Winter came early this year, and many communities had a snowy Thanksgiving. While snow storms can certainly be fun (think snowmen and cross country skiing), they can be dangerous (think power outages and car crashes), and therefore local governments should ensure that there is a focus on storm preparedness in their communities to keep residents safe for the holidays.

Because successful winter storm preparedness involves so many different partners within communities (including but certainly not limited to fire departments, EMS, police, public works, emergency management, power companies and schools), local government managers need to be involved in planning for winter storms to ensure that everyone is working together in tandem. To help them do this, I pulled some great resources together from ICMA and beyond.  

• From ICMA’s Knowledge Network, here are 7 different stories about community’s innovative snow removal and winter preparedness plans.
• Leonard Matarese from the Center for Public Safety Management gives his 5 top take home points for public safety during storm conditions. 
• Emergency Management Magazine has an interesting take on how GPS and the internet are helping large municipalities modernize their snow removal efforts. 
• Is your community StormReady©? Check out what it takes to be storm ready by the National Weather Service’s standards, and get your community StormReady© certified!
• Thanks to Emma Finch of FacilityDude for this great blog post on communication during crises. For more, you can also check out the new InFocus Report on crises communication. 
• The folks over at Governing Magazine give you this inside scoop on Philadelphia’s snow emergency response practices.

How does your community prepare for winter storm emergencies? Who takes the lead? Share your own experiences below.