Critique of Dallas Emergency Response - Essay Example

? Critique of Dallas’ Emergency Response Plan Critique of Dallas’ Emergency Response Plan Response to emergencies is one of the biggest challenges facing the United States of America today. In the wake of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attack, the issue of emergency response plan has gained prominent attention. This paper explores the Dallas county emergency response plan. The Dallas emergency response plan is organized and managed by FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Agency), which is part of the United States of America’s DHS (Department of Homeland Security). FEMA’s mission is to support United States’ nationals and first responders in ensuring that, as nation, people join forces to deal with all types of disasters in case they occure. Disasters can strike anytime, anywhere, and usually takes different forms ranging from hurricanes and earthquakes to fires, toxic oil spills, mother nature acts and terrorist attacks. Every year, many Americans are faced with disasters together with their terrifying consequences (Huggins, 2007). As of October 2011, FEMA had over 7,000 employees all over the country working to support citizens and first responders in ensuring that they join forces to improve their capability to respond to disasters. FEMA employees perform their duties all over the country- at the headquarters, the ten regional offices including one in Dallas, the National Emergency Training Centre, Noble Training Centre/Centre for domestic Preparedness, among other locations- so as to support the larger team that deals with managing emergencies. FEMA comprises of a team that includes state, tribal and local officials, federal partners, the private sector and non-governmental organizations together with the public. The Office of the Homeland Security and Emergency Management provides a 24-hour operation aimed at reducing injury or loss of lives and property. It also aims at protecting citizens of Dallas county from all types of disasters through providing and coordinating resources, skills, leadership and advocacy through a comprehensive security based on risk, an emergency management program of prevention, preparedness, recovery, mitigation and response. The emergency management program for the County of Dallas is derived from the Texas Government statute that requires each county to maintain a disaster plan. The stature is a basis for the state or local relationship, solidified by inter-jurisdiction agreements with Dallas County eleven other intra-county cities for assistance on daily operations, and during disasters. The Building Security force is a section of the Homeland Security and Emergency Management that deals with providing a safe environment to the public and workers who partake of Dallas County’s services as provided by fulltime and contract security officers (Jenkins 2009). In order to perform their duties effectively, FEMA trains its members. Training provides homeland security officials, first responders, emergency management officials, and other persons with the skills, abilities and knowledge necessary to undertake key tasks required by specific capabilities. The National Training Program (NTP) gives a detailed and organized approach to training for emergency response providers and emergency managers all over America that supports the National Preparedness Guidelines. The NTP provides policy, tools and guidance that detail training design, development, delivery and evaluation as necessary. It will also support the promulgation and regular updating of national voluntary consensus standards in training, ensuring that the training is consistent with the standards. FEMA has four training organizations; CDP (Centre for Domestic Preparedness), EMI (Emergency Management Institute), NTED (National Training and Education Division), and NFA (National Fire Academy). CDP, located in Anniston, Alabama, is Homeland security’s only Weapons of Mass Destruction training center that is federally chartered. It began operations in 1998 and offers the best services in terms of advanced training for America’s emergency responders at the state, local and federal government levels. It also contains a hospital called the Noble Training Facility, the only hospital that provides training on disaster preparedness and response in the United States. In addition, CDP has over 50 training courses ranging fro m incidence management to terrorist acts. The Emergency Management Institute has a wide range of courses targeting people who have responsibilities in emergency management and the public for free. The courses include incidence management, hazard mitigation, and integrated preparedness among others. Planning of emergencies is a continuous process that involves coordinated planning, training of the members, exercise sessions, and revision of training procedures. This emergency planning is usually scheduled to occur in four phases; preparedness, mitigation, response and recovery. The purpose of planning is to develop and maintain an updated emergency Management plan, abbreviated as EMP. An EMP is a document showing how people and documents will be protected incase a disaster or emergency occurs. Despite the emergency planning occuring in cycles, EMP has a specific point where it starts.The Dallas emergency response plan employs four phases during the process of emergency planning as outlined