The Bainbridge Prepares’ Food Resilience Team Veg Club, as always, is itching to get started on another season of abundant growth.

This month the Prepare in a Year topic is water. Do the Prepare in a Year activity (submit the form if you want to enter to win a prize), but also teach yourself more on the topic.

We’re starting our Prepare in a Year 26 program with water because, without it, you’re not going to last very long after a disaster.

Prepare in a Year 26 starts now. You can take care of all of your worries about being prepared for disasters by following our monthly readiness program, which tackles one topic per month.

The Dumpster Fire of 2025 is coming to an end. We can hope for a better 2026, but there will certainly be more natural and unnatural disasters near and/or far in the upcoming year.

The two most important things you can do to prepare for emergencies are to ready your household and connect with your neighbors.

After our series of atmospheric rivers, we are now being gifted with blizzards in the Cascades and Olympics. Try not to travel through the mountain passes, but if you must then be sure to add these items to your vehicle.

With the wind whipping us all over the place today, it seems like a good time to remind everyone about Bainbridge Island Fire Department and Puget Sound Energy rules regarding downed wires:

Nothing says I love you and care about you quite like the gift of emergency preparedness. Show your family and friends this holiday season that you’re thinking about them by giving them something they actually need and that might just save their life.

More than 70,000 (possibly as many as 100,000) people have been given evacuation orders during the current flooding of rivers in western Washington. All 10,000 residents of Burlington were asked to evacuate Friday (Dec. 12) morning.

The National Weather Service is predicting heavy rain for the next six days at least. The rainfall is coinciding with King Tides, between today and December 9. This combination puts low-lying areas at risk for flooding.

On Bainbridge Island, we use the Map Your Neighborhood (MYN) Program to help neighborhoods organize and prepare for disasters. To date, more than 54 percent of households on Bainbridge have gone through the program. If your neighborhood is one of the other 46 percent, you need to get connected.

Our Prepare in a Year program helps you get ready for disasters, like large-scale earthquakes that isolate us from outside help for weeks or longer. By tackling one simple task per month, you can get your household in good shape by the end of a year.

The task for December is to work on increasing the resilience of your neighborhood and community.

The partnership between Bainbridge Island Fruit Club and the BP Food Resilience Team, an initiative called Grow for Helpline, generated more than 3,000 pounds of food for Helpline House in 2025. Helpline House, the local food pantry, is experiencing a new level of stress generated by federal cuts to food aid and increased usage of its services.

Last Week in Lousiville, at the International Association of Emergency Managers (IAEM) Conference, Bainbridge Island Emergency Manager Anne LeSage and BP Program Director Pascal Schuback received the 2025 IAEM-USA Preparedness Award on behalf of the City of Bainbridge Island and the BP Water, Safety, Hygiene (WASH) Team.

Terra Anderson of South Whidbey Prepares (SWP) reached out to tell us that their organization’s website went live on November 16. SWP is modeled after Bainbridge Prepares.

The fall issue of PNW Bainbridge Magazine featured BP and it’s future-thinking approach to emergency preparedness.

On October 3, Bainbridge Prepares threw its annual Volunteer Appreciation Dinner at Kiana Lodge. About 100 guests gathered to reocognize the very special contributions of a few notable BP volunteers.

On October 5th, a sunny day, more than 150 south end Islanders gathered at their Disaster Hub—Fort Ward Community Hall—to tour the Hub.

Our Prepare in a Year program helps you get ready for disasters, like large-scale earthquakes that isolate us from outside help for weeks or longer. By tackling one simple task per month, you can get your household in good shape by the end of a year.

The task for November is to is to learn key skills.