Hey, there you are.

Howdy, you're there.

We were hiding from you back here.

So first uh Tommy Holstein with Baker Ripley regarding the Blue Sky Volunteer Planning Group.

Thank you for being here on behalf of Blue Sky Volunteers.

We're anxious to hear what you've uh bringing to us today.

We wanted to get an update on our plans for uh those those things that sometimes form in the Gulf that we're not going to mention.

We're not going to talk about that.

So, anyway, welcome.

If you can just uh uh let someone know when just say advanced slide will expand the slides for you.

So go ahead and get started.

Thank you for being here.

And the opportunity to speak with y'all.

Um I'm Tommy Holstein, and I'm here with Picker Ripley, but I'm here on behalf of a group called the Blue Sky Volunteer Planning Group.

And I'll get into some of my friends that are here, but uh the starting point is really what this started as.

And I'm sure a lot of y'all are looking back at last year thinking, let's not repeat that, but um at least weather wise, but also some of the response and thinking about how regionally we can improve, um, particularly with the deployment, recruitment, activation of spontaneous volunteers.

So there were a lot of different conversations happening.

Um I know that uh the roundtable has a has an interest in volunteerism that Kelly may touch upon later.

Um, Councilmember uh Chair Carter with your experience with volunteerism at the Astros Foundation certainly had um some thoughts.

Uh the county judge and some of our leaders had some thoughts, and so we came together to try to consolidate a lot of different conversations into um one cohesive uh planning unit.

And so um we started about a year ago in October 24, and the the main ideas were to grow our volunteer base, coordinate with all jurisdictions, particularly the city and the county, as well as our regional um volunteer voluntary organizations active in disaster, the VoAD, and to encourage and manage spontaneous volunteers for local and national groups in disaster response and recovery.

Uh so the next slide is our steering committee, and it shows a whole lot of wonderful people, um, a few of which are here today.

We have Gary Flaherty with the uh Texas Gulf Coast Regional VoAD.

We have Jackie Miller with the mayor's office of public safety and home home security, um Jennifer Wandry with the ARP of Texas, and then Gayla uh Wilson and Jay Romero with I Am Houston and uh the volunteer Houston, as well as so many others, and really the perspective here is jurisdictions, it's government units, it's organizations, um, and civic entities as well as platforms and the the folks that actually manage and deploy some of the systems that get people in.

And so it was a great perspective of the doers, the facilitators, the uh recruiters, the ones that are statutorily required to be doing this type of work, um, and a lot of it a wealth of experience that um um all of us brought to the table.

So the next um slide is why blue sky planning um and why the names.

The name we came up with was that we need to be thinking about this 365 days a year.

We need to be thinking about it on days like today, even if it may get a little bit of gray skies in a little bit, but that the response doesn't happen in a day plus one or when something's brewing in the Gulf.

That um, if we're gonna be improving, we can take into account experiences as well as forecast um how we can improve, how we make sure that systems are are ready to go, how we make sure that collaboration is already happening, uh the Rolodex is already filled, and so that when it's a win for us, when um we need to act, the environment is already created to be successful.

Um next slide.

So I mentioned some of the initial objectives, and as we really honed in, we we identified four kind of biggie challenges and then solutions that we could we would try to address.

The first was volunteer recruitment, trying to increase our pool of volunteers, and that is and what I'll dive into kind of what each one of these is in a second.

But to recruit and deploy volunteers did not meet the capacity needed last year, and so we wanted to establish targeted pools of unaffiliated spontaneous volunteers.

Second was the volunteer Houston awareness.

Looking back at last year, did organizations or community members know that that was a resource?

Did they trust it?

And so the objective was to refine the process for recruiting and placing and assigning an identified unaffiliated volunteers into the system.

Third was the experience.

This is something that was kind of near and dear to me and our organization is that if we're facilitating, if if we're leading things or referring our neighbors to opportunities, we want to make sure they have a good experience.

Because if they don't, they may not come back.

And they may think poorly about us in the future and may not do some of our overgreen opportunities.

So identifying ways that we can have some more consistency with the experiences that volunteers have at any type of opportunity they face.

And another one was capacity building, and that was you know, one piece last year we've been so flood-prone, one example so flood-prone in recent years that when a windstorm, two windstorms came about, uh, the the capacity that was skilled and in chainsawing and debris removal just it wasn't quite there.

And so that was it was a lacking piece in the immediate response.

We had to rely a lot upon outside of the region volunteers, and so thinking about ways of how can we, in times like this, offer opportunities to build or build the regional capacity to to attack all types of things that um folks could be interested in.

Uh so the next slide is uh a focus on volunteer recruitment, and we had a group that came together.

Um, it was myself, um, Robert Anaki with the uh county judges' office, as well as um Jennifer was on it from ARP, um, Houston Methodist was represented, Houston Responds, a group that brings together faith-based uh organizations, um, and probably a couple others that I'm forgetting in the moment, but we came together to think about how can we reach a broader pool of volunteers.

