Everything Pin311 does, step by step.

1. 1Sign up at /start — pick your city, you become the owner (EMA Director role, full access).
2. 2Open Settings → set your population (this makes the FEMA per-capita math accurate) and your report categories.
3. 3Settings → Coverage Map: draw your city limits (and wards/zones if you want). Reports auto-tag to the right zone — no GIS staff needed.
4. 4Grab your public report link (pin311.com/your-city/report) and the Promote kit (website button + QR posters).
5. 5Drop the link in the same Facebook post you already use during storms. That's it — residents can report.

💡 Everything life-saving is free forever: citizen intake, incidents, the FEMA threshold + PDA export, the live map. You only pay when you want City Ops (work orders, routing, reimbursement, procurement).

A resident taps your link, drops a pin on the map, snaps a photo, and picks a category (pothole to downed tree). They get a timestamped receipt with a tracking link.

1. 1They can reopen that receipt anytime to see status — like tracking a package.
2. 2They can reopen that tracking link anytime to watch the status change to resolved — the transparency that earns trust and brings more reports. Residents who opt in also get an email at each milestone (a city can switch these off in Settings). SMS updates are coming soon.

Note: Hazards like live wires or flooding always show a 'Do not approach — call 911' message. Pin311 is for non-emergencies.

1. 1Open the Call Intake tab. Type the address or intersection and hit Find — it drops the pin for you.
2. 2If there are already reports near that spot in the last 72h, you'll see a duplicate warning so you don't double-log.
3. 3Pick the issue category, add what the caller said, and (optionally) the caller's name + number so they get status updates too.
4. 4Click Log report. It's on the live map instantly, tagged as a phone report.

Every report lands on a live map + heatmap and a filterable list (by category, severity, status). No digging through 200 Facebook comments.

Suggested incidents: when several reports cluster at one spot in a short window (a tree that took a wire and blocked the road), Pin311 suggests rolling them into one incident. One click creates it, attaches all the reports, and opens a work order.

1. 1Promote a report (or a cluster) into an Incident. Set a NIMS type and an estimated cost.
2. 2Watch your running damage total fill toward your county's real per-capita FEMA threshold — so you know when you've crossed the line to call the state.
3. 3Set the FEMA debris eligibility on each incident (see §6 below) before you claim debris costs.
4. 4Dispatch a crew right from the incident — that creates a work order.

FEMA only pays to clear debris on PUBLIC property or a public right-of-way. A tree that fell entirely in a private backyard is generally ineligible — claim it and FEMA takes the money back.

1. 1On each incident, set FEMA debris eligibility: Public right-of-way (eligible), Private (not eligible), or Private with Right-of-Entry + immediate threat (eligible).
2. 2Until you mark it, the incident warns you. Ineligible ones are flagged to exclude from the claim.
3. 3This is your judgment call as someone who knows the town — Pin311 doesn't guess from parcel maps (that data is unreliable and would be a false promise).

FEMA ties money to a declared incident period, not 'last Tuesday's storm.' Storm Mode anchors your whole response to one event.

1. 1Open the Storm Mode tab → Declare storm event. Name it and set the incident period (start/end).
2. 2Click 'Find NWS alerts in window' — Pin311 pulls the National Weather Service warnings/watches for your area and that time range. Check the ones to anchor; they're stored permanently as evidence.
3. 3Once active, every new report and logged hour auto-tags to the event.
4. 4Click 'Attach existing records' to sweep in reports/incidents/hours that already happened during the incident period (storms usually start before you declare).
5. 5Add the FEMA declaration number (DR-xxxx) once it's issued.

💡 When a real NWS alert is active for your county, the Storm Mode tab suggests declaring an event and pre-fills it for you.

1. 1Create a work order from an incident (or standalone). Assign it to your own crew or an outside contractor.
2. 2Hand a one-off contractor a no-login clearance link — they mark the job done and upload an after-photo from their phone, no account needed.
3. 3Every work order can hold close-out photos and receipts (the 'digital shoebox').

1. 1On a work order, log labor hours and equipment hours as the work happens.
2. 2For equipment, pick the Asset (your registered truck) — it auto-fills the official FEMA equipment rate and values the hours. 'Truck 14' is far more audit-defensible than 'a dump truck.'
3. 3Split equipment into Active hours (valued at the rate) and Standby hours (idle/parked — logged at $0). FEMA does not pay standby; logging it separately and never billing it is exactly what passes audit.
4. 4Attach the official payroll timesheet or voucher (PDF or photo) to the work order as a 'Timesheet' document — it binds your logged hours to the city's payroll proof, which FEMA's labor documentation requires.

Note: Labor is exported as HOURS, not dollars — the city applies its own payroll rates at closeout. That's correct FEMA practice and keeps us out of your payroll system. (Set a blended planning rate under Settings → FEMA & cost settings so the live cost forecast can estimate labor dollars before payroll runs.)

To be paid for hauling debris, FEMA wants load tickets — not just truck hours. Each truckload is a ticket.

1. 1On a debris work order, open Debris haul tickets and add one per load: date, truck, load call (full / ¾ / ½ / ¼), cubic yards, material type, and the disposal site.
2. 2Disposal sites you've used before auto-suggest, so it's two taps.
3. 3The audit package turns these into a haul manifest with total cubic yards — an ironclad record.

