Creating a COIN in Your Community

Principles of Community Engagement (CDC, 1997) represents the first time the relevant theory and practical experience of community engagement has been synthesized and presented as practical principles for this important work. It defines key concepts and insights from the literature that support and influence the activities of community engagement.

A summary of Principles of Community Engagement can be found in the resource guide.

Every person who lives, works, or travels through your community should be able to access information in an emergency. To ensure that happens, regardless of the communication and other barriers, you must first know who is in your community at any given time and how best to reach them with messages that will motivate action.

Community engagement and collaboration is crucial to achieve truly inclusive emergency planning. Comprehensive preparedness is only possible when public health professionals integrate the knowledge and skills of governmental and local public service providers, community-based organizations (CBOs), faith-based organizations (FBOs), and public health toward a common goal of enhancing communication, response, and recovery efforts. Community organizations should be involved in emergency preparedness planning from the beginning and engaged at every step of the way.

The process to accomplish this mission is divided into three phases: define, locate, and reach. Each phase includes specific activities to help you create and maintain your own community outreach information network (COIN), a grassroots network of people and trusted leaders who can help with emergency planning and give information to at-risk populations during an emergency.

By following the steps in each of these phases, you will have laid a solid foundation for your network, and you will be more prepared to reach at-risk populations during an emergency.

Kentucky Outreach Information Network (KOIN)

Since many people can be difficult to reach through mainstream media in a disaster, the Kentucky Cabinet for Health and Family Services continues to build and maintain a person-to-person network that can reach these at-risk populations. This network is referred to as the Kentucky Outreach and Information Network (KOIN).

Through the KOIN, the state is using trusted people and agencies in local communities, informal and formal groups, and the media to get its preparedness messages out. The KOIN includes hundreds of trusted partners and can reach vulnerable segments of the population.

This network can be used not only in emergencies or disasters, but also to protect the population’s health in day-to-day situations such as immunization clinics, diabetes education/screening, or flu shots.

Previous | Next