And we we thought about kind of the biggie trusted institutions, corporations, um faith-based groups, civic organizations.

Uh Amy Um Zach Meyer with the new Houston was one I was missing.

That remember that.

But if we can create basically a bigger World Odex of people that we can reach out to, um, we can give them a toolkit of here is how you can cascade information about volunteer opportunities, your employers trust you, your congregants trust you, um, the membership of if you're kind of a civic organization, trusts you, your constituents trust you.

And so, as trusted messengers, y'all can be active conveyors of information and in a little bit more of a unified message, um, and so driving folks to as kind of a singular uh funnel as possible to uh to be able to respond, um, consistent messaging, things like that.

And so uh today we developed the slide deck, we've done a few soft launch meetings, um, JP Morgan Chase was one, SitGo is one, um, some council offices as well, just to trot out this line as well as develop a prospect list to continue meeting with folks to get them on board to be a I can rely upon you to I'm gonna share information with you, and you'll send it to the folks that uh are in your network.

Um the second piece was volunteer Houston, and again um the idea here was looking at uh looking at how we can improve that.

And there are in the packets the blue folders that you'll have a few printouts of some then and now's and some of the improvements that we tried to make.

So one piece looking back at last year was that, and sometimes it was hard in the media aftermath to even find disaster opportunities, and so there's been a great way to elevate that disaster response is an evergreen piece on their site.

Um we've also rolled up our sleeves a lot with a kind of the behind-the-scenes provider to develop an easier system for folks to um register.

I think I'm a podcast listener, and so one of the ads that I get a lot is it's one of those e-commerce sites about making sure that if you have something in your cart that you're actually gonna buy it, and they say, Oh, we have the best system, and if you should adopt ours so that people will actually purchase it.

Same here.

If people get to a site and it's clunky, if it requires a lot of information, um the confirmation information isn't clear, they may not sign up.

They may not show up.

And so, if we can uh take down those barriers of entry for folks that um do want to volunteer, they just don't want to be defeated by a system, that will help people show up when it matters.

Um the next piece is the volunteer experience, and this was a really neat deal.

Um a group led by Brooke Campbell with uh the United Way of Greater Houston, and formerly with Volunteer Houston, um, put together an app.

And this is I think this is something that will be interesting for y'all and some of the networks that you have.

It is kind of volunteer management for dummies.

Um they may not like that term, but uh the idea, particularly now, is that there is a drain on capacity of year-round volunteer management.

Um Baker Ripley, we're lucky to have uh a volunteer coordinator, but a lot of organizations with the the drain on resources just don't have that in their budget, and so in times of disaster, you have people thrust into a role that they may not know how to do or they may not have experience.

And so this app is something that that can be downloaded on my phone, um, and that someone that has been voluntoled into being a volunteer coordinator now has a resource about how they can effectively recruit folks, manage a system, um, run a show, uh run the event the day of, and steward folks.

And so I think that particularly even for some of the evergreen activities, a lot of the the civic organizations or neighborhood groups that y'all you know interact with, this could be a tool for them even outside of disaster about how they can just better manage volunteers that they have.

And then last piece is uh the capacity building.

So we uh mentioned kind of the the flood storm versus windstorm, but one of the neat things here is that um we developed a whole range of job descriptions.

Gary was the ringleader on this, and these um are printed out on the packet, and it's basically making it easier for organizations to recruit because it's you can have systematic, this is going to be a swamper, this is gonna be a pod volunteer, this is gonna be a cooling or warming center volunteer.

Um, also easier for ordinary volunteers to know that they don't have to worry about terminology.

Everyone's gonna be trotting out.

Uh I didn't say next slide about a million times, sorry about that.

Um that they they can kind of know what they're getting themselves into.

And so, uh and another value too, I think, is just to expand the scope of what volunteer um deployment can be after um after storm.

It's the slide eight capacity building.

Um I think so often I know that y'all are um really curious about points of distribution, warming and cooling centers, make sure there's debris removal.

Um, but there's other ways for people to get involved.

Maybe that isn't a skilled labor position or a manual labor position, someone that wants to work behind a phone or to be more of a kind of customer service operator.

I think that it's a way to expand the net of opportunities to get more people involved, um, particularly those that may think, oh gosh, I don't want to go out on the heat or I don't want to lift carry heavy things.

There's a role for you, and we and we can be more creative with how we deploy folks.

So the next slide is basically the sum-up of those four objectives.

Um, the idea is that if we have this blue sky planning, handshake emoji with the gray sky readiness.

Um, the volunteer recruitment piece will have a broader pool of volunteers with will have a better funnel to get them into a as as few possibilities as possible, get them into a single way for them to activate themselves.

That'll make it easier for them to sign up and show up where they're gonna have a great experience.

And when you have a great experience, you're gonna want to come back, and um, which will further increase um the broader pool on a year-by-year basis.

And in between, particularly on gray sky or blue skies like today, we'll make sure that those people that were spontaneous are being built into with skills.

