Optimal Life Recovery Assistance for Those Residing in DesignatedTemporary Housing after the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake
Disaster: A Final Project SummaryS. Tatsuki1
ABSTRACT
In order to respond to huge temporary housing demands caused by the 2011 Great East Japan
Earthquake (GEJE) disaster, the Japanese national government introduced a new policy to rent
private apartments and houses as designated temporary housing (DTH) for the impacted survivors.
As of May, 2013, those who were dwelling in DTH, PTH, and public housing units were 50%, 41%
and 9%, respectively. This paper summarizes major findings from the four-year designatedtemporary housing (DTH) residents’ life recovery study in Natori city, Miyagi prefecture. First, aseries of qualitative studies revealed three distinct types of DTH households, consisting of young
upward mobile adults, elderly and people with functional needs. Second, FY 2014 Natori population
surveys showed that DTH residents on average showed higher recovery scores than PTH residents.
However, those DTH households that required reasonable accommodation in their everyday life
functioning (e.g., households consisting of single elderly, or physically vulnerable members)
showed lower life recovery compared with the PTH counterpart. Third, disaster case management
was necessary for those vulnerable households with functional needs and the ICT system developedby the project was found to be useful in facilitating case management processes in order for thosesurvivors to design and implement their life recovery plans.

In order to respond to huge temporary housing demands caused by the 2011 Great East Japan
Earthquake disaster, the Japanese national government introduced a new policy to rent private
apartments and houses as designated temporary housing (DTH) for the impacted survivors. DTH
has since become a mainstream policy: 57,825 units of apartments/houses were rented as DTH
units while 47,839 prefabricated temporary housing (PTH) units were newly constructed. As ofMay, 2013, those dwelling in DTH, PTH, and public housing units were 50%, 41% and 9%,respectively. Japanese disaster research, however, has been mainly focusing on life recovery
assistance for PTH inhabitants who live near each other. However, not much is known about thelife recovery processes of DTH residents. This paper summarizes major findings from the fouryear DTH residents’ life recovery study in Natori city, Miyagi prefecture (see Figure 1).
Ethnography Research on DTH Residents’ Life Recovery Processes
In order to identify life recovery process characteristics of DTH residents in comparison withother types of housing arrangements, 21 GEJE survivors were intensively interviewed by theethnography research team from October, 2012 to March 2014. The 21 informants were allresiding in Yuriage community, Natori city at the time of GEJE and consisted of DTH (16), PTH
1Professor, Dept. of Sociology, Doshisha University, Kamigyo-ku, Kyoto, Japan, 602-8580

Proceedings of the 4th International Conference on Urban Disaster Reduction, Wellington, New Zealand, 2016.

① １Identify Life Recovery Process
Characteristics of DTH Residents
Ethnography Interview Research(S. Tanaka, Tokoha Univ.)③ Create a Local Govenment

Ethnography Monograph Publication

JointMeeting•Sendai•Iwanuma•Ishinomaki•How DTH & PTH residents
make decisions on moving
out to permanent housing
units.

Seven Critical Element Modelof Life Recovery

Workshop & Survey Reserach(S. Tatsuki, Doshisha Univ.)

Natori Life Recovery Population Surveys• Population Surveys in Fys 2014, 2015 &2016• 2014‐2015‐2016 Panel Data Analyses

Endogenous
Parameters forLife Recovery
Manupulable/Controllable
Parameters forLife Recovery

Local
Gvmnt

(Disaster Casemanegement Support System
S. Tatsuki, Doshisha U. & S. Sato, Tohoku Univ.)
Impacted Survivors in Need
（Identified through Surveys and/or Interviews）
Disaster Victim
Registry Data BasePart 2

Disaster Casemanegement
Support Module

Exeogenous・Household &Parameters for PersonalLife Recovery
Information
Uncontrollable/Constraint
Parameters forLife Recovery

Rental UnitOwners
Supporters

Public forum
Multi‐faceted
Examination ofPolicy/Program
Recommendations

Focus Group WS• 2013 WS (31 participants)• 2014 WS (19 Participants)

Part 1

Working Papers for Guidelie

Ethnography Research on DTH and PTH
Program Colosure Processes
Project Areas
Research Question②Rsearch, Development & Utilization ofDisaster Casemanegement Support System

Guideline for DTH Program
Administration

DTH Progaram
Guideline for Local
Government

・Victim Assistance
Service &Program
Reception
RecordLife Recovery
Assistance
Dpt.

Related City
Dpt.
representatives

Service Coordination
Community
Outreach
MeetingCenter
Service Coordination through
Maintaing Common Operation PTH Residents

