**March 10, 2008 FEMA Emergency Management Higher Education Program
Report**

**(1) Campus Preparedness and Mitigation:**

Brown, Vincent. "A Campus Plan for Natural and Man-Made Disasters." *The
Police Chief*, Vol. 75, No. 2, February 2008. Accessed at:
<http://policechiefmagazine.org/magazine/index.cfm?fuseaction=display&article_id=1421&issue_id=22008>

> "Academic institutions in the eastern and southern United States are
> at risk from hurricanes and floods; the eastern and Midwestern parts
> of the country, from tornadoes; and the West, from earthquakes and
> wildfires.... almost all of the regions of the United States are
> subject to flooding and fires, and some areas also may be at risk of
> landslides, severe winter storms, coastal erosion, avalanches,
> hailstorms, tsunamis, heat waves, and dam failures---plus man-made
> emergencies such as terrorist acts and campus shootings. Natural
> disasters frequently lead to significant financial losses and disrupt
> an institution's teaching, research, and public service missions.
> After Hurricane Katrina flooded New Orleans, the campus of the
> historically black Dillard University was devastated, and tuition had
> to be refunded for the fall semester. Two months after the hurricane,
> the university was forced to reduce its faculty and staff by
> two-thirds due to lack of funds.
>
> "In 1994, California State University in Northridge shut down for
> weeks after an earthquake, costing the school an estimated \$380
> million. In 2001, a tropical storm left 22 feet of water in the
> medical school at the University of Texas at Houston, which caused the
> hospital to close for the first time in its history. In 1997, the
> University of North Dakota had to relocate critical functions, such as
> its computer center, after the Red River inundated the campus..... A
> 2001 tornado killed two students at the University of Maryland. In
> 2000, a fire at Seton Hall University in New Jersey killed three
> students and injured many others. Irreplaceable university archives,
> research laboratories, and college libraries containing rare volumes
> are at risk if campus buildings housing these facilities are located
> in a flood hazard area.....
>
> "Decreasing the vulnerability of a campus to natural and man-made
> hazards through systematic predisaster planning and long-term
> mitigation actions can reduce loss of life and property damage.....A
> study by the Multihazard Mitigation Council reported that "\[each\]
> dollar spent on mitigation saves society an average of four dollars."
>
> "Through the Disaster Mitigation Act of 2000, FEMA provides an array
> of funding for planning projects and mitigation activities, including
> two grant programs: the Pre-Disaster Mitigation Grant Program and
> postdisaster Hazard Mitigation Grant Program. States are the conduit
> through which most FEMA funds flow and set the priorities for
> allocating funds for mitigation projects; for these reasons, state
> hazard mitigation officers should be considered valuable resources for
> obtaining additional information on FEMA's grant programs. Without a
> mitigation plan, some smaller academic institutions may be unable to
> recover from a major disaster. Institutions that have developed a plan
> and implemented mitigation actions are able to resume operations more
> quickly, thereby helping them retain their students and faculty.
> Mitigation activities, which some universities have adopted, include
> improved building practices, sound land-use management, and flood
> insurance that protects financial investment in flood-prone
> buildings."

**(2) Culture of Disaster Preparedness and Resilience: (Missed This At
The Time)**

Department of Homeland Security. *Remarks by Secretary Michael Chertoff
to the National Congress for Secure Communities.* Washington, DC: DHS,
December 17, 2007 News Release. Accessed at:
<http://www.dhs.gov/xnews/speeches/sp_1197986846840.shtm>

\[Very good and lengthy remarks on broad spectrum of citizen and
community disaster preparedness and resilience, including broad range of
DHS programs addressing these topics. Recommend, as well, the Q&A on how
to assign roles and responsibilities across the broad spectrum of
federal, state and local government, private sector, and citizen
communities.\]

**(3) Cyber Story II National and International Exercise -- Set to Begin
This Week:**

DHS has released a Fact Sheet on this week's biennial Cyber Storm
Exercise:

