How did your group overcome these challenges?

• Based upon feedback given by the instructor, revise your presentation of the group’s emergency response plan.
• In addition to revising the presentation, address the following questions in 2–3 pages:
o What were the most significant challenges that your group experienced while drafting the emergency response plan? Explain in detail.
o How did your group overcome these challenges? Explain in detail.
o What best practices do you think are essential for successful emergency response planning? Explain.
 How were those best practices utilized in your group’s planning process? Explain.
• Be sure to reference all sources using APA style.
When it comes to emergency management and implementing committee it is simple if we have a group that is willing to assist in a task that is very difficult, we should except their ideas and let them be a part of the planning committee. The first individual we will have on the planning committee will be : County safety manger as they have their best practice when it comes to risk management and some expertise in hazard materials.
The next member will be The Police Chief due to them have numerous resources such as shutting down roads, being boots on the ground, and having the communication network to alert citizens quickly.
The next member will be county executive, as they are in charge off the county and are able to divert funds until the federal government is able to step in.
The next member will be the mayor of the town most effected by disaster as they are also able to divert funds while awaiting government assistance.
The head member will be the county emergency manger as they are responsible for the county emergency plans and have all of the county and not just a town or city to be responsible for.
The next member will be the local fire chief as they are also a asset and depending on disaster are able to respond and clear roads that the police cannot.
The next member will be The CEO of the local hospital because depending on the event they will where patients are taken to when a disaster strikes.
The next member will red cross as they are able to provide assistance in housing, food, and water immediately and bring in volunteers.
The next member will be the county public works department as they will be assisting the fire department with clearing roadways, closing roads and reporting down power lines or levee breaches.
The final member will be the National Guard as they have the most resources to bring to the table and draw up their own emergency management plans that will be of great assistance.
The following are the components of the emergency management plan that most be used.
• Communication, we must have clear communication and be able to have that established before a disaster strikes. Communications can be radios, emails, and telephones. The communications must be established and clear and concise with the emergency managers group.
• Training, We must have quarterly training such as drills, FEMA ICS courses completed, and collaboration in the training to ensure when a disaster strikes we know what to do.
• Assets, we must ensure we know what assets we have and what at our disposal due to ensure we know that we are not ordering things like water and blankets when we have them already.
• Technical support, such as updated radios for communication, generators that are good working order, dependable vehicles to respond, and geo fence technology to see what happened before, during, and after the incident.
• Medical, we have to have adequate medical equipment, a example is if we have a plague break out due we have enough hospital beds and ventilators to take care of patients. Do we have enough trained emergency responders able to provide the area first aid as they are the first to encounter victims.
Part 2 Introduction: The Component Parts of Houston’s Incident Management Plan for Storm Surge Flooding
For the purposes of organizing this emergency planning committee’s natural disaster risk assessment and action plan, we will be assuming the committee is being organized in Houston, Texas. Because floods are the most common – and more severe – natural disaster that the city faces, this incident management plan focuses on mitigation strategies to make Houston’s landscape more flood-resistant.
A. Preparedness – being aware of what natural disasters and hazards are high-risk in the Houston area
When structuring the component parts of Houston’s Emergency Operations Plan, it is important to first identify the natural disaster that are at risk of causing the most damage to adjacent counties and communities. A quick analysis of previous Houston Hazard Mitigation/Emergency Plans – like Harris County – illustrate that flooding caused by hurricanes are by far the greatest threat to the Houston community (Harris County, 2010). This risk is followed by tornadoes. Rarely, there have also been wildfires that reached the level of receiving a FEMA disaster declaration (Understanding Houston). Residents should also be wary of extreme heat and drought conditions during the summer.
Thus, the component parts of this action plan revolve primarily around flood mitigation tactics, as these natural disasters threaten the lives of every Houston resident. As an example of the absolute destruction flooding can cause the Houston area, Hurricane Harvey cost $125 billion in damages and killed 39 people (Amadeo, 2019).
