[BenW]

Interesting article in Government Executive. I put this in L&P because the suggested solution is creation of another government entity.

A couple of my own thoughts:
The report also found a "preparedness divide" between rich and poor Americans, with poll respondents who had lower incomes and less education saying they wished they had more money and time to take precautions.
It seems to me one month without basic cable would give a family of four the bare neccessities for 72 hours. A few months without it would provide a comfortable wait of a week or two for the government assistance these people seem to want. Sorry if I sound harsh, but a lot of "poor" people in this country have luxuries that really poor people in other parts of the world would never dream of.

The report recommended that Congress give President Bush the power to create a new Citizen Preparedness Directorate within the Homeland Security Department.
When I was growing up, there were already two "agencies" doing this. One was called "parents", the other was called "The Boy Scouts."

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http://www.govexec.com/story_page.cfm?articleid=32847&dcn=e_hsw

Hurricanes have little influence on citizen preparedness, report finds

By Chris Strohm
cstrohm@govexec.com
Hurricanes Katrina and Rita have had little impact on most people's preparations for disasters, but have hurt confidence in all levels of government, according to a recent study.

More than half of Americans surveyed for the study said they have not taken steps to better prepare themselves for a disaster even though they are aware of the devastation caused by the hurricanes and subsequent flooding of New Orleans, according to a report from New York University's Center for Catastrophic Preparedness and Response. The study compared a survey conducted before the hurricanes hit to one conducted after.

The report also found a "preparedness divide" between rich and poor Americans, with poll respondents who had lower incomes and less education saying they wished they had more money and time to take precautions.

"Reading between the lines of this survey, a significant biological or terrorist attack would make the New Orleans situation look like a calm evacuation," said Paul Light, a professor at New York University's Wagner School of Public Service and author of the report. "The general point here is that the main effect of Katrina was no effect at all. It did not constitute the wake-up call."

The report recommended that Congress give President Bush the power to create a new Citizen Preparedness Directorate within the Homeland Security Department. "Such a directorate would have the authority to develop interagency plans, deploy and redeploy resources and oversee governmentwide activities to better prepare individual citizens and federal, state and local agencies for a wide range of catastrophic events," the report stated.

DHS spokesman Marc Short said the department has several citizen preparedness efforts and programs, but acknowledged they are not organized under one directorate. He said the department is now considering placing all those efforts under the new Preparedness Directorate, which was created as part of a reorganization announced by Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff in July.

"I think there's a lot of momentum for that plan," Short said. "I think the notion of uniting citizen preparedness activities under one directorate has made a lot of apparent sense to a lot of people for a while. But the second stage review provided a vehicle to make that happen."

Short added that the department also has consulted with Israeli officials on how to improve citizen preparedness.

The report recommended that Congress reform the process for approving presidential appointees to ensure that key positions are filled rapidly with qualified personnel, and to reduce the number of lower level positions that require an appointment.

"What the nation needs most right now is a robust response system that can bend and ?ex to the unique circumstances of a given event," the report stated. "Such a system must be alert to impending catastrophe, agile in implementing well-designed plans for response and recovery, adaptive to surprise events such as the collapse of the New Orleans' levees, and aligned so that all responders can pull together from Washington on down to the very first responder who shows up at a site."

[NCP24]

Interesting article in Government Executive. I put this in L&P because the suggested solution is creation of another government entity. We have several city and county governments that train and prepare for possible disasters. Even so, I firmly believe the burden of emergency preparedness should fall on each and every member of our communities. Being self-reliant is a patriotic duty, not to mention just plain old good common sense.

[Pilgrim]

As I said one day to a municipal court judge, "There are a significant number of people who go through life looking for others to tell them what to do. When they outgrow their teachers, parents, and Sunday school teachers, they turn to police, judges, and probation officers."

Pilgrim

[JJpdxpinkpistols]

We have several city and county governments that train and prepare for possible disasters. Even so, I firmly believe the burden of emergency preparedness should fall on each and every member of our communities. Being self-reliant is a patriotic duty, not to mention just plain old good common sense.

I gotta agree. Almost all disaster planning that needs to happen should be happening at the local level, not at the national level. Relying on the feds for logistics, helicopters and army corps of engineering assistance is one thing--my local city doesn't have any helicopters at their disposal to pluck folks in a flash flood, but asking the feds to stockpile food and basic necessities for you is just wacko.

