What can you do?
Libraries, museums, archives, and arts and historic preservation organizations across the nation will set aside May 1, 2010, to participate in MayDay, a national effort to prepare for disasters.
Sponsored by Heritage Preservation and other members of the Heritage » read more
What can you do?
Libraries, museums, archives, and arts and historic preservation organizations across the nation will set aside May 1, 2010, to participate in MayDay, a national effort to prepare for disasters.
Sponsored by Heritage Preservation and other members of the Heritage Emergency National Task Force, MayDay encourages organizations to take one simple step to protect the art, artifacts, records, and historic sites they hold in trust.
Do One Thing for Emergency Preparedness!
If you have a disaster plan, dust it off and bring it up to date.
If you don't have a plan, make a timeline for developing one.
Get to know your local firefighters and police.
Invite them to tour your institution and give pointers on safety and preparedness.
Identify the three biggest risks to your collection or building (such as leaking water pipe, heavy snow, or power failure) and outline steps to mitigate them.
Conduct a building evacuation drill and evaluate the results.
Update your staff contact information and create a wallet-size version of your emergency contact roster. See the Pocket Response Plan™ (PReP™) at www.statearchivists.org/prepare/framework/prep.htm.
Eliminate hazards such as boxes and furniture in hallways, blocked fire exits, or improper storage of paints or solvents.
Join forces with nearby institutions and develop a protocol for helping each other in case of a disaster.
Identify and label priority collections and objects for evacuation during emergencies. Which are most important to your mission, irreplaceable, or most fragile?
Register for a free course to learn how your institution fits into existing emergency response protocols. A list is available at www.heritagepreservation.org/lessons/courses.html.
Learn more about MayDay from Heritage Preservation’s news release. A text version and logos are available to use in newsletters and other publicity at http://www.heritagepreservation.org/programs/TFlessons/MayDayAnnc.html#logo
For more ideas and to see what other organizations are doing, visit http://www.heritagepreservation.org/programs/tflessons/MayDay.html, and the Regional Alliance for Preservation (RAP) website for links to RAP member sites!
Preservation Week, May 9 to 12, 2010 - Pass it on!
Take this opportunity to celebrate collecting and preservation in your community, and to highlight your institution as a source of preservation information. Some 630 million items in collecting institutions require immediate attention and care. Eighty percent of these institutions have no paid staff assigned responsibility for collections care; 22 percent have no collections care personnel at all. Some 2.6 billion items are not protected by an emergency plan. As natural disasters of recent years have taught us, these resources are in jeopardy should a disaster strike. Personal, family, and community collections are equally at risk.
ALA encourages libraries and other institutions to use Preservation Week to connect our communities through events, activities, and resources that highlight what we can do, individually and together, to preserve our personal and shared collections.
Here are some ideas:
• create a display about preserving and collecting personal, family, or community heritage
• offer a preservation workshop or event or
• highlight Preservation Week on your web site with a link to ALA’s Preservation Week resources.
For more information, resources, templates, graphics, and ideas for celebrating Preservation Week, visit http://www.ala.org/ala/mgrps/divs/alcts/confevents/preswk/index.cfm.
You can make a difference to help save our heritage!