If they're curious, they can have that opportunity to increase their skill set.

Um we can make sure that the placements are prioritized so that folks are going to underserve communities.

Um, and so all in all, we hope that these four pieces are going to really strengthen the system.

Um, so the next step uh we have a few wrap-ups.

First of all, uh, you may have seen teased on the volunteer recruitment piece.

We have a goal of 5,000 volunteers.

It's a big round number.

What does it mean?

Uh 5,000 is about one percent of the population of Harris County, Houston, City of Houston, Harris County.

So kind of convenient there, but I think it's it's a bold goal to say we want to build a network and a pool based off of these uh corporate entities, civic uh organizations, communities of faith, uh electeds uh reaches, anyone that wants to raise their hand to get involved, we want to create that type of pool of people that we can get information out to, and for some that may have say, like we've met with Cent Go, for example, and they said, you know, we have a distribution list of a lot, but like candidly, we can probably you can count on us for about 10 to 20.

Well, that's 10 to 20 more than we could before.

I know that you could reach, say, a hundred.

Um, but be being able to to figure out what's that high-end expectation when we share information as well as what's a more cohesive uh number that that makes sense that we can rely upon.

Um so where y'all can get involved, where electeds in particular can get involved is again, y'all are y'all are trusted leaders.

You have distribution lists, you have you have networks, particularly with other community leaders, other like the the step below y'all is the civic association presidents and the uh super neighborhoods and um business leaders, just you know, biggies, and I think that they know that they can trust you, and so that's just such a neat network to be able to facilitate broader messaging too.

And so we want to be able to count on y'all to say, if we get you a toolkit, you'll share information to your constituents and newsletters and social media and whatnot to say if you want to volunteer, here is how, and please sign up.

The next slide, so that was our our little call to action.

The next slide was our goal of 5,000.

The next slide after that, these are a few of the folks uh the next one after that.

These are a few of the folks that have signed up that are with us.

So you can see a lot of community leaders, a lot of leading nonprofit organizations and boaz, a lot, even some corporate folks, some some leaders thus far.

You may see yourself, I haven't added a couple, but it demonstrates that we have we're cooking a little bit.

Um we need to we need to do a little bit more, but we already have a good network already that we want to continue to build upon.

So the last slide is um basically a a last piece to say how y'all can help.

And so um, you know, I mentioned hopefully we can be able to count on y'all to share information.

Um we've already started a few meetings, but now it's time for the roadshow.

We built some materials, we've we built the collateral, we need to go start talking to people.

And so uh as y'all have referrals of community leaders, neighborhood associations, uh corporate groups, faith-based groups, what have you, we welcome those uh referrals.

We'll be following up to see if you have any.

When we met with uh council member Ockhorn's office, they had one, so it was it was a really neat thing.

Um, but that is one helpful thing, potentially too, to create kind of capacity within y'all.

Y'all are each of you and your staff are out in the community a lot.

Maybe this can be a part of your your messaging and updates and and and sharing ways that that those different networks can get involved.

And the second is the unified messaging piece.

I mean, again, it's kind of the way to say, hopefully, with with our electeds, with our with our community leaders or corporate leaders, whatnot, if we can all kind of say the same things, even if it has you know a little bit of different branding or whatnot, that will build trust in the community to say, well, I like all of y'all, and I like my employer, and they're telling me the same thing, so it must be true, and I can rely upon that information instead of say if there were different uh conveyors of messaging and someone's saying, Well, come to my thing or go to this thing, or uh creating confusion sometimes creates uh paralysis on the user to say, well, I don't know which one is the most important.

So I uh I I don't know how I can help if if they're telling me different messaging.

And the last thing is to start thinking about resources.

Uh we that's I know everyone's favorite word, everyone has a ton of money, but um, but really and truly we've shoestring this along, and uh I think we're proud of our work, and we're not that there's not an ask for dollars, but I think in general, there is a a thought about how this process can be you know resourced going forward so that there's a strong network of volunteer coordination and port and personnel across organizations.

They've heard me quite a bit talk about branding.

This is what happens when you go to office depot last night and you and you lean on your work printer.

It's it doesn't all look the same if we can kind of polish it up a little bit and think about some of your PR contacts that could be helpful to say, hey, let's wave a little magic wand so it looks better.

Um and then another piece is kind of the recognition.

You know, one of the thoughts that we talk about with particularly leaders like y'all is that you certainly have a network of resources and of people that that have neat opportunities to give.

Um, and and I think ways to encourage and steward some of our community volunteers is to think about hey, let's get you to an Astros game, let's get you a Texans preseason game, things that won't sell out, the zoo, the symphony, museums, things like that that are you know, they're not free, but they're likely available, and they could be ways to um create kind of a recognition pool for folks that that raise their hand when it when the time comes.

And so that is a long ramble.

Uh welcome any questions, and uh again, thank y'all for your time.

Well, thank you, Tommy, for the presentation, and uh I'm glad to see that you all are at a point where you're ready for referrals.

