Roberta J. WittyToday, DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano held a press conference to commemorate the end of “National Preparedness Month” in the U.S. Her key message was that readiness and resilience is a shared responsibility starting at the personal level and extending to government agencies, communities and the workplace.
According to Secretary Napolitano, readiness and resilience are related activities – readiness meaning being prepared with needed plans and resources before an emergency occurs so that one can adapt in the moment and emerge stronger after the crisis – a demonstration of resilience.
In order to be prepared, we must change our attitude that someone will be there when something bad happens to us. To highlight this point, Secretary Napolitano stated that readiness and resilience is not just the job of the government. Disasters (from power outages, natural disasters to terrorist attacks) can happen to each of us – not just others, and therefore, we each need to be personally prepared.
To achieve that end, Secretary Napolitano stated that the heart of resilience is individual family readiness. Every family needs to take very basic steps so that we act with control and not fear during a very chaotic and disorienting time such as a crisis. We need to know the events that are likely to impact our particular location, have an emergency kit and family reunification plan (see my research note: “Personal Preparedness enhances Corporate Recovery” as well advice from www.Ready.gov)
Secretary Napolitano also encourages everyone to get involved and work as a part of a community. She said that America is not just a nation of individuals and families; rather, we are a nation of groups of all kinds – groups being the fiber of our society and we need to keep the fiber strong so that we are more effective to respond when something bad happens. She encourages everyone who is already part of a group to go one step further and raise their hand in the group to which they belong and ask the question: “What’s our plan?” Organizations, social groups and efforts like Citizen Corps –a grassroots effort from FEMA to bring together government and community leaders to involve citizens in all-hazards emergency preparedness and resilience all help to prepare communities for any kind of emergency
DHS has made $3 billion in grants available to communities to bolster the preparedness of the local and state government agency network. At the federal level, Secretary Napolitano stated that DHS will start to hold “no-notice” disaster exercises to ensure everyone at the federal level knows how to respond in a moment’s notice. This is a very different practice from past exercises which were scripted well in advance.
DHS has also launched a series of public service announcements as well as a weekly email message that will directed at family preparedness.
DHS is also expanding to other communities the secure communities network (SCN) which today provides emergency preparedness training and rapid communication services during a crisis the Jewish community.
Finally, DHS will be starting a national award program that awards people and organizations that bring innovation and excellence to national preparedness and resilience.
The following questions were asked at the end of her speech.
- Will states take on the no-notice drills? Secretary Napolitano responded that DHS can encourage states to do so, but cannot mandate it. They plan to lead by example.
- What can business do to help with readiness and resilience? Secretary Napolitano responded that citizens should work with your employees to put in place workplace preparedness programs.
- Is there any support to include a donation, for example $2, on the annual IRS tax return? Secretary Napolitano responded that it is not planned, but DHS is happy to take those donations.
- Does resilience include building code guidelines and so forth? Secretary Napolitano responded that resilience does extend to such practices.
- What is the assessment of the country’s readiness for H1N1? Secretary Napolitano responded that the U.S. is ready and prepared, having worked throughout the spring and summer of 2009 with such activities as reaching out to the private sector to ensure they have plans, working with school districts for response plans and school closures, and states in preparation for the H1N1 vaccine program rollout.
A replay can be found at: www.Ready.gov
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