And after another 2 months that have screamed past in what felt a matter of minutes, the team is growing and flourishing. In one month from yesterday, the countdown for the pre-pledge will be up, and The Concert 2012 season will officially end. Fortunately, the systems will continue.

We recently hired a fantastically talented Musician called Chris, who also happens to know a thing or two about web development. Chris has been tasked with taking the functionality of ‘The Concert’ and integrating it into this website. This means that once the pre-pledge is finished, if you visit www.theconcert.co.nz it will redirect you to the flash new projects page at volunteerarmy.org. From here, you will be able to view, search, or sign up to volunteer opportunities just like for the concert, but with a few new features that Chris says will be ‘really neat’. This is exciting.

To add to the betterment, if you are a community group, charity, or good-sort-who-feels-like-helping-others-out-off-your-own-back and are looking for some volunteers, listing up what you need is now going to be even easier. Keep your eyes peeled.

Finally, next week Sydney is host to the Optus RockCorps event - tell your mates across the ditch to check it out. You might recognise the idea…

Stay cool.

With things finally starting to settle down for 2013, We thought it was about time to updated you all on what the Volunteer Army Foundation is going to be up to in 2013!

Since returning from NYC we have been tidying up the loose ends from The Concert and are now well in to planning our activity for 2013. There are plenty of exciting volunteering opportunities in the pipeline which we are beginning to organise.

Keep an eye on our facebook page for the latest updates, and if you haven’t already then be sure sign up to The Concert so you receive the odd newsletter updating you on our antics!

Bring on 2013

So it’s our second to last day in NYC and it is looking like things have finally fallen into place.

Over our first few days here it became clear that a central coordination framework for existing volunteering organisations was needed. In an earlier update we said “The direction we’re heading in is top level initiation of universal on the ground process and procedures”, and as of about two hours ago it looks like this is becoming a reality.

They say luck is where preparation meets opportunity. We have spent the last two weeks preparing a system that allows organisations to communicate with each other, then this morning whilst briefing 380 US National Guard infantry about how to use the survey app, we got the opportunity we were after.

Adam briefing the National Guard.

A member of the Mayors Office who attended the briefing struck up conversation, asking what we thought needed to happen, why, and how. She completely agreed with our thoughts and recommendation, sent some quick emails, and boom. We’ve just transferred the base, RV, and supplies from 129th into a compact military tent at Floyd Bennett Military Field. There are marquees ready, available, and pencilled in for use as a designated volunteer dispatch centre (much like the Big Top tent in the UCSA carpark in February 2011). 90% of our required technology is being installed as I write.

Our new temporary command tent, next to one of the Marquees

Using a centralised staging area, National Guard and volunteers can be dispatched to comprehensively survey the affected areas. So far today 1,034 surveys have been completed on a fleet of 120 Samsung Galaxy 10″ Tablet’s (thanks to the Office of Emergency Management). This data is immediately and automatically collated, set to be pushed to the relevant organisations to do the work required.

120 Samsung Galaxy 10inch Tablets used for data collection on the electronic survey. Results are immediately collated, saving hours, and thousands of dollars of labour.

Serendipity,  luck,  hard work,  whatever it is, phew! Everything is falling into place. If only we had more time over here.

When various goals, plans, and actions align, cooperation is likely. At last, cooperation looks likely.

The concept is simple:

1. Take a sufficiently detailed data collection method, and make it easy to use and readily available. Mandate it’s use. Out with paper surveys and hordes of monkeys frantically typing data in from wrinkled sheets; in with a universal survey, remotely accessible by any internet capable device, anywhere. Lucky smart phones are the majority! The survey in this picture is what emergency call centre staff in New Jersey and Vermont would input data into when someone called them about..well..anything. They would take the opportunity to get ‘across the board’ data about the needs of a property and it’s inhabitants. It was built and is managed by a single guy called Aaron, sitting in his house in New Jersey.
   As an approved volunteer organisation, we can also input data. But more importantly, we can view the requests for help (with beautifully specific but succinct details) and ‘claim’ the job – letting all other groups know that it’s going to be taken care of. Upon completion, it’s marked off and the job is closed.
2. Channel collected data to appropriate organisations, ready and waiting for their chance to help.  With so many complex requirements, a job is rarely as easy as just showing up to do the job and then it’s done. Flooding as a result of the hurricane means muck in basements. It also means damaged power boards, water supply, walls and roof, potentially damaged sewage facilities, and the imminent growth of mould and many other nasties. Plus it’s been snowing. There’s a certain order that some tasks need to be taken care of – you don’t turn on the power if the roof is still leaking, and you don’t fix water with an absence of waste water lines. If these jobs are not coordinated between each other, people wait for weeks for the power company to arrive, not realising they need to get a builder first. Or when the plumber shows up, he leaves if the mud and sand hasn’t been removed yet. Centralised communication and coordination of tasks is vital. This platform needs to be intuitive, accessible, and *most importantly* it needs to make everyone’s life easier by using it.
3. Share. It’s a strange phenomenon that after a disaster somehow everything manages to fall into the ‘unprecedented’ category. Despite the thousands of historical mishaps, we seem unable to predict what is going to happen. Decisions invariably get stalled until days or weeks after critical moments, and eventually that most terrifying leap is always made when there is no other option. What’s the worst that can happen? Nothing.  We seem capable of only learning from our OWN burnt hands, despite the historical trend of development. As some of the newest spring chickens in the field, even we are able to predict the train wrecks as they first start moving.

That’s enough of a ramble, more to come.

It’s an interesting thing, discussing regions and sizes in a place you find wholly unfamiliar. The last few days our efforts and discussions have centred largely around mapping, accessibility of information, and the delicate balance between detail and ease of understanding.

