Building the Neighborhood Phone Tree

In case of an emergency, do your neighbors have your cell phone number? Do you have theirs? The Hermosa Beach Emergency Preparedness Advisory Commission reminds residents to share contact information with their neighbors.

A letter from Commissioner Gila Katz that stresses the importance of creating a "neighborhood phone tree" is included in the panel's meeting agenda for Monday night (see accompanying letter under photo.)

Katz, Hermosa Beach Police Department chaplain, wrote that one of her neighbors had a dangerous reaction to his medication last week. As someone called 911, Katz and other residents nearby didn't know how to contact the man's wife because no one had her cell phone number.

"What all of us realized is that we need to have a phone list for one another so that in an emergency we can find each other," Katz wrote. "It takes only a moment to get all our home and cell numbers on an e-mail, which can be shared with the neighbors."

This list of contact information serves as a "phone tree," and can even be programmed into smartphones.

"I would suggest that everyone talk with your neighbors all around you and develop a phone tree that you can program into your cell phones," Katz wrote. "Certainly there is a real comfort in knowing that at any time you can find your neighbor when you are in need."