Jeff,

Simple or complex answers? Pete's suggestion to involve the staff is A-1 in my book, BTW.

I think you have an especially complex situation if you and other staff (with families?) are living in the same building (upstairs?).

IMO, a week is a heck of a long time to try to keep that many folks sustained and sheltered on your own. The 72 hour rule of thumb is probably tough, too, depending on your climate and the exact circumstances. And if you need to evacuate your urban area, so will everyone else around you - that's not realistic to plan for on your own.

I think some risk-assessment is in order. What are likely scenarios, what are the likely consequences of those scenarios, etc. Also, I suggest you chat (a lot) with your local emergency management agency. Who knows - maybe they have specific plans in place for your facility in certain situations (I would hope so, with 150 homeless folks in one facility). You'll be ranked below, say, hospitals, but... and if they have NOT factored in facilities like yours into plans, you may just be able to participate in building a cooperative plan with the agency.

Really general here because I don't know enough particulars in your case to get more specific:

A lot of urban emergencies are handled in hours. Some take a day. Large scale disasters vary - an extended effect of something like massive storms can be loss of power and possibly other utilities for fairly long times. But other types of large scale disasters - perhaps a conventional terrorist attack, if you think that is probable - either permanently affect your facility or they don't, and any shelter-in-place options are likely to be of fairly short duration, regardless - say 1 day or three before massive aid swarms in to help.

What kinds of adverse things are probable at your facility? How much of those consequences are you going to have to deal with alone? And for how long?. There are common things that can happen, such as loss of the structure to fire. What will you do with all those folks?

Move on to overnight situations. Then 24 hours. I suspect that by the time you get 72 hours covered, you'll be the most prepared facility of its type - and well-prepared by an absolute yardstick.

Not sure how you plan to train staff, but if you have a large staff, I suggest that you always have a skilled leader on site, designated as the disaster coordinator du jour. Also, as Ike supposedly said: "Plans are useless. Planning is essential" (I hope that concept applied to disasters is clear enough).

If you want to explore this more, please share additional info - your climate and urban setting would be a handy bit of info to share. There are a ton of folks here who will have great ideas, and several are "in the business", so to speak.

Regards,

Tom