Inter-agency cooperation is a familiar topic, and by no means ground breaking stuff. With a few large organisations (or organiZations, as we are becoming accustomed to), it’s a manageable process to facilitate a conversation so that each respective effort can be complimentary to the others. This conversation becomes considerably more difficult with dozens if not hundreds of smaller groups that don’t even know the conversation is happening.

The problems in the Rockaways are certainly noteworthy. Unfortunately, across the whole east cost the problems are similar. But larger. After a brief stint of canvassing for information (140 people over two days), we had this many ‘help requests’ lodged.

That seemed quite a lot for a small area. Until taking an expanded view:

The problem we are crunching through surrounds making needs information secure enough to prevent exploitation, yet still available enough that small and honest groups are able to make a meaningful contribution with their spare afternoon. More productivity, less aimless door knocking in previously swamped areas.

The lessons we have learned previously have been invaluable in saving time effort and energy in our immediate surroundings on the ground, but the truly effective lessons are the development of macro-level decision frameworks and tools, that not only allow, but encourage cooperation and coordination between independent work teams on the ground. It’s encouraging that these things are entirely feasible for such a large area and population, having first sprouted in little ol’ Kiwiland.

Learnings from this trip have already changed the direction of our thinking around volunteer coordination, and we’re excited about the prospects for The Concert and it’s next generation siblings. We like to think that New Zealand will be a continuing world leader in whatever it decides to turn it’s attention to.

It’s Sunday night here in NY so we thought we’d head to a near by bar to watch some Sunday Night Football (Green Bay Packers vs New York Giants for those interested, Giants smashed them 38-10). Went for a quick walk into Times Square and took this panorama – look closely to see what takes up one of the main billboards…

The Hobbit in Times Square, NY

The Hobbit is advertised everywhere here, pretty cool to see NZ repping it in the Big Apple!

Tomorrows agenda involves putting the finishing touches on the website, and then showing it off to various volunteering organisations so they start listing projects on it. Fingers crossed they like it!

Bed time now

I just realised none of our updates have properly explained what we’re spending our days doing over here. As we’ve mentioned, one of the barriers to an efficient clean up following the hurricane has been a lack of communication and coordination between the countless organisations which are volunteering to help with the clean up. This was noticed a couple of weeks ago and we were asked to come over here in the hope that we can find a solution… I think we have.

The concept drawing of website header… watch this space!

It comes in the form of a website, titled Taskforce: Rockaway.

The site allows all of the major organisations working in the Rockaways to list projects which need volunteers. Volunteers simply pledge to a project until it is at capacity, and then go out and do it on the day. Sound familiar? It is heavily based on TheConcert.co.nz - that platform has the tools required to achieve the goals over here.

So basically any organisation can register projects on the website, and volunteers can then look through them and pledge their time to a project. This allows other organisations to see what has been done, and not waste time planning to do the same thing. Planning and developing that has been what we have been doing the past few days.

We also have a nifty map system in the pipeline which will make identifying which homes have been cleaned super easy, but we’ll tell you about that another day.

P.s. it just started snowing!!

Yep, it’s that holiday that we all hear about in NZ but never really understand. To be honest I still don’t really understand it but I can tell you one thing, the food is epic! Turkey left right and centre, pies (of the dessert kind, not steak & cheese) galore, and people who are thankful for what they have (no matter how little it is, especially in current circumstances). A pretty cool occasion on all accounts.

Hurricane sandy has done little to get in the way of this holiday, and by the sounds of it nothing will. Many families are spending it in our warming tent rather than at home, but it seems like a classic case of ‘the more the merrier’. Enough turkeys to feed thousands have been donated to our shelter, and even the tables within the tent have been dressed up in a red table cloth.

The view from the entrance to the tent

It’s a pretty big deal over here, with today and tomorrow being public holidays for it. Unfortunately this means our plans to roll out a large scale volunteering program are on hold as the people we need to have meetings with are on holiday. Fingers crossed we will make some more progress tomorrow though.

Unfortunately you can’t share the food with us on this holiday, but you can definitely share the spirit, get amongst and be thankful. Happy Thanksgiving!

The thing about disasters is that people want to help. In a city of 25 million people (or thereabouts), that’s a lot of help. Some of this help is from people who own businesses – big ones.

To make this village operate, everything is built from temporary equipment:

• Giant diesel generators power everything
• a 2.4m inflatable beachball looking thing provides high speed internet to anywhere you set it up in the world
• Marquees form buildings and housing
• Solar panels can charge phones and mobile wifi devices (when the sun appears)
• Water is bottled
• Toilets are portable

But responding could never be easier.

The high prevalence of smart phones means that at least 1 in every 2 people can access webpages from anywhere in the area. This makes coordination and communication paper free and instant.

Data collection

Part of the plan includes a mobile webpage that acts like an app. It works on any smart device, and works as an electronic survey. On the first day, we sent 30 volunteers on a surveying mission, and they came back with data from all of these places.

The end of paper

This survey had a couple missing questions, so half way through the day, it became temporarily unavailable (for 120 seconds) and then it was back up, updated, and immediately collecting the latest info needed.

Realtime request updates

If you are clearing the yard or basement of someone who needs an electrician, you can simply fill out the survey with a few answers and immediately submit that to the central database which pushes these requests to the appropriate agency. We responded to 4 urgent medical enquiries on the first day, establishing an informal link between ‘us’ and the Visiting Nurse Services of New York.

Technology, saving lives. Oh, and I’m sitting in a car tethering internet from a cellphone right now. Technology rocks!