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Key Takeaways
Community resilience is relational, not just technical
Emergency preparedness is less about what’s in your toolkit, and more about who is in your toolkit. CREW’s approach centres neighbour-to-neighbour connection, trusted local volunteers, and everyday relationships as the real emergency infrastructure.
Conversation circles as preparedness tools
- If you have to leave, what will you take with you?
- Who or what will you worry about most before, during, and after evacuation?
- What would you hope is organized for you when you arrive at the evacuation destination?
These questions can help to surface practical and emotional needs, such as concern for Elders, children, transit orientation, access to appropriate food, cooking together, play groups, community connection, and avoiding isolation in hotels or other placements for evacuees.
Centering Dignity
The St. Jamestown examples showed how community members respond in ways formal systems often miss: bringing hijabs, jackets, boots, and culturally appropriate supports to evacuees. Evacuation response should protect people’s dignity, culture, religion, food needs, mobility, family responsibilities, and sense of safety.
Evacuations compound existing inequities
From urban, high-rise evacuations, Indigenous community evacuations, rural/remote evacuations, and climate displacement, people already facing housing insecurity, poverty, isolation, language barriers, or systemic racism experience evacuations more severely.
Communication and coordination are life-saving
Evacuations in Canada show a need for better coordination between agencies such as Red Cross, Indigenous Services Canada, provincial governments, health authorities, Chief and Council, municipal emergency services, and local volunteer networks, in order to reduce confusion, duplication, gaps, and harm.
Mental health, trauma, and psychosocial support
Evacuation is often a traumatic experience, especially for people who experience multiple evacuations. Mental Health First Aid and psychosocial support can build needed capacity when neighbours, volunteers and community leaders are supporting folks in community.
Volunteers are essential but under-supported
CREW, like many community-based orgs rely on creativity and strong volunteer infrastructure rather than stable core funding, but community outreach requires capital for printing, coordination, materials, demonstration supplies, food, transportation, and basic expenses.
Intergenerational leadership
CREW’s model includes youth, seniors, families, and informal building-level leaders. Young people become future volunteer leaders, while seniors and long-time residents often hold trusted relationships and practical knowledge across buildings and floors.
Multi-channel, multilingual outreach
The outreach strategy relies on 'every door is the right door', using posters, chats, WhatsApp, word of mouth, in-person gatherings, regular meeting spaces, multiple languages, food, potlucks, and being consistently present in community.
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