Department of Homeland Security. *Fact Sheet: Cyber Storm II: National
Cyber Exercise*. March 6, 2008. Accessed at:
<http://www.dhs.gov/xprepresp/training/gc_1204738760400.shtm>

> "The exercise will simulate a large-scale coordinated cyber attack on
> critical infrastructure sectors including the chemical, information
> technology (IT), communications, and transportation (rail/pipe)
> sectors.... the goal of Cyber Storm II is to examine the processes,
> procedures, tools and organizational response to a multi-sector
> coordinated attack through, and on, the global cyber infrastructure.
> Exercise planning and execution provides the opportunity to establish
> and strengthen cross-sector, inter-governmental and international
> relationships that are critical during the exercise and in actual
> cyber response situations....
>
> "Participation in Cyber Storm II includes the private sector as well
> as federal, state, and international governments, including Australia,
> Canada, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom. Eleven cabinet-level
> agencies will participate in Cyber Storm II including the Department
> of Defense and Department of Justice. Nine states have been invited to
> participate including California, Colorado, Delaware, Illinois,
> Michigan, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Texas and Virginia. Private
> sector participants have been coordinated through the Information
> Sharing and Analysis Centers, Sector Coordinating Councils, and
> Government Coordinating Councils. Over 40 private sector companies
> from the four critical infrastructure sectors will participate in the
> exercise. It is through the interaction between the public and private
> sectors that the exercise can accurately simulate the
> interdependencies of the world's cyber and communications networks."

For more on this largest ever exercise of its type, see:

Krebs, Brian. "Washington Prepares for Cyber War Games: Week-Long
Simulation Tests Agencies\', Companies\' Response to Online Attacks."
*Washington Post*, March 7, 2008. At:
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/03/07/AR2008030701157.html>

**(4) Disaster Resilient Communities -- Check Out:**

Oak Ridge National Laboratory. "ORNL 'Resilience Plan to Help Tennessee,
Mississippi and South Carolina Communities Beat Disaster." Oak Ridge TN:
4 Oct 2007 News Release. At:
<http://www.ornl.gov/info/press_releases/get_press_release.cfm?ReleaseNumber=mr20071004-00>

> The new Community and Regional Resilience Initiative (CARRI) will be
> implemented in Gulfport, Miss., Memphis, and Charleston, S.C., to
> increase \"resilience\" - the ability to prepare for, respond to and
> quickly recover from natural and man-made disasters - of the three
> communities.

*Tulsa Partners Jan/Feb News*:
<http://www.tulsapartners.org/Newsletters/JanuaryNL2008.pdf>

**(5) Eleventh Annual FEMA Emergency Management Higher Education
Conference (June 2-5, 2008, EMI) Planning Notes:**

Confirmed today that Dr. Dennis Mileti, the former Director of the
Hazards Research Center in Boulder Colorado, will be able to provide two
presentations during the conference. On June 3^rd^ Dr. Mileti will talk
about (a) public hazards education that changes household readiness
behavior, and (2) public warnings that foster protective actions. One
will be a morning plenary session and the other an afternoon breakout
session.

Confirmed that Dr. Emily Bentley and Deden Rukmana at Savannah State
University will develop and manage a breakout session dealing with
"Social Vulnerability" -- probably the afternoon of June 3^rd^.

Confirmed that Carol Cwiak, with the EM Program at North Dakota State
University will be presenting on three topics: (1) at report on her
2^nd^ "State of the Emergency Management Higher Education Community"
survey; (2) a report on her survey of Emergency Management Practitioners
on their conceptions of the core Body of Knowledge for Emergency
Management; and (3) a joint presentation with Stacy Willett, head of the
emergency management bachelors program at the University of Akron,
entitled "Fake It Till You Make It: Emergency Management Higher
Education's Struggle for Internal and External Validity."

Confirmed that Dr. Daniel Klenow, Chair of the Sociology, Anthropology
and Emergency Management Department at North Dakota State University,
will be developing and managing a Breakout Session on Emergency
Management Theory -- or Theory of Emergency Management.