Here is the most frustrating aspect of Houston’s flood problems: Houston’s urban sprawl and excessive hardscape surfaces (e.g. sidewalks, streets, paved roads) are a main culprit, not being below sea level like New Orleans. In other words, storm surge flooding is not endemic to the Houston geographical or topographical landscape; it has been exacerbated by the 600 square miles of overdeveloped land Houston has been built on. With many of the natural bayous reduced in size, storm surge runoff gathers along all the “hardscape” features of the city – like sidewalks and streets. During natural disasters like hurricanes, this water has nowhere to go, so it pools on all the city’s hardscapes, causing billions of dollars in infrastructural damage in the process.
Because Houston is such an exuberant town, convincing residents that the city can legitimately transform the landscape to be more flood-resistant remains to be seen. Getting all residents to agree on the right way forward has held up progress in Houston for years when it comes to flood-resistant infrastructure. It appears that convincing residents to proactively handle flooding is difficult because while the flooding is sudden, dramatic, and catastrophic, the importance of stormwater management is harder to explain to the public (Bogost, 2017). As a result, inaction has held up proper mitigation factors for some time. We hope the solutions presented below help to mitigate such severe and catastrophic flood damage in Houston.
B. Mitigation – Take proactive, informed steps to prepare the community and surrounding infrastructure for any potential incoming natural hazard
The mantra for this phase of incident management is “ounce of prevention = pound of cure.” Any amount of truly effective mitigation strategies that can be implemented prior to a storm surge event can reduce the damage to the city by several orders of magnitude. It is also important to meaningfully provide solutions that are not only “good ideas,” but actionable in their sequential presentation. For the purposes of this hazard mitigation plan for Houston, 5 key “best practices” were agreed upon for mitigating Houston flood damage:
1. Curtail development in risky areas prone to flooding
The first successful risk mitigation strategy seems simple, but is currently being ignored by Houston’s developers – even in the wake of Hurricane Harvey’s destruction (Houston Chronicle Editorial Board, 2018). We need to stop building new homes in regions of Houston historically designated as “floodplains.” Even 100 and 500 year floodplains are received damage more frequently as a result of climate change, so many of these areas are simply unsafe for residential or commercial development.
By cutting down on expanding Houston through urban sprawl – and instead focusing on making its 600 square miles more flood resistant – the city would potentially save tens of billions of dollars during the next major natural disaster. Contract services to floodplains must be negated for development plans; they are far too risky and place people and vital city infrastructure at risk. Cutting down on these scenarios will improve storm surge safety across the city.
2. Find a way to offer flood insurance to all Houston residents as part of their mortgage (should be built right in through a contract service provided by the city in partnership with private companies)
If Houston residents are going to continue to push the limits on Houston’s urban development, then flood insurance must be offered at a market-adjusted rate to residents. Whether that means a light “flood insurance” tax or rates that depend on how many residents contribute, the city has to find ways to leverage getting flood insurance to residents. If flooding does happen, the lack of insurance can cripple communities.
As a specific solution for this, we recommend that residents get a reminder for flood insurance every month. They can ask to be taken off the list if they desire, but money needs to be put toward establishing a constant reminder system that keeps residents considering flood insurance.
3. Creating intelligently-placed floodplains that slow down the velocity of water
Instead of over-developing existing floodplains and cutting up surrounding bayous, Houston needs to transform the landscape through floodplains that are designed for a specific purpose: slow down the velocity of water as it surges in the city during a hurricane. (Bogost, 2017). These floodplains are meant to provide spots where instead of gathering speed – like water does on sidewalk/street hardscapes – water pools and slows down. Because Houston is only prone to storm surge events, floodplains are going to be a crucial part of Houston’s future city landscape. Hopefully, parks and other greenbelts can double as these floodplains, but such work will take the city contracting eco-minded architects that are willing to affordably transform America’s 4th largest city.