I was just making a list for you, and you and I will connect.

But um, I think certainly uh from my perspective, having done this once before, the uh need for ongoing engagement with volunteers is critical.

You know, I think that you know, sometimes we tend to stay kind of stale and then all of a sudden we need people and we reach out to grab and you know, people are in all different directions, but certainly that ongoing engagement because most people, if you ask them to volunteer, they they will.

But um, so just to clarify, are you the primary contact for this one because to introduce you to corporations or I'm happy to be we have several primary contacts that and I know that you met with uh Robert Gary, I think that we are um we have a lot of folks that thankfully have their hands raised, thankfully showed up today and and are watching, but um at least for that piece, and then I think you know we've kind of been keeping it close to the vest a little bit thus far, but but we're looking to ourselves to say we need to divide and conquer um different folks and portfolio things, um, think about warm handoffs, think about who knows people best and lean on the that trust and that those relationships instead of making cold calls.

So you're ready.

Yes, ready, set, go.

Well, thank you because uh we're ready.

Um I'm excited to see the progress.

Um there are no questions, no council members in the queue, no questions, and so we'll move on.

Thank you for being here.

I have one last sum up because I wrote it down and I want to make my uncle proud.

My uncle said uh if you're standing still, you're moving backward, and that's true in the Cuba Libre business.

He was teaching me about a Roman Coke at the time.

Um it's also true in the volunteer business.

And so this is this is a status update presentation, it's not the end of the story.

We're gonna roll our sleeves up and keep on going, knowing that you know, knock on wood, things are good this year, but we want to keep on uh preparing for the future.

Well, we do have thank you for that.

We do have one council member who popped up.

Ramirez, council member mayors.

Thank you, madam chair.

Tommy, uh no questions.

Just want to thank you for your presentation.

We had the opportunity to to visit virtually earlier this week, and I appreciate the work that you're doing on this.

Uh only good can come of it.

So thank you, John.

All right.

Thank you.

Great presentation, great update.

That's exciting news.

Uh, next up, uh, Miss Kitty, where are you?

Kelly Hearn with the mayor's office regarding she's gonna report in on the Houston Ready Round Table, and this is also exciting news too.

Thank you.

Hi, thank you for having me here today.

Um, we can just go to the next slide.

The slides are just to help me stay on track a little bit.

So our round table's been doing a lot of really exciting work for the past year and a half.

We've had seven meetings total, five of those meetings have been broken into individual groups.

Um we have vulnerable populations, financing, volunteers, food, handoff readiness, and neighborhood approach.

Those individual groups are able to meet during our roundtable meetings, but we also encourage them to meet on a monthly basis to continue to work on the problems that we've identified, the goals that they've set, and the things that we would like to see for the city moving forward.

So for our main meeting, um, we wanted to move groups a little bit of outside, a little bit outside of themselves, because we recognize that during a disaster, you're not gonna just be relying on the volunteer groups to handle volunteers within them.

The food group is gonna need volunteers as well.

So knowing how the food group can access those volunteers that volunteers works with.

The neighborhood approach group, they work closely with those neighborhoods, the neighborhood leaders, make sure that they know how they can connect to the other groups as well.

So for our main meeting, I created a disaster exercise for the groups to go through of a disaster hitting Houston, takes out all the infrastructure, um, communications are challenged, and we wanted to give the groups a chance to start to work together.

So during that meeting, we focused on that exercise, and the main themes that emerged from the exercise, um, there were three.

The first one was communicating readiness and safety protocols.

We recognize that communication can be challenging.

Um during blue sky days, right?

It's hard to find make sure that everybody's getting the information they need.

It's even harder during the disaster when power is out, people may not be answering unknown uh callers, things like that.

So we want to understand community communication preferences to streamline our outreach and aid delivery.

Just because you can go on Facebook for one population doesn't mean that everybody's gonna see it.

Instagram's there, the radio's there.

Some populations just want to hear what's going on from their neighbors.

They don't trust the media.

So we need to find a way to get into those communities.

Um doing that, we can use door knocking, recorded community meetings.

Um, and by recording those community meetings, we're gonna cut down on that community fatigue.

You're never gonna be able to set a meeting time that's gonna accommodate everybody, and everybody needs to know that information.

Um, much like city council adjusting meetings to be in the evenings so more people can participate.

I want to make sure that everybody can participate in these meetings as needed.

Um, canvassing and using neighborhood captain training like CERT to foster direct communication and to motivate the residents.

We want to see them take action when we're asking for action rather than waiting until it's too late and then asking for help.

Um, city support.

We want to establish communication structures with city departments that will support local local coordination.

So we have volunteer departments here in the city.

Let's get them linked in with our volunteer organizations to make sure that everybody has the support that they need.

Um, engage trusted leaders, collaborate with 311, the health department, council members, super neighborhood civic clubs, trusted nonprofits, apartment complex ambassadors.

The list goes on and on and on of people that can help us build trust and align their efforts when it comes to disaster readiness and recovery.

