Welcome to Resilient Town and Resilient Town’s Museum • 74
Welcome to Resilient Town’s Museum Resilient Town’s Museum is a well-known part of town life: a place for everyone throughout their lives, and that connects the past, present and future. The Museum’s functions in the town have changed over the years, but they have always been about aiming to be a positive asset to the town, and giving people opportunities to exercise their rights to education, to cultural participation, and to access their shared heritage. After Resilient Town’s last disaster (let’s call it a flood, but it could be anything), the town looked at what institutions and sectors in the town could do to help society be better placed to face disasters in future. The Museum was identified as a place that could help educate people and raise awareness, bring people together, and that housed important cultural and natural heritage that needed safeguarding. The Museum was also a good place to connect people with the town’s plans, and to connect the town and its people with issues facing the wider world. So, the Museum came to play a key role in Resilient Town’s future planning, working with other partners.
The Museum has plans in place for its own survival, and understands how a range of different types of disaster could be managed as well as possible, in the circumstances. It doesn’t aim to be the biggest or best museum in the world, or in the country, but it aims to be a part of the town for the long-term, and it aims for this because the town and other partners have told it that they want it to be there for the long-term. Resilient Town’s Museum provides people with opportunities to debate, shape and contribute to plans for the town, to face the future with confidence. People in Resilient Town take part in community activities at the Museum, that explore both the possibilities of, and risks to, Resilient Town. People draw on their heritage and communities, as well as information and traditions from elsewhere, that can play a part in supporting equitable, fair, and vibrant communities. People understand the importance of addressing the causes and consequences of disasters facing the town, their own property, and in the wider world.
Museums and Disaster Risk Reduction • 00