4. Improving vegetation and health of Houston’s surrounding bayous and rivers for retaining water (hurricane-resistant landscaping thru contract services with eco-architects)
This solution bears similarities to the one above, but highlighting the importance of revitalized vegetation throughout the city is another way to slow down the path of surging storm water. When it comes to mitigation strategies, there is no one panacea solution; the goal is to achieve a powerful compounding effect by successfully deploying several mitigation strategies. Thus, on top of creating floodplains, non-floodplain terrain still needs to dotted and broken up by vegetation specifically chosen for its ability to retain water during flooding events.
5. Maintaining mutual aid connections to Texas state emergency operation centers and FEMA resources/personnel
Along with the 4 steps above, Houston’s emergency planning committee needs to maintain a strong mutual aid connection Texas state emergency operation centers and FEMA resources/personnel. During severe natural disasters like Hurricane Harvey, a successful local response is impossible without the immediate support from these state and federal agencies. While the local response will start, making sure that communication networks and emergency supply chain lines are solid should be a consistent effort on the part of Houston’s emergency planning committee.
C. Response – Making sure communication networks and lifelines remain strong even during severe natural disaster events
During an actual natural disasters, we must hope that communication networks and emergency supply chains do not collapse. As soon as the emergency committee members become aware of an imminent natural disaster, the response should start right away. Because roads flood, evacuation it is extremely difficult for Houston residents to evacuate. There must be “safe shelters” established and ready to open when a hurricane is expected to make landfall. That way, residents can know exactly where to go during the actual natural disaster. We would like the establishment of an SMS text alert system for the city of Houston that sends the address of each shelter to Houston residents. That way, they can find out exactly where to go in the event they are advised to evacuate their home but not the city itself.
Additionally, universal FM radios should be sent to every home, so they can make sure they receive vital emergency updates and information from the FEMA broadcasting channel. Local Emergency Committees should make sure that boats and helicopters are available to conduct rescues if residents get trapped inside their homes.
D. Recovery – establishing both short-term and long-term goals to return the community to normalcy and then seeing them through
In the short term, residents can begin by ensuring lifelines – food, shelter, and water – are uninterrupted as the damage is surveyed. Further risks need to be identified (e.g. – toxic water, dangerous animals), and recovery efforts will be smoother if a blueprint is in place to ensure the steady flow of vital supplies to the local residents.
Making sure shelters, hotels, and homes are available as soon as possible will be important, too. Short-term recovery goals are done when a majority of residents are moved back into their home or are on their way to submitting paperwork for fixed paid for by flood insurance.
Long-term recovery goals involve completely restoring and renovating any residential or commercial infrastructure damaged by the hurricane. This is where contract services could be helpful for the city, but there must be a way to make the process both transparent and expedited. The saddest part of recovery efforts are when money or resources stall because two different agencies disagree – however slightly – on the best way to approach recovery efforts. Emergency committees are made up of public servants; we must hold ourselves to a higher degree of accountability and responsibility to the city of Houston.
Incident management during an emergency involves multiple phases at different levels to be able to attempt to regain control of the area involved. There are 4 phases of Emergency Management of which there is an Emergency Manager who is assigned to take the lead and monitor people and assets throughout the event. The four emergency management strategies are mitigation, preparedness, response, and recovery. In the state of Louisiana there are more tornadoes and hurricanes and while dealing with these hazards’ emergency managers need to work more efficiently and properly. Having personal preparedness to begin with is the one of the most effective levels of preparedness to help minimize some major losses during disasters. Some of the other challenges during emergencies are identified during the event as the personnel are responding to the hazard areas. Many disconnects can happen to the community and responders the public, awareness and ensuring the proper information is disseminated will be one of the biggest challenges for the emergency managers to handle.
