CHAPEL HILL - With the height of hurricane season still a month or two away and the memory of last year's devastation of the Gulf Coast still fresh, there is still time to rethink our approach to disaster preparedness, especially for the poor and disadvantaged in our communities.

These groups are no less informed about disasters than others, but the consequences of not being informed for them are more severe: they tend to live in low-lying flood-prone areas and in houses less able to withstand the forces of nature; they don't have the money needed to stockpile food and water or make other recommended disaster preparations; they struggle to evacuate; and don't have the savings, insurance or access to credit necessary for recovery. For these groups preparedness is vital.

With the support of FEMA, over the past year we've been figuring out how to increase levels of awareness and preparedness among disadvantaged people in order to reduce the impact of disasters on them. We've talked to emergency preparedness professionals in six states along the Atlantic seaboard (from Florida to Delaware) as well as people who have lived through disasters, including some who are currently working in the Gulf area.

We've learned there are parallel systems at work before and after a disaster strikes -- the formal emergency management system, and an informal community system. Both are effective, but neither is sufficient acting alone. Our challenge is to get the two systems working to support each other for the survival of the community.

The formal system is based on a military model and uses a top-down approach to managing disasters. When disaster strikes it takes over, often unaware of the way the community operated before the disaster and discounting the value of local social networks afterwards.

In the informal system, people know and care about each other. When disaster strikes, they risk their own lives and give generously to help their neighbors and are frustrated sometimes when the formal system's bureaucracy ties their hands. (For example, after Katrina volunteers answered the call but often had to stand by until someone at the top decided what to do.)

As people emerge from a disaster, however, the formal management system can reduce the level of chaos by assigning experienced people to certain roles or official responsibilities -- but people who need help often do not know whom to call upon in the formal system, or where to go for the help they need. Though likely to be more trusted, informal systems cannot provide support equal to the technical and financial resources that accompany a presidential disaster declaration.

We must create an integrated system where the formal and informal act in concert. To do this, emergency management officials need to "partner" with citizens and citizen groups to share information, identify populations with special needs and gaps in current plans, and then find ways to fill those gaps by maximizing formal and informal resources -- before another disaster strikes.

Identifying local resources could be as simple as locating those people who don't have cars but do have driver's licenses and would be willing to drive school buses to help evacuate others who have no transportation. Communities could create a roster of people, by neighborhood, who will need special assistance in the event of an emergency (the elderly, single mothers, people with disabilities) so that they can be accounted for when the time comes. Communities can also identify groups that might be willing to feed and shelter displaced residents or become resource centers during recovery.

To be effective, preparedness planning needs to involve every citizen and agency that could have a role in managing disasters, especially those serving the populations who will need the most help afterwards. The harsh lessons of Katrina demand no less.

(John Cooper, Ph.D., manages the FEMA Emergency Preparedness Demonstration Project at MDC Inc. of Chapel Hill, in cooperation with UNC's Center for Urban and Regional Studies.)