What is a POD?
It is a method used to sub-divide a community into smaller portions, to help facilitate communications and planning, for Firewise or emergency preparedness in general.
It can be considered a way of grouping homes together, helping neighbors collaborate for evacuations, watching out for one another, and having a list of residents to give to First Responders during emergencies.
The typical size of a Pod is 10-12 houses that are co-located
This technique has been used successfully by the Chemeketa Park Firewise community, and is under consideration in several other communities
The Details
Each Pod has a "pod leader" who agrees to be the point of contact and coordinator for that group of houses. That Pod leader may be responsible for recruiting/enlisting the other households in the Pod.
The Pod leader is not necessarily a member of the Firewise Steering committee, but would collaborate with that steering committee as needed (if a Firewise committee exists).
The Pod leader creates/maintains/shares a contact list within the Pod, and helps coordinate activities such as emergency evacuation plans, possible brush clearing days, ways to improve street and house signage, etc. That contact list could include an email distribution list, shared contact info in a spreadsheet, shared accounts and docs such as google docs. The contact list could include not only name, phone # and email addresses, but also information about pets (that may need to be evacuated), children at local schools (who may need pickup coverage), people who might need special help to evacuate (elderly, disabled), people who have special skills (doctor, fire professional, chain saw owners, etc)
The Pod leader coordinates with other Pod leaders in the community for agreeing on community wide priorities, actions to support a shared goal, such as Firewise recognition or emergency preparedness
The first community meeting for a Pod being formed could focus on how neighbors would like to collaborate, ideas, and priorities for emergency preparedness (such as go-bags, assembly locations for evacuations, etc)
For example: in an emergency, what is the most effective way to notify everyone in the Pod? Some Chemeketa Park pods use the GroupMe app to send group texts (for emergencies only.)
Subsequent community Pod meetings could be on a quarterly basis, to review what's working, what's not, and priorities for the next few months.