And the last one for this communication was volunteer coordination using sites like Volunteer Houston law enforcement and volunteers to distribute the information that's needed, especially in areas without power.

Um, and that can happen during a disaster and it can go on for weeks afterwards where people may not have a way to get that information, um, especially those that may be mobility challenged.

It's not easy just to go outside and check in and see what's going on.

The next uh major theme that we saw was prioritizing cleanup and services and vulnerable populations.

Um, with cleanup coordination, we can leverage local VOAD as well as crisis cleanup for debris removal, ensuring compliance with safety protocols, and use the greater Houston disaster alliance for home repair and support.

And just because I mentioned these organizations doesn't mean they're the only ones we're gonna rely on.

These are the ones that are identified during the meeting, and we're always looking to identify more partners as well.

Um resource communication, share recovery resources via OEM websites for city and county press conferences, social media, and partner jurisdictions, again, requiring on everybody to get that word out for us rather than just hoping that they see one place.

Um, and just again, just because this is being mentioned during the meeting as possible concerns, doesn't mean that this is something that we aren't already doing.

It could possibly mean that the person that brought this up during the meeting didn't know we already did it, which also kind of goes to that communication.

Um, rapid resource deployment.

We can pre-stage resources by mapping locations for rapid deployment within 72 hours post-disaster.

I know some of the council members already do that with the um crates that are located at the Houston Tool Bank.

Um, uh empowering neighborhoods.

We can use 311 data and neutral third parties like festivals and markets to rebuild trust and support recovery, avoiding reliance on uh potentially distratted distrusted entities.

Um, and the last main point from our main meeting was supporting vulnerable populations by identifying at-risk groups using STEAR, Alert Houston, next door, and other resources available.

We can reach out to seniors and individuals with disabilities in high-risk areas.

Transportation options, we need to make sure everybody knows what their transportation options are, whether it's Metro, Evolve Houston, church support, or other ADA compliant transportation for those with mobility concerns.

Um, deploying multilingual robocalls and early information and focused visual evacuation plans to ensure accessible communication and transportation.

Data sharing is another concern that we have because oftentimes during a disaster, um, they give their information to the first the first people that they see when they're checking into a shelter and they have case managers.

Oh, I'm still on slide number two.

I just haven't moved forward.

Um, I'll let you know, thank you.

Um they give their information and then they get moved on to a new case manager and they give their information again, and then that organization is done with their stage of recovery and they give their communication again.

So they're reliving this this disaster over and over and over again, and they don't know who's gonna be that final person that's gonna be able to help them.

So if we can promote better data sharing, we're gonna have a chance to keep these people in the system.

And that again, um collecting impact and needs data from disconnected communicate uh communities to align local efforts with official plans, which ensures inclusivity without alienating those residents, which is what can happen during some of these recovery efforts.

Um I really loved seeing all of our groups work together during that main meeting, seeing them get up from their tables, interacting with other tables to see who needs to be involved with those plans.

So for our August meeting, we move forward a little bit and we started to look at disasters that have happened in the past, how we responded to them, and what better recommendations we can have moving forward.

So I had each group put together like a display of a disaster, what happened, what their recommendations are in the future, and then I encourage other groups to go to the other tables with post-it notes.

Really simple, low technology, to put their comments of what they felt like their groups could have brought to that conversation.

And I do have those that I can send out to you.

I'm not gonna read off all seven of those posters for you.

Um I also do have photos of those posters, which were really great to see with some of the graphics on them.

Um so we can go to the next slide.

Thank you.

So I wanted to highlight what some of the members of the round table have been doing.

So Volunteer Houston, as you just heard from Tommy too, and I know we have some of our representatives here.

Um the website and sign-up processes have been updated to make it more seamless and accessible.

The updated system will create a more user-friendly experience, allowing volunteers to quickly find opportunities that fit their schedules, locations, and interests, um, as well as age, what they I think is really great because sometimes you have a family that wants to go out and volunteer, and then you get there and you find out your 13 year old isn't allowed to volunteer.

You can sort it by age to see if there are family friendly volunteer opportunities.

So I think that's a really useful, helpful tool that we'll be able to use during our next disaster.

Um I also wanted to highlight the work that some of our uh round table members did during the three corners apartments fire a few weeks ago.

So there were nearly 400 people that were impacted.

56 families lost everything, and 52 family units suffered from smoke and water damage.

Um, the memorial assistance ministries reached out, and they worked with various partners like Red Cross and United Way, but they were looking for more support.

So we did reach out to our roundtable members seeing if any of them could offer direct support.

And we did have DRC USA, which had a funder that was able to donate money directly to uh MAM ma'am uh to help with that disaster recovery.

And then recently, Governor Abbott has asked for assessments to see if the disaster met the threshold for disaster assistance, and it did.

So, starting, I believe today, the small business administration is gonna have location set up where people can go in and apply for those low interest loans to help them in the recovery process.

Another group that really has done some great things with updating their process is our food group.

