Watch Duty and the grassroots crisis response system
How a nonprofit is bridging gaps in information and fostering collaboration
A lot happened this past week. Dear friends were in town for CES. I am working on an intense project for the University of Nevada, Las Vegas around documenting the crisis communications response to the shooting that killed three people on Dec. 6, 2023. And the Palisades and Eaton fires began raging across Los Angeles, devastating the city. I’ve been checking in with my California loved ones, and inquiring about their loved ones, and their loved ones.
I’m also watching, in California, all the ways nonprofits and grassroots engagement weave together to create a network of support. Community centers and foundations, shelters, hospitals, and other emergency organizations provide their services and expertise; individual helpers rise up too, filling gaps in myriad ways, from organizing food drives, to providing shelter in their own homes, to volunteering—even as firefighters. What I recognize is that grassroots efforts are how we fill in gaps in unforeseen circumstances.
New structured solutions arise, too. This week you might have heard of Watch Duty, a small nonprofit that is playing a huge role in California’s emergency ecosystem. (You might even be obsessively checking your Watch Duty app.)
Watch Duty is a nonprofit that alerts, maps, and tracks wildfires in 20 states in the Western U.S. Its tracking services are operated by experienced fire reporters and other collaborators who diligently monitor radio scanners and data sources around the clock.
The organization was established in 2021 in Santa Rosa, Calif., by software developer John Mills, who had moved from Silicon Valley to a wildfire prone area of Northern California. In this new environment, Mills recognized the need for a centralized source of critical, accurate information about wildfires—including evacuation orders, road closures, public health updates, shelter locations, press briefings, and more. So, he set out to build it.
Mills invested $1 million of his money to develop Watch Duty’s tech, then persuaded people he knew in Silicon Valley to help him write the app’s computer code, according to the Washington Post. (Most nonprofit founders do not have access or funding like this.)
Watch Duty grew from less than $350,000 in contributions and grants in 2022, to $1.2 million in 2023, according to GuideStar. In 2024, the app had reached more than 7 million people and raised $5.6 million in contributions and grants, and I can only imaging the funding that has come in this week.
Beyond the tech, Watch Duty’s other incredible asset is more than 150 volunteers, many of them retired firefighters or public safety personnel who serve as the reporters, monitoring every fire that starts in the American West.
I don’t think I fully grasped the dedication, knowledge, and specialized skill of these volunteers until I read this 2021 Wired profile of Michael Silvester, who lives in New Zealand and who, despite never having been to California, follows its fires expertly:
During California’s long fire season—roughly May through October—Michael sits at his desk all day, sometimes for 18-hour stretches, keeping watch over that single state’s blazes. On his desk sit four phones: one personal device and three devoted to running PulsePoint, an app that monitors the radio channels first responders use. When emergency workers respond to a distress call, the app sends him a notification. The phones let him keep track of more than 100 agencies across California: Los Angeles County Fire, LAFD, Marin County, Sacramento, Napa County. The app only lets him follow 25 agencies per phone, so he runs another two phone emulators on his PC to cover even more departments. When he hears what he thinks is an essential detail of a fire’s movements, he tweets it in real time to more than 100,000 followers.
The story of Watch Duty provides a few takeaways for me. One, the organization’s elegant design is so simple but profound. (The best ideas often are, right?) Two, investments in technology can create positive, real-world solutions when they’re channeled to serve the public good. I really love this. Three, people are generous. And good. They want to give back, to be involved in volunteer work that feels important and relevant.
I know Watch Duty has ambitions to scale and provide public information for more types of disasters. It is also quite young; growth and organizational maturity come with their own challenges. But I hope it can remain as nimble, innovative, and effective as it is today.