We have seen riots breaking out across the country and street battles are evolving and escalating in a bad way. As more of the population realizes their local government is not backing the police in stopping the violence they are arming themselves and taking matters into their own hands.

So far the violence has been mostly confined to urban areas, however Antifa and BLM have both said they will be moving into “rural” areas. No one knows what that would exactly look like, and it is quite possible they consider the suburbs “rural” areas.

If you live in an urban or suburban area you need to be working on a specific plan to keep yourself and your family safe in the event that riots break in your neighborhood. And thinking this sort of thing will only happen in really large cities ignores the fact that Kenosha, WI has a population right around a 100,000. Depending on your perspective you may consider that a “small city/town” or a large one.

Know what is going on in your area

The first step in preparing for riots or “spontaneous protests” in the middle of the road is to get yourself a police scanner or a police scanner app for your mobile phone. To avoid trouble, you need to know where it is.

Even if you only occasionally visit a city, having access to what is going on is very important to your safety.

Know more than one alternative evacuation route

GPS is great at getting you places – until it isn’t. Get paper maps of the places you frequent and keep them in your vehicle. Highlight alternative routes in different colors to show preferred evacuation routes to all the cardinal points on the compass. Drive them and review them so that if you should be on foot or without your vehicle for some reason you can navigate your way out of Dodge based on memory.

Make sure all members of your family are aware of what to do and where to go if they need to evacuate – regardless of the reason that evacuation is needed.

Prepare your home