💡 Manage your disposal & staging sites under Settings → Disposal sites (landfill, temporary debris-staging yard, tipping fees). They populate the haul-ticket picker and show on your maps.

Buy services without following 2 CFR Part 200 and FEMA can claw it all back at audit. The Procurement panel (on each work order) walks you through it.

1. 1Enter the contractor and dollar amount — Pin311 tells you the tier (micro-purchase under $15k, small purchase under $350k, or formal) and what each requires.
2. 2Click Check SAM.gov — it verifies the contractor isn't federally debarred/suspended, and stores the result as proof.
3. 3If you went sole-source in the emergency, log the exigency justification. Pin311 tracks how many days you've been on a noncompetitive contract and nudges you to transition — riding it too long is the top audit failure.
4. 4Tick the required contract clauses (Section 889 telecom, Build America, Davis-Bacon, etc.) — Pin311 shows only the ones that apply.

Note: This is a documentation aid, not legal advice — confirm with your state Public Assistance officer.

1. 1Open the Assets tab → add a truck/loader/chainsaw (or bulk-import your whole fleet from a CSV). Link each to its FEMA equipment rate.
2. 2Run a daily pre-trip check — tap any item that fails; a defect automatically opens a work order and can take the asset out of service.
3. 3Set preventive-maintenance reminders (by date or engine hours). Overdue items show a badge.
4. 4Log service/repairs against each asset for its history.

💡 We deliberately don't try to out-build Fleetio — no fuel cards or telematics. Just the registry, checks, and FEMA link that matter for a small public-works shop.

First time through a federal claim? Open the FEMA Recovery tab. It's a guided checklist that walks you from 'the storm just hit' to 'packet submitted' — declare the event, set right-of-way eligibility, log force-account time, capture purchases and haul tickets, run procurement checks, then generate the Disaster Packet. Each step links straight to where you do it.

1. 1Threshold speedometer: your running eligible damage against your county's real per-capita FEMA threshold, so you know the moment you've crossed the line to call the state.
2. 2Live cost forecast: blended-rate labor + equipment dollars at FEMA rates + materials, minus donated cost-share credit, scoped to the active event — a real-time estimate of what you'll claim.
3. 3Plain-English teaching on every step (what counts, what gets clawed back) so you're never guessing.

💡 Set your blended labor rate, volunteer rate, and any local procurement (P-card) limit under Settings → FEMA & cost settings — the forecast and the procurement tiers both use them.

Everything above feeds your federal claim:

1. 1PDA export: a one-click Preliminary Damage Assessment from your incidents.
2. 2Reimbursement export (CSV/JSON): every logged labor + equipment hour valued at FEMA rates, with standby shown at $0.
3. 3Emergency materials & purchases: on an incident, log sandbags, fuel, or a crane rental with vendor, amount, dollar-tier guidance, and a SAM.gov debarment check — the Materials / Rented-Equipment record FEMA wants.
4. 4Donated Aid: volunteer hours and donated equipment valued at FEMA rates — audit-ready credit toward your local cost share.
5. 5Audit package (per incident): citizen before-photos, force-account log, equipment $, close-out proof, procurement files, ROW eligibility, haul manifest, and material purchases — printable / save-as-PDF.

1. 1Settings → Resource hubs (or the Storm Mode page). Add shelters, cooling/warming centers, water & supply points, donation drop-offs, debris/tree dumps, charging stations, and more — pick a preset or name your own custom type.
2. 2Drop each hub on the map, add hours/details, and it goes live. Close or reopen them as the situation changes.
3. 3Road closures: Storm Mode → Road closures. Trace the closed road on the map (click along it) and draw the detour route — residents see red = closed, blue dashed = take this, plus a closures list. Mark them reopened when cleared.
4. 4Your public map lives at yourcity.pin311.com/<your-city>/map — a privacy-safe heatmap of reported issues plus your resource hubs and road closures, with a Report button. Share it on your website or social media.
5. 5Toggle the public map on/off under Settings → Organization.

During a storm, residents can claim and clear each other's damage on the public storm map — red 'needs help,' amber 'on the way,' green 'done' — no login.

Note: Safety + privacy are hard-gated: live wires/flooding are never claimable (call 911), and a volunteer's contact is never shown publicly. Volunteers must accept a Good-Samaritan disclaimer; reported abuse = an instant permanent ban. Each acceptance is recorded with a timestamp and the relevant federal + state Good-Samaritan statute, and is exportable for your city attorney. Every cleared job's volunteer hours flow into your FEMA donated-resources credit.

1. 1Settings → Team: invite people by email. Pick a role — EMA Director, Dispatcher, PIO, Field Crew, or a scoped Contractor.
2. 2Each role carries granular permissions (view reports, log field time, manage procurement, export, etc.). Customize as needed.
3. 3Field crews are unlimited and never blocked — a responder logging from a truck mid-storm is always free.

1. 1Promote kit: a 'Report an issue' button for your website + printable QR posters. Every report tracks where it came from.
2. 2Community Alerts: residents opt in (you can auto-offer right after they file a report), then you broadcast closures/boil-orders by email in one send. Text is an add-on when you're ready.