**(6) Hurricane Hazard -- New Publication from U.S. Geological Survey on
2005 Hurricanes:**

U.S. Geological Survey (G. S. Farris, ed.). *Science and the Storms: the
USGS Response to the Hurricanes of 2005*. USGS Survey Circular 1306,
2007, 283 pp. <http://pubs.usgs.gov/circ/1306/>

Abstract From USGS Website:

> "This report is designed to give a view of the immediate response of
> the...USGS to four major hurricanes of 2005: Dennis, Katrina, Rita,
> and Wilma. Some of this response took place days after the hurricanes;
> other responses included fieldwork and analysis through the spring.
> While hurricane science continues within the USGS, this overview of
> work following these hurricanes reveals how a Department of the
> Interior bureau quickly brought together a diverse array of its
> scientists and technologies to assess and analyze many hurricane
> effects. Topics vary from flooding and water quality to landscape and
> ecosystem impacts, from geotechnical reconnaissance to analyzing the
> collapse of bridges and estimating the volume of debris. Thus, the
> purpose of this report is to inform the American people of the USGS
> science that is available and ongoing in regard to hurricanes. It is
> the hope that such science will help inform the decisions of those
> citizens and officials tasked with coastal restoration and planning
> for future hurricanes.
>
> "Chapter 1 is an essay establishing the need for science in building a
> resilient coast. The second chapter includes some hurricane facts that
> provide hurricane terminology, history, and maps of the four
> hurricanes' paths. Chapters that follow give the scientific response
> of USGS to the storms.... Chapter 8 is a compilation of relevant
> ongoing and future hurricane work.....

**(7) National Approaches to Emergency Management -- Emphasis on
Bottom-Up or Top-Down -- or, the Safe, No-Thinking Required, Answer -- a
Balance Between the Two:**

Center for American Progress*. Change FEMA\'s Business Model*. Wash, DC:
March 6, 2008. Accessed at:
<http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/ideas/2008/03/030608.html/print.html>

> The old preparedness model, maintaining a skeleton disaster capability
> and ramping up once disaster strikes, is no longer adequate.... The
> answer does not lie in a different bureaucracy, but in a significant
> increase in operational capability.... Federalizing or militarizing
> disaster response is not the answer. The system must be federally
> supported, but community-based. A stronger regional structure and
> robust command, control, communications, computers, and
> intelligence...structure should improve coordination between the
> Departments of Defense and Homeland Security and their key elements,
> including FEMA, the National Guard, and Northern Command.
>
>         **Invest in FEMA \-- before disaster strikes.** Project Impact
> should be reinstated, and with it better advance planning and
> mitigation before the next natural or man-made disaster. To do this,
> FEMA requires more full-time personnel so that it can plan, mitigate,
> and respond---all at the same time---alongside a larger budget that
> cannot be raided for other purposes besides national preparedness.
> FEMA should be granted greater independence, but remain within
> DHS...."

**(8) Private Sector Preparedness -- Or Lack Thereof -- Familiar Story
or What?**

Miller, Valerie. "Rainy Day Preparations: Disaster Planning Essential to
Small and Big Businesses Alike." *Las Vegas Business Press*. February
2008. Accessed at:
<http://www.lvbusinesspress.com/articles/2008/02/25/news/iq_19819486.txt>