Locally, the city will actually sit down with you, go over what you have prepared for and make suggestions, if you ask them to. Their view is that the better prepared the average citizen is, the more time they are able to devote to care for those who are unable to prepare--folks like the mentally incapable, the infirm, the elderly.

I know that NOLA caused my wife to get serious about disaster preparedness, and really get moving on stockpiling a couple of days of food, preserves and other essentials. I am not quite through putting up our new fire extinguishers. We got 4 of em, one for each floor and one for the kitchen.

[Art Eatman]

Face it: The structure of our society has created sub-cultures who refuse to do for themselves. Somebody else will provide; commonly, government.

So, a lot of people refuse to learn of dangers headed their way; refuse to believe anything bad can happen to them; refuse to listen when serious warnings are given--and then refuse to get out of harm's way.

Sorta like the story of the guy on his front porch when the flood waters were rising. He knew the Lord would provide; would protect him. First a truck came by, to evacutate him. He refused, speaking of his faith that the Lord would provide. Then, a boat, as the waters had risen. Same answer. The waters rose, and he moved to his roof. A helicopter arrived, but once again he refused.

He drowned. In Heaven, he complained that his faith hadn't been answered.

The Lord responded, "You dumb SOB, whaddaya want? I sent you a truck, a boat and then a chopper!"

:), Art

[geekWithA.45]

The summary of the report reads exactly like the sort of thing we do in commerce when we want to justify some new initiative.


As for the "preparedness divide", I agree with Art, but add that there's a whole slew of people who, for both psychological and sociological reasons view their entire life as one continuous disaster, with "stuff happening to them" day in and out.

It simply never occurs to them that it might be any other way, and that taking some initiative to change the initial conditions in a meaningful way might have an effect on the outcome.

God help us, these people vote.

These people vote, with nothing at stake, nothing to lose, and everything to gain.

[BenW]

As for the "preparedness divide", I agree with Art, but add that there's a whole slew of people who, for both psychological and sociological reasons view their entire life as one continuous disaster, with "stuff happening to them" day in and out.

And this reminds me that I should not have picked on only "poor people" in my orginial post. I should know better, working with yuppies who, even though they live in earthquake country, would never, ever, ever prepare for disaster. They somehow look at preparation as some kind of fringe element "dig" on our great society. We're civilized after all, and the government will take care of things. Preparation is like saying you don't trust the government to respond (Yeah, don't get me started).

The only reason (according to them) it didn't happen this time around was because Bush was in charge. If Kerry were in charge, everyone in NOLA would have been eating five course gourmet French dinners instead of MREs. :rolleyes:

[TarpleyG]

You know...it really irks me that all these people keep yammering on and on abour "Katrina" and "Rita" and how the "poor people suffered." What, exactly, do they think happened down here a few weeks ago. It sure wasn't Disney World. I guess we handled or mess so well with out FEMA and the .gov, we don't rate the attention. Good thing IMO.

Greg

[Standing Wolf]

There are a significant number of people who go through life looking for others to tell them what to do. When they outgrow their teachers, parents, and Sunday school teachers, they turn to police, judges, and probation officers.

Well said!

[Flyboy]

Hurricanes Have Little Influence on Citizen Preparedness
Well, duh. Those who aren't inclined to be prepared aren't likely to be swayed, because they believe it's somebody else's job to watch out for them (and we're doing little to disabuse them of that notion).

Those who are inclined to be prepared, well, we're not going to be influenced either--we were prepared before the hurricane hit.

The status quo lives on.

[publius]

More than half of Americans surveyed for the study said they have not taken steps to better prepare themselves for a disaster even though they are aware of the devastation caused by the hurricanes and subsequent flooding of New Orleans, according to a report from New York University's Center for Catastrophic Preparedness and Response.

Nicely phrased. I'd count myself in that half. I've been hit by Andrew, had my house (without me in it that time) hit by Charley, been threatened by countless others, and I have not taken any further steps in a while to better prepare myself. Does that make me unprepared?

I'm well aware of the devastation caused by hurricanes, and always kind of suspected that building below sea level might be a bad idea.