Society for the Preservation of Natural History Collections September 2020 - 16

Society Reports
of October, and there already have been nine as we enter
peak hurricane season. For real-time information visit:
National Hurricane Center and Central Pacific Hurricane
Center: https://www.nhc.noaa.gov/
*

Wildfires: as of this writing, there are 86 large wildfires
in 15 states, most being in California. Wildfires not only
affect forests, but also buildings (commercial and residential), water treatment facilities as well as museums.
For information on wildfires see the National Interagency
Fire Center: https://www.nifc.gov/fireInfo/nfn.htm

Derechos: recently, a very large derecho impacted primarily Illinois and Iowa which had sustained winds of
110 miles/hour. For general information on derechos:
https://www.weather.gov/lmk/derecho

Prepare your museum for natural disasters by following
Smithsonian Cultural Rescue Initiative on twitter: @SmithsonianCRI and on Facebook: Smithsonian Cultural Rescue
Initiative. And note that COVID response activities efforts are
hindered and exacerbated by storm-related impacts.

Spotlight on Puerto Rico Recovery

HENTF member activities have helped build resilience in the
Puerto Rican arts, culture and historic preservation communities. Most cultural institutions are still in the recovery phase
from Hurricanes Irma and Maria which occurred during autumn 2017. And to add to the recovery timeline, many museums and institutions are struggling with recovery efforts due
to multiple earthquakes occurring in the area this past year.
The Alliance for Cultural Emergencies Puerto Rico (founded
by the Heritage Emergency and Response Training - HEART
graduates) provided substantive recovery training for staff
at several cultural institutions including museums, archives
and libraries. Multiple task forces are looking at long-term
capacity to repair and recover cultural heritage buildings by
focusing on traditional trades, such as masonry, and establishing training in traditional building methods. In addition
to support from task forces, the nonprofit, CERF+ The Artist
Safety Net, is helping studio artists with disaster recovery and
issues due to COVID.

COVID-related Issues

In the United States, due to funding cutbacks, permanent
closures of some institutions of higher learning are a possibility. HENTF would like to explore assistance opportunities for
collections and records held in university museums, libraries,
archives, and science departments.
Respectfully submitted,
Lisa Palmer, SPNHC representative to HENTF

16 * SPNHC Connection

Integrated Digitized Biocollections
COVID-19

Obviously, all of us continue to grapple with COVID-19,
both in our personal and professional lives. From an iDigBio
point-of-view, we note many people in the community can
continue their work remotely, while
others are not able to for many reasons,
including no access, lay-offs, and furloughs. As iDigBio moves into year 10
soon, we seek to offer help in any way
that we can, to support continued digitization of collections and related activities (e.g., education, outreach, diversity,
inclusion, capacity development, data use). One example is
the latest Webinar Series: Adapting to COVID-19: Resources
for Natural History Collections in a New Virtual World.
Not surprisingly, another trend seen is the demand for more
online resources. We all need to figure out ways to continue
to increase accessibility to resources and expertise. One
example, given our current (mostly remote) work situations,
is that most of us now know Zoom very well. Another dream
of mine for SPNHC revolves around adding tools beyond the
NHCOLL-L listserv that help support the missions of SPNHC
to be truly international in reach and provide members with
up-to-date ways to stay in contact and work together. Several years ago, Genevieve Tocci made my Slack for SPNHC
dream come true. With the need to plan SPNHC 2020 online,
many more SPNHC members joined this Slack community
and experienced how this tool helps in a way that cannot be
said for email and listservs. The planning team agrees, we
could not have planned the conference in the timeframe we
had without Slack. The SPNHC Slack community is growing,
all of you are welcome to join.

Posters

[Cue music: You Make My Dreams Come True]. As part of
the planning team for the SPNHC and ICOM NATHist 2020
online conference, I volunteered for the opportunity to take
on poster submissions. Some of you have heard me lament at
the ephemeral nature of posters. So sad for you all to work so
hard to visually represent information, only to have it reduced
to a paragraph abstract in the future. Excited for the challenge
to give these graphic works a longer, richer life, I knew the
SPNHC wiki would be one option for creating a more permanent resource. After finding and experimenting with gallery
options in the wiki, I found a useful one for this purpose.
With the magic of collaboration, Emily Braker stepped in
to take over managing uploads (and dealing with some wiki
software issues), and Liath Appleton took on getting these
posters a spot on the conference website. Please have a look

https://www.nhc.noaa.gov/ https://www.nifc.gov/fireInfo/nfn.htm https://www.weather.gov/lmk/derecho https://www.idigbio.org/content/webinar-series-adapting-covid-resources-natural-history-collections-new-virtual-world https://www.idigbio.org/content/webinar-series-adapting-covid-resources-natural-history-collections-new-virtual-world https://culturalrescue.si.edu/what-we-do/resilience/heritage-emergency-and-response-training-heart/ https://www.spnhc.org/virtual-meeting-2020-posters/

Society for the Preservation of Natural History Collections September 2020

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