Disaster management personnel have to be able to communicate the information to all the affected areas by any means available throughout the time of the disaster in the attempts to keep the communities informed of any changes to during the event and what if any responders, or additional personnel are needed to help contain the area. When Louisiana has a natural disaster like a hurricane or tornado, the emergency manager is responsible to plan and strategize how the technology is to be used to provide the information and responses using this technology and implementing the newer technologies that have been tested to provide the timely information about the hazards. Currently the system being used to alert the public are sirens in the public places to warn of the oncoming disaster. Also installing strobe lighting around the areas to help with the people with impairments. Having both working in unison will allow the public to be warned simultaneously about the situation. Using CAP benefits the town giving audio, video, photos, and maps in addition to serving the needs of people with hearing and vision disabilities it sends the alerts in multiple languages for the different nationalities in the city. The IPAWS system is used by over 1,500 federal state local tribal and territorial alerting authorities to warn the public of the events and emergencies in their areas.
Trying to alert the whole community is a big challenge but, when attempting to evacuate this will fall under the response phase of emergency management and the EM may have to conduct physical evacuation drills to ensure the people are prepared and trained properly. To effectively evacuate large groups like moving a state into another state will require coordination from multiple agencies. If the states infrastructure starts to collapse this will fall under the mitigation phase during the emergency. For this it will require the community to prepare the buildings for the storm by boarding up buildings and fortifying the structures as much as possible. For buildings and new houses, the builders and owners are to follow all building codes employing the use of window shutters and constructing safe rooms or basements based on the geographical areas on the propensity of flooding to prevent the loss of life and help to deal with some of the issues with trying to evacuate during the disaster. The building codes should include the areas that are not to be built on based on the location and proximity to additional damages. The newer buildings should be built with basements to withstand the pressures of the tornadoes and heavy rains from the hurricanes. Natural disasters are impossible to predict and prevent but, by taking these steps in prevention can help to possibly reduce the loss of life in the future.
The short-term recovery goal of the community is to minimize the loss of life and maintain the lifesaving services at the minimum standards during the disaster until they can return to the normal operating standards. When working on the short-term recovery goals they can eventually turn into long term recovery efforts. The reestablishment of transportation routes for the citizens to be able to access the roads to enter and exit along with allowing emergency personnel to be able to access the areas to provide services such as providing medical care, food, and moving people to better shelters for the duration of the storm. By doing this, will give the state the ability to begin the recovery efforts of rebuilding the infrastructure. The long-term recovery goals of the community include what is currently started along with additional activities that will stretch over a longer period of time namely years.
When the state is starting the recovery efforts, the short-term recovery efforts are put in place to reestablish some of the basic services restarted and provide essential care to the community. After a major disaster has hit the area, the EM starts the redevelopment of the infrastructure and community. These changes are to strengthen the area and mitigate some of the previous issues by either moving some of the businesses and homes from the dangerous areas and relocating them to better geographic regions based on the topography of the land. Relocating the communities to better areas can improve the level of life and decrease the losses of lives during and after the disaster event. Long-term recovery goals would lean more towards the rebuilding of public health and medical recovery units i.e., getting the local hospitals back up and running to full capacity, beginning economic redevelopment, and infrastructure resilience.
References
Bogost, I. (2017, August 29). Houston’s flood is a design problem. The Atlantic. https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2017/08/why-cities-flood/538251/.
City of Houston. (n.d.). Understanding Houston. https://www.understandinghouston.org/topic/disasters/disaster-risks#overview.
Domonoske, C. (2017, August 28). Why didn’t officials order the evacuation of houston? NPR. https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2017/08/28/546721363/why-didn-t-officials-order-the-evacuation-of-houston.
The Editorial Board. (2018, October 23). Has Houston gone insane? New homes in the flood PLAINS [EDITORIAL]. Chron. https://www.chron.com/opinion/editorials/article/Has-Houston-gone-insane-New-homes-in-the-flood-13328280.php.
Harris County Emergency Planning Committee. (n.d.). Harris County: All Hazard Mitigation Plan. http://mitigationguide.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/TXHarris.pdf.
Mission Areas and Core Capabilities. FEMA. (2020). https://www.fema.gov/emergency-managers/national-preparedness/mission-co