So they've started a process to divide the response into three different phases life sustaining, replacement, and recovery with designated triggers for the organizations to provide support, um, starting with meals and MREs in the first 96 hours, followed by meals and grocery MREs and then grocery replenishment.

It's important that each one of those organizations knows what they're responsible for and when that triggers hit so that they can start providing the food that they know the communities need.

The group is also emphasized the need for daily coordination calls with other groups that will be providing food to make sure there's not a duplication of efforts.

That's one of the things that we did highlight during our August meeting was recognizing that sometimes one community speaks louder than another and they get all of these resources sent to them, which limits the number of resources that can go to other communities in need.

So we want to make sure those coordinations are happening on a regular basis.

We can go to the next slide.

Thank you.

Um the next one is our goals, and these are going to be changing, and I'm gonna go over that in just a minute.

But some of the rough goals that we've been working towards over the past year and a half would be developing handoff strategies for the disaster housing continuum, spanning from shelter to long-term housing and home repair with a focus on case management.

Our handoff group has been really meeting on a regular basis.

They meet every three weeks or so to continue the work that we've done the round table.

They're really one of the most active groups.

Um they've mapped out the sequence of housing delivery, identified key doctors, um, handoff points and gaps, and outlined necessary data sharing agreements.

And that data sharing agreement goes back to what I just talked about from our main meeting as well, right?

People get that fatigue of sharing their story over and over and over again, not knowing who has their information.

We need to make sure there's that continuity there with their data.

Um, their next steps that they're working on would be including uh finalizing MOUs and contact uh conducting renter-focused journey mapping, because we do recognize in the disaster continuum, there is a gap there when it comes to renters.

So much assistance is offered to homeowners whose homes were destroyed, but there's not a lot out there for the people that rent those homes that may have just lost all of their belongings.

Um, our readiness group has expanded their team to include uh more representation from government corporate and nonprofit members and identified potential partners and areas that overlap so they can enhance collaboration amongst their process.

And then our neighborhood approach group is focused on identifying equipment community leaders who can step up in times of disaster, guiding their neighbors through response and recovery.

So we recognize that the members on our neighborhood approach group are very important, but we also have a lot of communities that have their own leaders individually that we would love to engage with.

So we want to start inviting them to the meetings, and I invite you if you have somebody in one of your neighborhoods that you work with where you know they would be interested in working with the round table, we can invite them to that neighborhood approach monthly meeting to start to share their experience because we know there are people in those neighborhoods that people go to on a regular basis when a disaster happens.

Thank you.

So what's next?

What are we working on?

So I've asked the groups between now and November 20th, which is tentatively our next meeting date, to start going over their group goals.

Like I said, we've met seven times total, five teams within our five times with our groups, and I feel like we've settled into a really good base of people that come to these meetings every single uh quarter when we hold them.

So we'd like to see people update their goals.

We did goal setting back in August, which was only our third meeting, um, their first meeting with with their groups.

Since then, we've had members that have joined, we have members that have left.

We'd really like the members that are there and have still been there to help reset those goals for us, make sure that the goals that we have are attainable, that they're things that the community needs and they're things that we're able to work on with them.

Um we're also encouraging that other group, uh working with other groups like we did for the May and August meetings.

I'm starting to encourage them.

If you're having your monthly meeting and you know you're gonna need support from the volunteer group, invite them, invite those members and start to work collaboratively so we can solve some of these very real world problems.

Um, we're also gonna identify additional stakeholders to come to the smaller group.

So, like I said, that neighborhood approach group, we're gonna be inviting people from the communities to come in.

Um, our next meeting is in November, and during that time, I'm gonna be having our group share out what they've been working on for the past three months.

I want to see what those updated goals are.

I want to see what goals they have that they really feel like they've accomplished that they can come off of that list and be checked, um, and what our focus is gonna be moving forward.

Um, that's all I have.

Thank you so much for your time.

Thank you.

Great presentation.

Um, the only question I would have is for instance, let's say something happens.

Um, would you all uh immediately start coordinating with OEM and work together and divide and conquer?

Absolutely.

So we I do have a spot at OEM, so if a disaster happens, I will be at OEM.

Um, some of our stakeholders, some of our members are already at OEM depending on their um their places.

And I have the phone numbers and emails of every single person in the round table and my cell phone.

So as soon as something happens, we're able to jump in.

I know back in January when we had that first freeze come through, three days before that freeze, we were already on the phone with Red Cross, making sure that we had what we needed before we needed it.

Great.

Uh, any questions around the horseshoe?

Comments, Councilmember Ramirez.

No comments.

Thank you.

Thank you for your presentation, just double checking.

All right, thanks for being here, Kelly.

I appreciate the work that you're doing.

Thank you so much.

Have a good afternoon.

You too.

Uh, next up, we have Marley Maskell with the Houston Tool Bank, one of the best kept secrets to some in the city of Houston.

Thank you, Marley.

Come on down.

Thank you.

Hopefully, not a secret for much longer.

Well, it's great to be here with all of you.

