LOCAL GOVERNMENT
Practical preparedness and capability for local government before, during and after disruption.
Forward State Advisory supports councils to strengthen existing emergency and recovery arrangements, build role confidence, test how plans work in practice and augment capability when operational demands increase.
The focus is practical: helping staff understand their roles, making existing local government preparedness and capability arrangements easier to use, and improving how teams coordinate when conditions become complex.
LOCAL GOVERNMENT IN PRACTICE
Strengthen what already exists for local government preparedness and capability. Make it easier to use when it matters.
Councils already operate within established emergency-management, recovery and governance arrangements. Forward State does not seek to replace those systems with another framework.
Instead, support is focused on clarifying and strengthening existing arrangements, building staff confidence, testing how plans and playbooks work in practice, and helping councils prepare for changing operational demands.
READINESS & ARRANGEMENTS
PEOPLE & CAPABILITY
COORDINATION & RECOVERY
Strengthening existing plans, activation pathways, role clarity and preparedness arrangements before they are needed.
Building practical confidence through training, exercises, facilitation, role development and applied learning.
Supporting effective coordination during disruption and helping councils transition into structured, sustainable recovery.
PREPAREDNESS
Make existing arrangements clear, usable and ready to activate.
Municipal emergency-management arrangements
Activation and escalation arrangements
Contingency planning
Recovery readiness
Practical readiness assurance
Preparedness support helps councils examine how existing emergency and recovery arrangements will work in practice — from governance and escalation through to coordination, contingency planning and recovery readiness.
The goal is not more documentation. It is greater clarity about how existing arrangements will work when they are needed.
Readiness reviews
Role clarity and governance
Stakeholder and agency integration
Emergency Recovery Centre preparedness
CAPABILITY
Plans and playbooks are not enough unless people can use them under pressure.
- Emergency Recovery Centre training
- Municipal recovery role capability
- Role-based training
- Forward-planning capability
- Exercises and simulations
- Scenario development
- Facilitation and workshops
- Practical role guides
- Playbooks and handbooks
- Capability assessment
- After-action review and lessons
- Testing plans and playbooks
FIRST HOURS
FIRST DAY
FIRST WEEK
BEYOND
Practical guidance and exercising help staff understand how priorities, decisions and coordination change from initial activation through to sustained operations and recovery.
Forward State builds council capability through practical training, exercising, simulation and facilitated learning — helping staff understand their roles, practise decisions and become more confident using existing arrangements.
RESPONSE
Clearer coordination when conditions are changing quickly.
During disruption, councils need practical arrangements that help people understand what is happening, make decisions, coordinate activity and work effectively with other organisations.
Incident management
Municipal emergency coordination
Emergency coordination-centre operations where relevant
Activation and escalation
Operational decision-making
Situational awareness
Inter-agency integration
Logistics and resource coordination
Operational advisory support
Forward State can support capability development before an event or provide experienced advisory and coordination support when operational demands increase.
RECOVERY
Build recovery capability before demand exceeds capacity.
Recovery often begins while response activity is still underway. Forward State helps councils prepare for that transition, establish practical recovery arrangements and sustain coordination as priorities change over time.
Recovery management
Impact assessment
Response-to-recovery transition
Recovery information management
Municipal recovery role capability
Recovery playbooks and role guides
Emergency Recovery Centre operations
Stakeholder and agency integration
Forward planning
Community recovery planning
Long-term recovery coordination
Recovery assurance and improvement
Capability augmentation
The emphasis is on helping councils move from immediate impact into structured, coordinated and sustainable recovery.
ADAPTED TO THE OPERATING ENVIRONMENT
Different council environments require different kinds of support.
METROPOLITAN & LARGER COUNCILS
Capability uplift, role development, exercising, assurance and testing existing arrangements across complex organisational structures.
Forward State adapts the support to the council’s operating environment rather than applying a fixed model.
REGIONAL & DISASTER-AFFECTED COUNCILS
Practical coordination, recovery augmentation, impact assessment, forward planning and additional capability when local teams are managing sustained operational demand.