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Chris Bennett

Chris Bennett's Blog (17)

CB2: Pet Preparedness 5 Years After Katrina

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Added by Chris Bennett on September 1, 2010 at 8:00am — 8 Comments

CB2: QR Codes for Crisis Response

What is that goofy-looking barcode to your right, you ask? It's called a QR (Quick Response) Code and it can store over 4,000 alphanumeric characters in this two dimensional black and white image. Think of it as a cryptogram or cipher readable by mobile devices. The one displayed here for instance ac
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Added by Chris Bennett on August 25, 2010 at 2:49pm — 8 Comments

CB2: Twitter Fast Follow for Crisis Alerting

Last week Twitter announced Fast Follow, a way for citizens to subscribe to your Tweets via S
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Added by Chris Bennett on August 18, 2010 at 12:51pm — 18 Comments

CB2: 3 Crises You Should Know About

Today's CB2 is by far the least uplifting to date with at least three major active crises in the eastern hemisphere:

1. Heat, Smog, and Death in Moscow

7,000 are estimated dead so far from record temperatures in Moscow and may climb as high as 15,000 in the weeks ahead, putting it in competition for the deadliest heat wave in recorded history. This figure comes from a mo
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Added by Chris Bennett on August 11, 2010 at 8:00am — 2 Comments

CB2: Can This Guy Keep Us Interested In Haiti?

Le Président Jean?

I, like many of you, read t

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Added by Chris Bennett on August 4, 2010 at 11:03am — 10 Comments

CB2: Getting Emergency Notification Right

Mobile emergency notifications can save lives by getting important messages out to (or soliciting them from) the public quickly. Whether it's a phone call delivering a tornado warning minutes before touchdown or a text message alerting students of a shooter on campus, there's no doubt that it's an invaluable service when done right.

But what do I mean, "
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Added by Chris Bennett on July 28, 2010 at 1:50pm — 3 Comments

CB2: Storm=Brewing, Well=Capped!

It hasn't hit the mainstream yet, but Florida residents need to keep an eye on what could become Tropical Storm Bonnie heading their way this weekend. Keep an eye out for a special edition CB2 should Bonnie pose a serious threat.

Forecast track

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Added by Chris Bennett on July 21, 2010 at 12:01pm — 4 Comments

CB2: Will We Ever Prepare for Disasters?

Where to begin? How does someone who has dedicated the better part of the past 5 years to family disaster preparedness come to terms with the conclusion that people who prepare will always represent such a tiny minority? In this week's CB2, I'll break from the oil spill temporarily to present an issue that's been weighing heavily on my mind.

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Added by Chris Bennett on July 14, 2010 at 12:54pm — 16 Comments

CB2: Understanding the BP Relief Wells

It's day 77 and we as a whole are losing interest in the oil spill. The top two CNN.com headlines right now are about Bobby Fischer and the heat wave, what caught my attention this morning is, "Oh cool. LiLo is going to jail," and if you prefer numbers, Google search traffic for "oil spill" is down 63% since late May.

This shouldn't come as a surprise, as our collective attention spans for disasters
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Added by Chris Bennett on July 7, 2010 at 1:11pm — 2 Comments

CB2: When Hurricanes Meet Oil

With the strengthening of Hurricane Alex, today marks the first hurricane of the 2010 season, and the 70th day since the Deepwater Horizon explosion. The question on everyone's mind is without a doubt, "What impact will a hurricane have on the oil spill
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Added by Chris Bennett on June 30, 2010 at 12:30pm — 13 Comments

CB2: Oil Spill Heroes and a Personal Update

A Shout-out to Heroes

With all the talk of heroes on GovLoop, I thought it would be cool to highlight some of the real heroes in this oil spill: the National Guard and Coast Guard. Over 2,000 of these men and women have dropped everything to work around the clock protecting our coast and wildlife from the threat of oil.

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Added by Chris Bennett on June 23, 2010 at 8:00am — 7 Comments

CB2: Did Obama make you feel better?

I just arrived back in New Orleans to begin planning the next phase of the nearshore oil vacuuming process for BP and US Flood Control. Just as it sounds, we'll be vacuuming oil that has accumulated in waters too shallow for larger barges or skimming. It's a huge job, but
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Added by Chris Bennett on June 16, 2010 at 8:00am — 15 Comments

CB2: Oil Spill - Not Your Typical Disaster

The oil spill is the largest ecological catastrophe of my lifetime, yet it's very different than most other disasters. We all care about it some, but it's hard to care about it as much as other crises on this scale. In this post I will explain why I believe so, then provide my Top 3 Needs (after "cap the damn well" of course).

  • The oil spill presents no immediate threat to the
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Added by Chris Bennett on June 9, 2010 at 8:00am — 4 Comments

CB2: Here I am, rock you like a hurricane.

Hey GovLoopers! I’m happy to announce that I’ll be contributing Chris Bennett’s Crisis Blog (or CB2, not to be confused with Chris Rock’s “rockumentary” CB4) each Wednesday, highlighting cool and important things going on in emergency technology. Please share the comment love to kick this off!
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Added by Chris Bennett on June 2, 2010 at 9:23am — 8 Comments

Gov2.0 Expo: How to do Gov2.0 for the kids?

The opening keynotes at the Gov2.0 Expo were overall very impressive. With slides advancing automatically every 15 seconds amounting to 5 minutes per speaker, the presentations were well-rehearsed nuggets highlighting projects run by bright people that everyone should be paying attention to.

One presentation I particularly liked was Liz Losh's "12 Don'ts for Government 2.0." The point that changed my thinking was "#2. Don'
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Added by Chris Bennett on May 26, 2010 at 8:41am — 1 Comment

Hero Day - Granting wishes for children of fallen soldiers

Fellow GovLoopers, today I'm happy to announce the launch of Hero Day - a new organization focused on granting wishes for children of soldiers who have given their lives in service of our country.

My colleague Peter Loui and I started working on this back in November after seeing this photo of five year old MacAidan at his father's funeral:
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Added by Chris Bennett on April 12, 2010 at 4:59pm — No Comments

Apps.gov Needs to Carry the Public Records Torch

"...only 18% of Apps.gov services enable agencies to comply with public records laws"

If you're viewing your town's Facebook or Twitter account, chances are the city attorney is still recovering from a social media migraine. And you may think I'm joking, but somewhere in your state
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Added by Chris Bennett on March 26, 2010 at 11:30am — 2 Comments

Latest Activity

I vote for #7! Great piece!
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Simple: I believe in our mission at EPA. In my 17 years here, I've literally helped save the world by working to protect the ozone layer, helped people understand acid rain, and run our response websites for 9/11 and Katrina. And now I lead our enti…
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Gov 2.0 Radio and Jamith Peterson are now friends
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Both Government Workers and Federal Contractors network through Web 2 and 3.0 - this group embraces the federal contractor on GovLoop.
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We're swinging into the final weekend of summer. Looks like we are safe from the hurricane, so to keep the season going as long as we can, time to list your favorite summer songs. What makes you feel like school's out? What is a song that defined a…
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I.J and Lauri Stevens are now friends
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San Francisco's aggressive open data efforts were on display this week, as civic and technology leaders took the stage at sf.govfresh, an event highlighting technology innovation in City government. City CIO Chris Vein (who also was recently intervi…
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I want to have both my votes to go to # 8 good job Kyle
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