The “Ready—Or Not” Project provides free emergency preparedness services to California organizations that care for cultural and historic resources (e.g., archives, libraries, museums, and tribal nations).
This project is supported in whole or in part with funding provided by the State of California (administered by the California State Library), and runs through May 2026.
Follow the project on LinkedIn for additional updates from the team!
FREE Services
California heritage institutions can request free consulting services by filling out an online form, emailing [email protected], or calling 855-501-3020.
Emergency Preparedness Assessments (On-Site)
A team of emergency preparedness consultants based in California conduct free, on-site emergency preparedness assessments for participating organizations and deliver a summary report that documents the organization's current state of emergency preparedness.
Each report includes recommendations for mitigating risks, taking emergency preparedness actions, and completing a disaster plan, thereby providing each with tools to better protect their collections in an emergency, ensuring that California’s cultural heritage is preserved into the future.
Schedule a Consultation
Disaster Plan Creation or Update (Remote/Online)
An emergency preparedness consultant will work with you one-on-one to gather the information needed for them to write or update your organization’s disaster plan. This work is done remotely.
Request disaster plan assistance
In-Person Wet Salvage Workshops
These in-person workshops cover disaster recovery basics—risk assessment, preparedness, response, and recovery. Participants will analyze two disaster scenarios, practice wet salvage techniques, and gain hands-on experience with a preservation expert. This training enhances annual disaster plan reviews and prepares attendees to be effective first responders. Only open to California-based participants.
Register for Upcoming Workshops
Online Classes and Training Videos
Training opportunities focused on emergency response and collections salvage.
Access to dPlan|ArtsReady
An online tool for risk assessment and emergency planning.
FAQS
Learn More
- What happens at a full-day site visit consultation?
An emergency preparedness consultant travels to each site for a full-day consultation (9am-4pm). The agenda includes an introduction and discussion of emergency preparedness goals, followed by a 3-hour Q&A session on past incidents, current practices, and risk assessment. After lunch, there is a facilities walkthrough, and a wrap-up meeting for final questions, impressions, and next steps. If the walkthrough takes 2-3 hours, a full-day is suitable for your organization.
- Can my organization meet for a half-day consultation?
An emergency preparedness consultant can visit for a half-day (10:00am to 2:30pm). The agenda has a flexible schedule but is meant to include a 3-hour Q&A session on past incidents, current practices, and risk assessment. There is a brief facilities walkthrough. If the entire building, including cultural heritage storage, can be seen in 30-60 minutes during the walkthrough, the half-day option is suitable for your organization. If some staff or volunteers are present for part of the day, the schedule can be adjusted to meet their availability.
- We have offsite storage and multiple locations. Can you visit all my sites?
Yes, if you are a multi-site organization that holds several locations under one entity, we can plan to visit each site. Please provide the number of branches, buildings, or offsite storage locations to be assessed. This will help us schedule one or more days for site visits to cover all locations. We will tailor the consultation schedule to accommodate your organization's needs.
- What staff need to be at the consultation?
We encourage attendance from as many staff and volunteers as possible, particularly those in Collections, Facilities, and Operations, during the consultation. If some individuals need to arrive or leave mid-day, the consultant will adjust the agenda to accommodate their participation. For instance, if the facilities manager can only join for an hour, we will prioritize covering facility-related questions and walkthroughs during that time. If your team is small (one or two members), we still encourage as many people as possible to attend and actively participate in the disaster planning process, including the site visit consultation and assessment.
- Can my organization really participate if we only have one staff/volunteer or a small collection?
YES! "Ready – Or Not" encourages small organizations to participate. We work with your small organization to determine what your disaster planning needs are and how much capacity your staff or volunteers have to carry out recommended actions.
- What do we discuss at the site visit?
The discussion focuses on past incidents, current practices, and risk assessment for building, collections, and human safety.
- What is in the report after the consultation?
The Emergency Preparedness Assessment Report provides observations and recommendations for various areas, such as business continuity, IT security, physical building security, protection of collections, facilities risk mitigation, water and fire protection, and human safety. The report, tailored specifically to your organization, includes best practices and actionable recommendations to minimize risks, plan and prepare for disasters, and effectively respond. Additionally, the report includes an Appendix with valuable resources to support your organization's disaster plan.
- When will the consultant send the report?
You receive an Emergency Preparedness Assessment Report about two weeks after your site visit consultation.
