HM501

Unit 5 Assignment

Part 1: Topic 1: Improving Emergency Response (Respond)

If you were advising the President of the United States (POTUS), what recommendations would you make to POTUS to improve emergency response?

Part 2: Topic 1 Respond to Student #1 (Respond to Erik below)

Erik Petersen

The vast majority of emergencies that occur in the United States will not involve a response from the federal government at all (Haddow et al., 2021). Therefore training municipal emergency response agencies is key to improving emergency response. Unfortunately, many smaller emergency management programs lack a consistent budget for training, particularly in areas that have not responded to large-scale disasters (Bullock et al., 2018). The federal government can assist with funding for training in two ways; providing grants for emergency response training, and providing free training for municipal agencies.

Grant programs do exist through the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) (DHS, 2020). Ensuring that local agencies are aware of these funding opportunities needs to be a high priority. Having the funding be dependant on agencies using DHS-approved training programs allows municipalities to choose trainings they feel will best fit their needs while ensuring that they are being trained to the needed standards.

The DHS also partners with state and local governments to provide emergency responders training, including in-person classes and online courses (DHS, n.d.). Increasing incentives for local governments to participate in these trainings will benefit all responders. As noted above, the federal government will not be involved with most emergency responses, and when a federal response is required, it is during the worst of the worst. Therefore federal agencies need to be involved with local training so that the two groups are not working together for the first time when lives are on the line.

Part 2: Topic 1 Respond to Student #2 (Respond to Keith below)

Keith Hamilton

Good morning class,

If I was advising the President of the United States on ways to improve emergency response, I would start with recommending removing the tactical mindset and becoming more practical, also to focus more on mitigation. When I say to remove the tactical mindset, when it comes to emergency management it’s not practical to put everything in a tactical mindset. It may be easy to do and to rely upon because so many of the emergency responders have a public safety background. As an emergency manager however you should focus more on relationships and strategy instead of implementing a tactical plan.

“Mitigation is the effort to reduce loss of life and property by lessening the impact of disasters and emergencies” (Bexar County, 2021). As we discussed in the seminar the mitigation process is the most overlooked and neglected. This process is in my opinion the most important and could be more beneficial in the long run. It may cost a lot of money up front but over time it is proven to save money, and be very effective.

References

**Bexar County (2021) The five phases of emergency management. https://www.bexar.org/694/Five-Phases

Part 1: Topic 2: Integration of Agencies (Respond)

If you were advising the President of the United States (POTUS), what recommendations would you make to POTUS to better integrate the different intelligence, homeland security, and emergency response agencies to improve effectiveness?

Part 2: Topic 2 Student Response #1 (Respond to Donald below)

Donald Derryberry

Doctor Kapperman and classmates –

Integrating the multiple agencies of intelligence, homeland security, and emergency response agencies is a large and difficult undertaking due to the sheer size of those organizations. They key to any integration is developing a well laid out plan and ensure constant communication and coordination is being conducted with all interested agencies at all levels throughout the process. Due to the Cabinet level of agencies involved, I would recommend that there needs to be a White House liaison as to where the executive level directives and guidance have the weight of the White House behind it.

Integrating their data programs where all three systems are communicating the same language would allow all interested agencies involved to be able to track the same information. Programs communicating with other programs and transferring data was always a problem when I was in the Army. Personnel programs did not communicate with training management programs that did not communicate with logistical programs, and so forth. Utilizing a program that allows those agencies to view the same common operating picture would assist in the integration process.

Part 2: Topic 2 Student Response #2 (Respond to Calvin below)

Calvin Parker**

In my opinion, I do not think that the intelligence agencies should be integrated unless they have the same mission, values and goals. They definitely should not be under the Department of Homeland Security. I feel as if it is too much "red tape" within the department. The intelligence agencies may do something that isn't approved by the DHS. This can cause problems on how they extract their information to protect the homeland. I believe the intelligence agencies should be over DHS. Depending on some of the intelligence agencies, they may need to integrate together, because we have 16 different intelligence agencies (Bullock et al., 2018). Now, while advising POTUS, how should we integrate different agencies within DHS and emergency response agencies to improve effectiveness. If agencies perform the same task, then they should be one. This will improve communication because it would be one big agency.

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