![](media/image1.wmf){width="0.875in" height="0.875in"} University of
Colorado at Denver and Health Sciences Center

**School of Public Affairs**

1380 Lawrence St., Suite 500

Denver, Colorado 80204

Phone: 303-315-2482 (direct)

Fax: 303-315-2229

Email: <lloyd.burton@cudenver.edu>

Spring Semester, 2007 Professor Lloyd Burton

Weekend Intensive

***P.Ad. 6600/7600.***

***THE LAW OF ALL-HAZARDS MANAGEMENT***

***[Syllabus, Part I. Course Description]{.underline}***

***Purpose.*** This course has two basic purposes. The first is to
provide students with knowledge of the legal environment within which
emergency managers -- whether local, state, or federal; and whether
civilian or military -- practice their profession.

The other core purpose is to train students in the art and science of
all-hazards legal research: how to find and understand the contents of
primary and secondary source legal documents (including court
decisions); how to research emergency management law questions of
particular professional or personal interest to the student; and how to
write up those research results in a scholarly, intelligible, and
professional manner. The legal research skills level acquired in this
course qualifies it as meeting the qualitative research methods
requirement for GSPA's Ph.D. program.

This course is a pre-approved elective in the School of Public Affairs\'
Program in Emergency Management and Homeland Security (EMHS). To
facilitate fulfillment of course purposes, *enrollment will be limited
to 20 students*.

***Content: The All-Hazards, All-Phases Framework.*** Using the case
study approach, we will study how authority is distributed laterally
across branches of government and vertically between levels of
government, depending on the scope and scale of a disaster; and on
whether it was naturally, accidentally, or intentionally (e.g.,
terrorist-) caused; that is, the course is based on the all-hazards
framework. We will also be mapping power shifts between branches and
levels, depending on which phase (mitigation, preparedness, response,
and recovery) of the all-phases model of emergency management is being
undertaken.

We will study the role of the courts in reviewing the actions of
emergency management agencies and managers on topics such as quarantine
planning and enforcement; liability for and immunity from civil lawsuits
among emergency management agencies and emergency managers personally;
the legal interface(s) between local, state, and federal emergency
managers; and the interface between civilian and military authorities.
Finally, we will be mapping all these interlocking relationships and
authorities into a unifying "legal GIS" framework that can allow
emergency managers to better understand not only their own legal
environment but that of their counterparts in other organizations as
well.

***Process.*** Class meetings will be from 5-9:PM Friday evenings and
9-5 Saturdays, on the first weekends of February, March, and April,
2007. The class will meet in the IT conference room and the computer lab
at the Graduate School of Public Affairs, Downtown Denver Campus of the
University of Colorado at Denver and Health Sciences Center.

After learning basic online legal research skills, students will be
divided into teams to do case study research and advocacy on legal
issues arising in the management of naturally, accidentally, and
intentionally caused disasters. There will also be guest presentations
by experienced emergency managers and their legal advisors.

***Readings.*** Required readings will consist of one text (Nicholson,
[Emergency Response and Emergency Management Law]{.smallcaps}) and a
small handful of articles and court decisions that will be posted on the
course website (and therefore made available free to course
participants). Recommended though not required are Nicholson's [Homeland
Security Law and Policy,]{.smallcaps} and Stephen Gifis' [Law
Dictionary]{.smallcaps} (though any inexpensive paperback law dictionary
will do).

***Evaluation***. The major work product of the course will be a
research paper on a topic of the student's own choosing. Students are
encouraged though not required to submit a rough draft of the paper for
early (non-graded) evaluation and advice for improvement. (Although the
last class meeting is in early April, the paper is not due until early
May). Other bases for course performance evaluation will be two short
case briefing exercises and class discussion participation, the relative
weight being:

Case briefing exercises: 30%

Class participation: 10%

Research/writing project: 60%

***Faculty***. Professor Burton holds a teaching law degree, and is
director of the EMHS Program. His first emergency management experience
was as a Navy Hospital Corpsman with the U.S. 3^rd^ Marine Division in
the Republic of Vietnam; he later taught at the U.S. Navy Hospital Corps
School. He chaired a gubernatorial commission overseeing the cleanup of
Colorado's largest municipal Superfund site; and currently serves on the
Denver Board of Environmental Health. For more information about this
course, contact Professor Burton via any of the information on this
course syllabus letterhead.

***Registration.*** Online registration for this course commences on
November 13, 2006. Those interested in taking the course who are not
already students in the University of Colorado system must first
register as non-degree-seeking students through the [UCDHSC-DDC
Registrar's
Office](http://www.cudenver.edu/Admissions/Non-Degree+Admissions/default.htm)
to gain access to course registration. For more information about either
the course itself or the registration process, contact Professor Burton
via any of the information on the syllabus letterhead.