- How long do organization staff or volunteers have to make edits to the report?
We encourage organization staff or volunteers to review our Emergency Preparedness Assessment Report and make any factual corrections within three months of the visit.
TESTIMONIALS
"On behalf of Grupo de Teatro SINERGIA at the Frida Kahlo Theater, we want to express our deepest gratitude for the detailed and comprehensive consultation you gave us on emergency preparedness. You immediately understood the needs of a small arts organization, and the realities and challenges we face in a post-pandemic environment. Your site visit was extremely thorough.
We really appreciated the time you took to patiently listen to our needs, take a tour of the facilities, and advise us on how to begin creating a detailed plan to ensure both safety and succession/continuity of business for our organization. The 35 page report, plus templates and additional resources, will be invaluable as we move forward. Consulting with you regarding preservation of our archival materials was extremely helpful, as we gain awareness of the importance of our history, not only to the theater community, but to the Latinx community at large.
We would also like to acknowledge the California State Library for funding and the Northeast
Document Conservation Center for implementing this program, which would have been beyond the scope of our resources. Grupo de Teatro SINERGIA wholeheartedly recommends this program and has given your information to several other Latinx theater companies in Los Angeles."
- Rubén Amavizca, Administrative Director at the Frida Kahlo Theater
“I wanted to take a moment to express my deepest gratitude for your valuable time and effort spent with our museum staff yesterday for the 'Ready-Or Not' Cultural Heritage Disaster Preparedness Project. Your insights and expertise were truly enlightening and have significantly contributed to the success of our project. Your dedication to preserving and promoting cultural heritage is inspiring, and we are incredibly fortunate to have had the opportunity to learn from you. The knowledge and perspective you shared will undoubtedly help us in our ongoing efforts to safeguard our cultural heritage.”
- James Bier, Museum Director of the Santa Ynez Chumash Museum and Cultural Center
NEws AND EVENTS
- New Story! "Disaster Planning in California: Putting the 'Ready—Or Not' Project in Perspective"
- Since 2022, NEDCC’s “Ready – Or Not” team has visited more than 375 organizations across California, including archives, museums, libraries, historical societies, tribal nations, county clerks, public art collections, cultural centers, state historic parks, national parks, university cultural departments, community organizations, outdoor art installations, and missions and diocese collections, wildlife associations, and botanical gardens.
- “Ready—Or Not”: Cultural Heritage Disaster Preparedness Project Receives Additional $1.7 Million (press release)
- RoN participants use their assessment reports to secure funding for emergency preparedness:
- NEH awarded the GLBT Historical Society funds to purchase and install preservation furniture for rare and unique archival posters.
- NEH also provided funding to the Automotive Research Library - Horseless Carriage Foundation for storage shelving, emergency response supplies, and online training to improve stewardship of materials related to automobile history.
- Groundwork Grants supported the Mineral King Preservation Society in acquiring items to better preserve and protect their collection.
- Groundwork Grants also supported Turtle Bay Exploration Park with funds to enhance the stewardship of their permanent collection of art, artifacts, historical documents, and images.
Project Background
Learn More
Press Release 2025
Press Release 2022
California Grants Portal
See Portal ID 8843, https://www.grants.ca.gov/grants/ready-or-not-cultural-heritage-disaster-preparedness/
Emergency Preparedness Among Cultural Organizations in California
2020
California is home to one of the most diverse and expansive cultural collections in the world. These photographs, books, diaries, manuscripts, pieces of art, and other artifacts are the primary keepers of local and tribal history and art.
In 2020, the California State Library and its cultural heritage partners embarked on the California Cultural Collections Protection Survey, which gathered information about the state of California’s cultural heritage collections and the extent to which institutions prioritize, plan for, and resource collection protection. The survey data estimated 1,200 cultural collection-holding organizations lacked disaster preparedness plans. Many of these collections are at grave risk of disasters, including natural events such as earthquakes or floods, as well as human-caused emergencies or threats.
Project Summary
2022
In response to the results of the California Cultural Collections Protection Survey, NEDCC was awarded $3.14 million to steward the “Ready – Or Not” Cultural Heritage Disaster Preparedness (press release) project, a three-year initiative to assess emergency preparedness at California organizations that care for cultural and historic resources (e.g., archives, libraries, museums, and tribal nations).