Thank you for having me back.

I presented um to this committee about a year ago, a little bit more than a year ago, but it was in between the Derecho and Barrel.

So we've had a lot of activity since then.

So I appreciate the opportunity to share updates about our partnership with the city.

And yeah.

You can go to the first slide.

So big picture, um, the Houston Tool Bank operates a tool lending program.

So we steward an inventory of almost 16,000 tools that we share across the entire nonprofit sector, and that includes any tax-exempt entities, so like government offices as well, can borrow from us for their projects.

Um, you'll see on the graph there that disaster recovery accounts for about 10% of our activity.

However, all of our operational planning is focused around disasters.

So we plan to be as efficient as possible during disasters, which definitely makes us operate well during non-disaster times as well, but it is the real the real focus of our operational planning for our organization.

Next slide.

So to hone in a little bit more on the disaster support.

Any of our nonprofit partners are eligible to borrow any tools that they need from us during times of disaster, whether it's before a disaster strikes or throughout the long-term recovery process to support their projects that support those recovery efforts.

Um, so these can be things like hosting a preparedness clinic ahead of time so that their community is prepared or repairing a home six months after an event.

And in addition to that, we try to be as strategic as possible to minimize the amount of times that it or the amount of time that it takes to access our resources after a disaster.

The Houston Tool Bank was founded in 2014, so we've responded to many disasters in the area since then.

But in the early days, we did have some missed opportunities where we weren't able to get to our warehouse or we weren't able to distribute the tools because the roads weren't travelable after an event.

And so we've been thinking really strategically over the last several years about how we can make sure that there is no delay in accessing those critical resources when a disaster strikes our area.

The first thing that we did was we positioned what we call neighborhood tool hubs around the greater Houston area.

So you'll see on the slide a shipping container plant panied with flowers.

We have six of those around town, seven of those if you count the one in our parking lot.

And what we do with those is before a disaster strikes, we will pre-stock those hubs with tools that are needed.

So those tools are already available in the communities.

If something happens and we're not able to get to our warehouse, we're able to say, hey, go to the Habit City Center, go to the hub on Galveston Island, go to the hub in our parking lot, and there's generators or muck and gut kits or whatever there might you might need available for you until we're able to physically access our warehouse.

The other way that we think strategically about disaster is through partnerships with organizations that we know are going to respond.

So we work really closely with organizations who have a disaster plan to make sure that we have those tools in our inventory and available, and we stay connected throughout disaster season to pre-position those tools with those organizations if they're needed.

And the biggest partnership that we have is with City of Houston.

So if you can go to the next slide.

So we have direct partnerships with eight City of Houston council members.

Many of you are here today.

It's great to see you all again.

And through those partnerships, we um reserve an inventory of almost 1,200 tools that are restricted solely for the use by those districts.

They also have access to our entire inventory of tools.

But what having that reserved inventory inventory does is guarantee access to those most critical tools that are immediately reserved should we be impacted by disasters.

Things like generators, chainsaws, AC units, and muck and gut kits, things that fly out our door as soon as a disaster is in our area.

If we know a storm is heading our way, we will pre-position those within the districts with pre-identified disaster hubs so that there's no delay in those responding entities having access to the tools.

If we don't know, or if we're caught by surprise, we'll distribute the tools as fast as we can.

And then we stay connected throughout the long-term recovery process to replace and replenish those tools as the needs change.

So we'll replace the AC units used for the cooling center with muck and gut kits for home repairs with drywall hangers once we get to the long-term recovery stage.

But we'll stay connected as long as it takes to support that recovery.

So if you go to the next slide, I have just a little bit of detail of what that looked like during Hurricane Barrel.

Um this is one that caught us by surprise, unfortunately.

We were connected before the event, but just decided not to pre-position because we were following guidance that we weren't going to be directly impacted.

But because of that, um our team was in the warehouse first thing in the morning the day after landfall, and we distributed tools as fastly as possible across not only our um district member or council member partners, but also the voeds that we work with as well.

So we distributed tools that supported those immediate volunteer reception centers, cooling centers, and resource distribution sites.

Um we worked with council members to position uh generators and ace units in individual constituents' homes when they didn't weren't able to travel to cooling centers, and then we supported those um cleanup and recovery needs and home repair needs.

We're still partnering with VoADs today who are doing those long-term home repairs as well.

And then next slide.

Just to zoom out a little bit from the individual disasters, but to our overall partnership with the city of Houston.

We've had our uh disaster preparedness partnership in place since 2021, um, and we have built great relationships with the council members that we work with.

You'll see a billboard that we did in partnership with council member Thomas on this slide.

Um, and we also partner with the Department of Neighborhoods who must have just walked out and the Solid Waste Management Department to support their community activities as well.

And if you can go to the next slide.

So for a breakdown of the type of work that we do with our our partnerships across the city, so um the direct disaster response accounts for about 25% of the activity.

This includes those big storms like the Derecho and Hurricane Barrel, but also individual constituents who pop whose power goes out in the middle of summer and they need a generating agency unit because they're they're overheating in their own homes.

