Policy Analysis Authentic Assessment Research Paper

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Policies and Emergency Management

ABSTRACT/INTRODUCTION: As a representative democracy, the United States tries to include as many people and interests into its decision-making processes as possible. Seldom has this practice been more challenged than since the country's intensive focus on emergency planning and preparations because of the rash of high-profile incidents that have brought about death, destruction, fear and critical assessments of our national capabilities, including the 9/11 terror attacks (Perry and Lindell, 2003). For the most part, the main sources of action in this regard have come from the federal government, which has been adopting various mandates and incentives to invite more effective systems of readiness. But state and local agencies and private and public organizations have also found their places in these steadily improving processes even though they continue to struggle with the many complexities they face of being ready for all types of conditions. Large and small institutions of many kinds have likewise begun to see the value in what it takes to "prepare for the expected to be prepared for the unexpected" (ERCMExpress, 2006). Even the most reluctant of people and stakeholders seem to be accepting that when looked at in this way, they are less reluctant to pretend that disasters might someday actually be upon us (Perry and Lindell, 2003: 347).

INSTITUTIONAL AND POLITICAL FACTORS: When it comes to emergency management planning, the federal government has put into place many of the core operational elements within the control of the new the Department of Homeland Security. Under structure, policies and legal expectations are usually initiated by legislation that starts either in the House of Representatives or the Senate where elected representatives hear experts, receive assessments and make predictions regarding consequences of taking or not taking actions. Based upon this input, specific laws are passed. Department heads, working at the direction of the President of the United States, seek to implement their requirements. Local governments and regional or state organizations with a wide variety of expertise then get involved and begin to offer their assistance in ensuring that each community is ready for whatever emergency that occurs. FEMA maintains a National Resource Center that helps centralize and clarify what these expectations and requirements are (FEMA, 2012).

BASIC ELEMENTS: One of the most important issues in regards to emergency conditions centers on understanding the difference between emergency management and emergency response. Waugh and Streib (2006) have helped to clarify this by noting that the key elements of emergency management go beyond the kinds of issues that first responders (such as police and fire fighters) are usually tied to, such as emergency care, medical assistance, temporary shelter, feeding, etc. While these elements are involved, emergency management also concentrates on hazard mitigation, general community disaster preparedness, specific disaster response activities following an incident, and disaster recovery -- or knowing how to get the community back on its feet again (Waugh and Streib, 2006: 131). How these aspects are operationalized depends on which components have an interest or the capabilities to assist, and on which infrastructure resources (from health care to schools to general community services) have a stake in collaborating for effective readiness (CAN HealthPro, 2007).

ROLES AND RESPONSIBILITES: There is no question but that within the U.S. The most important roles and responsibilities for significant emergency conditions spiral down from the Department of Homeland Security. They have been provided the legal and resource streams to ensure that they can react to or even anticipate such conditions and, when possible, share their abilities with local authorities. But the fact is that most of the real work comes from the ground up (Waugh and Streib, 2006: 133). Local police and fire fighters as well as most public health entities now have specific protocols in place to ensure that can be activated as needed, often through one or another command and control site (MRSC, 2011). The National Incident Management System, which is part of FEMA, is primarily responsible for undertaking these hands-on coordination tasks. Other departments such as the U.S. Fire Administration have developed continuity of government and responder services to help ensure that their resources are readily available and so that command potentials are not lost. Most local government maintain their own community and state systems that help ensure that vital records, information about local resources, access to local decision-making and other capabilities are not lost (MRSC, 2011). This top-down approach also allows for communications collaboration, which is often referred to as interoperability.

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"Communications interoperability allows emergency management/response personnel and their affiliated organizations to communicate within and across agencies and jurisdictions via voice, data, or video in real time, when needed, and when authorized" (FEMA, 2012).

PUBLIC SECTOR CRISIS ORGANIZATIONS: There are a number of public and private sector entities that have their own emergency management obligations. ESRI (2005), a private consulting company that seeks to work with these types of organizations to enable the efficient use of their capabilities, lists as many as ten different categories of public sector organizations that have an interest when just one type of event (a bioterrorist activity) occurs. Along with public and private hospitals, public works and even local pharmacies can have responsibilities to address serous potential contamination worries. Many of these entities have been specifically instructed to work with first responders to not only address medical implications for citizens but also to ensure that responders are protected so that they can continue their work (ESRI, 2005:4). Schools are similarly involved for their structural elements (community collection sites with kitchens, bathrooms, etc.) and so as to ensure that responsible people are trying to care for children while adults are engaged elsewhere (ERCMExpress, 2006).

PRESIDEDNTIAL POLICIES: When a crisis is happening, the President of the U.S. is the administrative commander. He is the person who makes sure that the department components work together and respond as efficiently as they can to immediate needs and failures of the system to work as expected. In this capacity, he can bring about policy changes and requirements based on immediate needs that arise from the specific circumstances. The decisions and refinements of policies made through this experience will often become the source of information needed for adapting the rules and regulations in the future.

MAJOR EVENTS AND CHANGES: The stakeholders who develop emergency management preparations do so based on best- and worst-case considerations. They work with what is available and with what is known in order to be ready when it is required. But this situation cannot anticipate all needs:

Modern emergency management presents a paradox. On one hand, emergency response requires meticulous organization and planning, but on the other hand, it is spontaneous. Emergency managers have to innovate, adapt, and improvise because plans, regardless of how well done, seldom fi t circumstances. Blending these conflicting needs is no easy task (Waugh and Streib, 2006:132).

Emergency situations are places where creativity and ingenuity have a home, even when the reality of the circumstances does not always show whether what is done at the time of the incident is best. As with presidential experience, it is these innovative responses that do, however, often form the basis for what can be done better next time.

SOCIAL VULNERABILITIES: People in emergency management appear to be getting more comfortable with the "vulnerability paradigm," which seeks to determine how preparations for urgent conditions get used in circumstances where populations and cultural differences put some people more at risk than are others. Fordham (2007) drew attention to this when she mentioned what some in vulnerabilities have referred to as "the tyranny of the urgent." If some people are getting treated first because of a social or cultural consideration, is this fair to those who have other urgent needs? Or as Fordham made note of in her introduction, "Please don't raise gender now -- we're in an emergency!"

The simple fact is that without an awareness of these issues some people and some problems will not be properly addressed. Katrina residents were often assumed to be able to provide their own levels of local transportation to get supply sites. Often that did not happen because of extreme localized poverty. In other places of the world, women may not be able to go somewhere to get aid or other response services if their religious or cultural prohibitions are strong enough to make it more dangerous for them to do that than to face down male authority figures (Fordham, 2007:1-2).

INCENTIVES AND MANDATES: The explosive response in the U.S. To the 9/11 terror activities brought about a number of national mandates for expanding and improving the emergency response and emergency management infrastructures (Perry and Lindell, 2003). Many of those changes were mandated and allowed for the resources to be used to make sure that localities could in fact comply with at least certain expectations. Other types of incentives, however, can be just as important, either before or after an event occurs. Studies.....

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