I’m a new member to this great site/community, so please bear with me. I’m probably explaining more than I need to, but being vague always gets me in trouble when asking for solutions to a problem.

Here’s the situation: I am a Christian missionary working within the homeless community in the intercity of a large US city. We have about 20 staff where I live/work and we run a number of programs, not only for the homeless but also for the surrounding metropolitan area, including hosting youth groups (up to 130 high school aged kids) to come and work alongside of us in our ministry. They get to experience a reality that they never could have imagined in their fairly sheltered suburban environment. Their stay usually lasts between 2 to 7 days.

In the event of an emergency, i.e. natural disaster, terror attack, etc, the favored choice would be to ‘shelter in place’. In storage at our facility is enough food (mostly rice in 5gal buckets) for 150 people (max occupancy w/ staff and students) for 7-10 days. There is also about 1000 gallons of treated drinking water in 55gal plastic drums. This food and water is rotated and replaced every five years (just rotated in September and the water and food was uncontaminated and still in good shape to consume). But beyond that, there is not much else that is slated for emergency use only. There are several propayne camping stoves that would presumably be used to cook the food, but their main duty is for yearly camping trips with staff and small groups of students. There are also basic hand and some power tools available that are used for building maintenance. A few flashlights too, but nothing I’d bet on surviving a short fall off the shelf. First Aid is mostly boxes of band-aids and a few bottles of aspirin, tylonol, and ibuprofen. Most of the staff live in the building we work in, including myself, so I should have quick access to my own personal gear, but it’s tough to keep enough for 150 people on my own.

I want to propose some additions to the stock of food and water (first aid equipment is number one priority) but what else?

My ideas:
Most of the people I work with wouldn’t be carrying any of this daily, so I’d like a few lanyard/key rings or something similar to ‘issue’ each of the staff that includes:

Small folding knife
Emergency whistle
Some form of fire starting
Small flashlight (probably LED)

What else would you add for the staff? For the students? General supplies?
What if we had to evacuate the city? (What a nightmare! Getting 150 people, teenagers at that, out of harms way, leading them to ?)

Suggestions welcome. Budget is a big consideration.


Thanks,

-Jeff