So we we really look at that wide spectrum of what is considered disaster.

Um we do a lot of activities um around lot clearing and debris removal to help it with those blue-skied preparedness steps that we can take to minimize the disaster impact should we have one.

And then we also support um other events like community resource fairs, backpack distributions, job fairs, and other projects that our our part city partners are doing in the community.

And that is all I have for you.

I really want to thank you all for your time and the chance to share a little bit about our partnership with you.

If you have any questions, I'm available.

Thank you.

What a great organization, one of my favorites, truly.

Thank you for the work you do and supporting our entire city.

I don't know that the average uh citizen knows the impact that you all have really had.

Certainly a great resource.

Um staff from Councilmember Peck's office.

Thank you, Chair.

Hi Marley.

Thank you for the presentation.

I just wanted to say on behalf of Vice Mayor Pro Tem, thank you to the Houston Tool Bank for your efforts and collaboration, especially during disaster preparedness and during recovery efforts.

You guys do an awesome, awesome job.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you for coming down today.

Uh at this time we had no public speakers signed up.

If there's any uh speakers in the audience, please feel free to step forward.

Yeah, hello.

Good afternoon.

Hi.

State your name.

I'm Pastor Deb Benario Martin.

Nice to meet you.

Some of y'all in person.

I've met some of you online.

Um I didn't sign up to speak.

I volunteered to serve on this committee in Houston uh Super Neighborhood Alliance, along with number 63, Ricky Cardenas.

We agreed uh to be part of this.

I haven't quite got that put together yet.

Um as far as anybody reaching out to us, but I represent Super Neighborhood 45, North Side North Line.

And we're also a part of the Northeast Super Neighborhood United.

That is 17 chapters that are flood impacted, and that includes District B and H.

And so I just wanted to uh tell you I love the work you're doing.

I'm familiar with all the presentations that were just given.

Uh work with quite a few of these people already.

Um what we're doing that I wanted to address you as is that I have two things.

Number one, the faith community.

Um Zelma Friends is our group.

We're a small group of Quakers.

Uh we do work to improve quality of life and social determinants of health in underserved area of North Line.

Um we have uh we're in year eight of our tenure healthy, wealthy, wise, resilient North Line plan.

And um this plan is getting into what we call micro-neighborhood work because in order to start this super neighborhood, and we're not active yet, it's taken a lot of work.

60,000 people in four zip codes in an area that's a food park medical resource desert, which we're improving.

Uh, but there's no place to meet.

There's no uh school that you can meet in.

Uh there is no community building and um not at our park, North Line Park.

So we're gonna develop with Melrose Park, it's in our territory, and we're gonna hope to get a lot of engagement there because they have a room, and we're utilizing National Night Out for the whole month of October.

We're gonna have disc golf there with the Houston Parks and Rec and try to bring in stakeholder engagement to get everybody that's on the menu over to the table.

And when I say on the menu, I don't mean no one's really trying to hurt them.

It's just that we have a large collection of multifamily HUD units, things, places for elderly.

Um you might be familiar with Independence Hall on a Boris.

The mayor was out there, they had a fire, uh 20 units burned, and a gentleman passed.

Um so we're trying to say that we're on the I-45 between Tidwell and the Beltway.

Um, and we know segment one is gonna bring us uh some changes.

So we want to uh y'all to know there's a lot of people that are vulnerable, special needs and at risk, and those are the people that Zelma uh works with.

And I thank you for the time.

I'm sorry to run over.

I generally don't get out.

I work online.

I've had two strokes, uh, but this work must be done, and God calls me to it.

So thank you so much for your indulgence.

Um thank you.

Thank you for it.

Don't go away.

Don't go away just yet.

Uh your time, your time has not expired, although I heard a bell ring.

Um no, thank you for the work you do and trying to to be a uh resource for your friends and neighbors.

Um that area when you say North Line, I'm certainly familiar.

I got my driver's license at the DPS at Jor North Line Mall back in the day.

That was the only thing around.

Um I'd love to have a conversation with you offline to see how we can help you.

Uh you said you found a place to to meet uh at Melrose, but certainly there are some resources I think that we can help connect you to, but happy to work with you.

And I think you may have me emailed our my office today.

And so uh I've not been in the office today, but certainly would get to you.

But we'll meet with you after the meeting.

We have great response from all city council that we've reached out to.

Absolutely.

So I want to thank all of you, even the ones that aren't here, and particularly Mario Castillo, who works very closely, and we're very excited to be working with his office.

Thank you so much for the time.

And I I I like to be here some more.

We'll see how this goes.

It's um I've made one and I made one super neighborhood down here, so I'm gonna get myself kept up and then I'm gonna come down here.

Well, come back anytime.

You're welcome.

The door is always open.

Thank you.

Any other comments or questions from the audience?

If not, it looks like we're done.

Thank you all for being here.

This concludes the resilience committee meeting.

Thank you.

Have a good day.