> Talk of disaster preparation may conjure up images of terrorist
> attacks. And Las Vegas is certainly a target of Muslim extremists,
> according to those who monitor the \"chatter\" between groups on the
> other side of the world. But observers say most local businesses may
> not be prepared for the more likely natural disasters. Any disaster
> that puts productivity in a holding pattern can wreak havoc.
>
> A new study finds economic havoc is a likely fallout from even a
> relatively short business interruption. A recent survey of 461
> companies done by the Las Vegas firm Urban Environmental Research
> found that **close to 60 percent of local businesses would classify a
> two-week closure as \"devastating.\"** More than 40 percent of
> companies responded that a shutdown of two to seven days would be
> devastating. **\"Most businesses haven\'t prepared for a disaster,\"**
> said Sheila Conway, the Las Vegas research group\'s managing partner.
> \"Most of these businesses would go out of business after a one-week
> interruption.\"\
> \
> The study also found that **74.4 percent of businesses had never
> attended a meeting on disaster preparedness**; 64.2 percent had never
> received written information on disaster preparation; and, almost half
> \-- 48.2 percent \-- had never developed a business disaster-recovery
> plan.... The Urban Environmental Research study found that 59 percent
> of businesses here had not purchased business interruption insurance.
> Almost 70 percent had not bought flood or earthquake insurance, even
> though the Clark County Department of Emergency Management ranks flash
> flooding among the disasters likeliest to hit Southern Nevada.
>
> The influx of millions of tourists to Las Vegas each year puts the
> city at risk to be a meet-and-greet place for contagious diseases,
> said Carolyn Levering, the department\'s plans and operations
> coordinator. The county department ranked flash floods second on the
> hazard scale, followed by wildfire. Power-grid outages are also an
> especially high risk on the West Coast, Peckman said. An big outage
> could leave local companies particularly vulnerable; the Urban
> Environmental Research study found that 79.2 percent of the businesses
> responded to a question about electricity: That it was so vital to
> their operations that they couldn\'t operate without it.\
> \
> And, if lost power and disease weren\'t scary enough, a recent Rand
> Corp. report suggests Southern Nevadan businesses should consider
> terrorism a real threat. The study, released in September 2006, listed
> Las Vegas as one of the top 10 cities at risk for a terrorist
> attack....
>
> Getting businesses to embrace disaster preparedness is important
> because it may put them in the best position to help themselves.
> Levering, for example, said the community\'s life-or-death needs would
> be tough to meet if a full-scale disaster were to strike; police and
> fire departments already have their hands full with day-to-day heart
> attacks and accidents.\
> \"We don\'t have enough first responders in the first place,\" she
> said. \"The best we could do would be to call people off duty and
> bring people over from shifts. Even with all of that, it wouldn\'t be
> enough in a big enough disaster, and that\'s assuming the first
> responders aren\'t among the victims.\"
>
> *An Ounce of Prevention:* A disaster may be outside a
> businessperson\'s control, but mitigating it isn\'t." \[Article goes
> on to note examples of many things business can do.\]

**(9) Southeast Region Research Initiative Homeland Security & EM
Research Abstracts:**

Oak Ridge National Laboratory. *Southeast Region Research Initiative
2006 & 2007 Projects Abstracts*. 23Jan08, 18 p.
[http://www.serri.org/linked/serri%20projects%20abstracts%2009-25-07.pdf](http://www.serri.org/linked/serri projects abstracts 09-25-07.pdf)

**(10) Western Illinois University -- Bachelor of Science Degree in
Emergency Management:**

Received a very encouraging email recently from Dr. Fred May, who this
past year took over the new Bachelor's of Science Degree program at WIU.
Dr. May notes that when he took over the program this past August there
were just three declared majors. That jumped to 39 after he came
on-board and the Fall Semester started. It is now at 55. Sounds like it
will not be long before additional faculty with emergency management
credentials will have to be added to the staff. More students tends to
lead to requests/demands from them for more...more....more. For
additional information, Dr. May can be reached at: <F-May@wiu.edu>

**The End.**

B.Wayne Blanchard, Ph.D., CEM\
Higher Education Program Manager\
Emergency Management Institute\
National Emergency Training Center\
Federal Emergency Management Agency\
Department of Homeland Security\
16825 S. Seton, K-011\
Emmitsburg, MD 21727\
wayne.blanchard@dhs.gov\
<http://training.fema.gov/EMIWeb/edu>

 **"Please note: Some of the Web sites linked to in this document are
not federal government Web sites, and may not necessarily operate under
the same laws, regulations, and policies as federal Web sites."**

 

EMI, the nation's pre-eminent emergency management training
organization, offers training at no charge to emergency managers and
allied professions through its resident classes in Emmitsburg, MD, its
online courses <http://training.fema.gov/IS/> and through development of
hands-off training courses.  To access upcoming resident courses with
vacancies <http://training.fema.gov/EMICCourses/>. 

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