hereunder: Hazard Identification and Risk Assessment. In this process, hazards that are a threat to Dallas County are singled out and a thorough research is carried out on them. They are then graded in respect to the dangers posed by them and the infrastructure likely to be damaged because of an event involving the singled out hazards. The Hazard Identification and Risk Assessment is a hazard analysis method that involves quantifying the total risk to the county for each hazard, in written form. EMP development. This includes basic planning, the order of functions and hazard-specific footnotes together with the laid down procedures for operations. EMP clearly states the actions to be taken in response to technological, manmade or natural disasters. It details the tasks to be undertaken by specific organizations at specific times and locations based on laid-down goals, assumptions and capabilities assessment. Testing the plan. This takes place through training and exercises. The Dallas County Office of Security and Emergency Management, abbreviated as OSEM, has come up with a detailed exercise plan scheduled for five years, which takes into account emergencies involving all types of hazards, including domestic readiness to respond to acts of terrorism. Dallas County’s Exercise and Evaluation Program, commonly known as exercise plan, is a vital document that is revised and modernized every year. This plan serves as a roadmap for improving Dallas County’s preparedness in responding to every type of emergency through collaborating with both local and regional partners. The county acknowledges that detailed planning and coordination among organizations that plan emergencies is the key to a successful emergency management throughout the region and state. Plan maintenance and revision EMP is reviewed every year and rationalized according to the order of current needs, threats and equipment available. OSEM updates and maintains the EMP together with a system maintenance made to make sure that they are always kept updated. The EMP is reviewed every year to make the appropriate changes or revisions and then is forwarded to the county Governor’s Division of Emergency Management according to procedure. Dallas county and jurisdictions all over north and central Texas possess non-similar levels of preparedness for all disasters in readiness, prevention, mitigation, response and recovery. Due to these differences, Dallas county OSEM applies a building-block approach in designing the overall exercise program. This building block approach enables successful progression in exercise design, complexity and execution, and training and exercise. Using this method, the county ensures the exercise scope, scale and complexity are followed to the letter while simulteneously maintaining consistency in service delivery. Applying the building-block approach and cycle of complexity increases the chances of success. The program paves way for a logical progression of regional and jurisdictional readiness by increasing the size, complexity and stress factor over time, while at the same time allowing for reasonable learning opportunities that boost, build upon and lead into each other effectively. This model can remain flexible so as to allow addition of other necessary exercise types that the county may require. In additional to the building block program, the county has the after action review and improvement plans. The After Action Report (AAR) provides a picture of the exercise participants’ and community leaders’ response so that it can be clearly understood what was expected to happen, what eventually happened, the circumstances under which it happened, and what could have been done differently for improved performance. In most cases, the initial Improvement Plan is included in the final AAR. The Improvement plan is the means through which the lessons learnt from the exercise are converted to concrete, measurable steps which, when followed, can result in improved response capabilities. The After Action Review and the Improvement Plan specifically entail the actions to be taken to address each recommendation presented, the agency responsible for taking the action, and how long it is approximated to take. Conclusion The Dallas county emergency response team is committed responding to emergencies whenever they affect the public. It is involved in planning and preparing to deal with emergencies that occur within the county. The team works in concert with community members and other bodies. The office of emergency management coordinates the activities of volunteer, private and public organizations in the county, ensuring total readiness in case of any eventuality. References Bartel, W. Murray, T & Starr, R. (2009). Information Systems for Emergency Management. M.E. Sharpe.Boston. Haddow, G., Bullock, J, & Coppola, D. (2010). Introduction to Emergency Management. Butterworth-Heinemann. New York. Huggins, L.J. (2007). Comprehensive disaster management and development: The role of geoinformatics and geo-collaboration in linking mitigation and disaster recovery in the Eastern Caribbean. ProQuest. New York. Jenkins, W. (2009). National Preparedness: FEMA Has Made Progress, But Needs to Complete and Integrate Planning, Exercise, and Assessment Efforts. Diane Publishing. Los Angeles. Wrobel, L. (2009). Disaster recovery planning for communications and critical infrastructure. Artech House: New Jersey. Read More