Since 2022, NEDCC’s “Ready – Or Not” team has visited more than 375 organizations in California, including archives, museums, libraries, historical societies, tribal nations, county clerks, public art collections, cultural centers, state historic parks, national parks, university cultural departments, community organizations, outdoor art installations, and missions and diocese collections, wildlife associations, and botanical gardens.
Each visit resulted in a summary report with recommendations for identifying and mitigating risks, taking emergency preparedness actions, and completing a disaster response plan.
The consultants gave advice as organizations worked through the recommendations and followed up to monitor and encourage each organization’s progress in completing its disaster plan. The planning process itself is crucial to emergency preparedness, as it encourages communication, documentation, and collaboration—all of which are important skills for successful disaster response.
Having taken these steps, each organization is better prepared to protect its unique collections in the face of a range of emergencies such as wildfire, earthquake, flood or mudslide, pipe break, extended power outage, pest infestation, terrorism, unexpected closure, and public health emergency. This, in turn, ensures that California’s cultural heritage is preserved into the future as part of the historical narrative of the state and its people.
In addition, the summary assessment report, self-completed disaster plan, and preparedness actions demonstrates an organization's commitment to preservation and can be used to support applications for grants and other funding that may be available to strengthen collections care and emergency preparedness.
2025
NEDCC received an additional $1.7 million in funding from the California State Library (CSL) to expand the “Ready—Or Not”: Cultural Heritage Disaster Preparedness Project.
With the additional funding, the project will continue its current project activities through May 2026. Additional services will be offered to support emergency planning for cultural heritage organizations, including:
- Assistance in writing or updating disaster plans for participating organizations.
- Access to dPlan|ArtsReady, an online tool for risk assessment and emergency planning.
- Delivery of online classes, training videos, and in-person workshops on emergency response and collections salvage.
- An on-demand course on disaster planning, available for California organizations to access anytime to refresh staff and volunteer knowledge.
RECORDED Information sessions
Learn More
Explore ways to engage in an emergency preparedness consultation.
Disaster Preparedness for Community Archives: View the recording.
Disaster Preparedness with Limited Resources: View the recording.
Disaster Planning for Remote and Rural Museums: View the recording.
Disaster Preparedness for Small Organizations: View the recording.
Disaster Preparedness for Tribal Organizations: View the recording.
Disaster Planning for Tribal Cultural Heritage Organizations: View the recording.
Getting Started with a Disaster Plan: View the recording.
Getting Your Library Ready for Disaster: View the recording.
Updating Your Disaster Plan: View the recording.
Resources for Participating Organizations
Pocket Response Resource: Instructions for Arts and Cultural Organizations
Download the Pocket Response Resource template here.
Learn More
What it is:
- A concise emergency resource that can be tucked in your pocket or stored on your device for immediate access to emergency contact information and emergency response actions.
- A template that your arts or cultural organization, of any size or type, can easily customize, update, reproduce, and distribute.
- An initial element of your more detailed and holistic preparedness plan. It’s a great place to start, and a great exercise to get your team engaged in thinking about emergency planning in a way that’s approachable and that quickly results in a useable document.
What it’s not:
- It is not a readiness, emergency, or disaster plan. A plan is a combination of documents, processes, policies, trainings and drills that has been developed by an internal team and is familiar to all key staff and volunteers.
- It is not a replacement for training and drills for staff and volunteers who may need to immediately respond to an emergency. Preparing and training provide the ‘muscle memory’ to swing into action right away.
- It is not the place to stop! Visit https://www.nedcc.org/free-resources/disaster-assistance/ for more information and resources to build out your complete preparedness plan.
How to fill it out:
- Less is more. You may be tempted to load this document with information that seems convenient to include. Don’t! Users must easily find exactly the information they need in the critical minutes and hours after an emergency. And, adding too much information will expand the document to three pages.
- Based on your particular computer, device, or operating system, the PRR may display differently. You may need to make some minor adjustments to ensure your PRR covers only two pages.
- Fill out a separate Pocket Response Resource for each of your buildings/locations.
- Consider security. You may need to include sensitive information in this document, which can be risky in wide distribution. (Examples include personal contact information, institutional financial and security information, facility access points and security details, etc.)
- If your organization has multiple facilities/buildings on a campus/complex, staff from each facility should work together. Complete those items which are common across the organization, including the institutional contacts and responses, and then tailor the remainder to specific locations.
This project is supported in whole or in part by funding provided by the State of California, administered by the California State Library.