DTH Residents Picture of Each Active Case
Support Center

Prefecture
Psycho-social
Support Center

Long-Term
Care Service
Coordination
CenterSupport Center

City Public
Visiting Nurse
Association Health Cebnter

Figure 1. Natori DTH Study Project Work Flow.
(4) or one’s own restored home (1) residents. Each interview took place on one occasion at each
informant’s residence with, in most of the cases, his/her spouse or other adult family members
being present. They were asked to share their experiences after the event in an unstructured
interview which usually took 2 to 2 and a half hours.
Three different household types (young adults, vulnerable elderly and those with functional needs)
were identified through the interviews. (1) The households consisting of mainly young adults withstable income, livelihood and previous experiences of renting houses, began rental housing searchsoon after the disaster and found interim units by their own efforts within two to three months.
They showed a high propensity to be independent from government support. (2) Those vulnerable
elderly households who missed opportunities to not only apply for government supplied PTH units
but also for suitable DTH units from the rental housing market, were forced to move into smaller,older and less desirable DTH units situated in inconvenient locations. Because relocations among
DTH or PTH units were not allowed, they had no choice but to continue residing in low quality
accommodations. (3) Those households with family members requiring reasonableaccommodations due to disabilities and other related functional needs decided that they would
cause trouble to other people in any emergency shelter, and that it would be too hard to live in
mass-provided/produced non-barrier-free PTH units. Because of this, they opted for rental
housing units immediately after the disaster (Tanaka and Shigekawa, 2014).
Life Recovery Assessment Workshop and Surveys
In order to identify factors that facilitate resilience for life recovery, participatory focus group
workshop sessions were held in January of 2013 and March of 2014 involving 31 and 19 EJEQ
survivor/participants, respectively. The participants’ housing arrangements varied from DTH andPTH to restored or newly rebuilt homes. During workshop sessions, participants were asked tostate elements that would help them to feel that “I am no longer a disaster victim.” Participantsfrom 2013 workshop produced 193 opinion cards and those from 2014 produced 118 cards. Basedon a Grounded Theory type of conceptual clustering of statements/opinions from each workshop,

seven super-categories emerged as resilience enhancers. Those consisted of housing, social ties,community involvement, physical/mental stress management, preparedness, livelihood, andrelations to government. These seven elements were commonly seen across different types ofhousing arrangements. The results turned out to be identical to the findings from the 1999 grassroots assessment workshops on life recovery from the 1995 Kobe Earthquake. The 1999 workshop
results provided an empirical basis to build the Seven Critical Element Model (SCEM) of life
recovery (Tatsuki, 2007). The similar results from the 2013 and 2014 workshops supported thevalidity of the SCEM and its empirical measures for further quantitative research on life recovery
processes among the GEJE impacted citizens.
Based on the SCEM, three population surveys on life recovery were conducted with Natori citizens
in DTH and PTH residences in fiscal years 2014, 2015 and 2016. Questionnaires were mailed toall those who were registered as DTH and PTH residents by Natori city at the time of each survey.
72.7 % (1,533 households) and 85.4% (1,187 households) returned the survey questionnaires inFy2014 and Fy2015, respectively (Fy2016 survey results are still in process of analyses at thispoint). Figures 2 to 5 illustrate the major findings on the effects of DTH/PTH on life recovery as
was found from Fy2014 survey. As shown in Figure 2, life recovery scores of DTH residents onaverage were significantly higher (p < .01) than those of PTH residents. This seems to support ingeneral the validity of the newly introduced DTH policy. Figure 2 seems to imply that DTH wasa better choice for “1) younger, self-reliant and upwardly mobile families.” In order to examine
life recovery situations among the next two categories of “vulnerable elderly households” and“households with persons with functional needs”, their average life recovery scores were examined(Figures 3 to 5). Figure 3 showed that single elderly households recovered better at PTH than atDTH. Similarly, Figures 4 and 5 illustrate that those households with physically vulnerable
persons (PVP) or persons with disability (PWD), respectively recovered better at PTH rather thanDTH. Those socially or physically vulnerable categories of survivors seemed to have benefited
from living arrangements with more formal/informal help available in PTH complexes.
Other TypesTypesofOtherof Household
HouseholdSingle ElderlyElderly
PersonSingle
HouseholdHousehold

PTH

DTH
Temporary Housing TypePTHDTH
Temporary Housing Type

Figure 2: Life recovery score by temporary housing typeFigure 3: Life recovery score by temporary housing type bysingle elderly household or not
Household without Pers
Householdwith Disability w/o PWD
Household with withPerson PWD
Householdwith Disability

Household with PVPHousehold w/o PVPNAHousehold with PhysicallyVulnerable Person
Household without
Physically Vulnerable Person

PTHDTH
Temporary Housing Type

Figure 4: Life recovery score by temporary housing type byhousehold with/without a physically vulnerable person

DTHPTH
Temporary Housing Type

Figure 5: Life recovery score by temporary housing type byhousehold with/without a person with disability

Development/Utilization of Disaster Case Management Support System
The 2015 Natori Life Recovery Population survey of DTH and PTH residents revealed about 301
households (or about 20 %) of those who responded were still undecided regarding where, when,
which types of permanent housing, and/or with which family members they would like to relocate
to. Proportionately more DTH residents (19.2 %) were undecided than those in PTH (6.1%). Thisis mainly because most of PTH residents were determined to build their own houses or to moveinto public restoration housing units back in the Yuriage community once the land elevation andreadjustment projects were completed. The reasons for not being able to decide on permanent
housing plans varied from financing a new home or finding a unit in a suitable location (i.e., close
to work, school, clinic, public transportation, etc.), through disagreement among family members,
to being too overwhelmed about making decisions. In other words, the reasons were allparticularistic and usually multifaceted, and there was no single universal solution. Case-by-casehelp therefore was required in order to sort out the tangled threads of multiple issues/wants/needs,
each of which might require corresponding formal and informal resources (i.e., health, social
services, education, income/job security and others) in order to meet its needs. Disaster casemanagement was found useful to manage these case-by-case helping processes.
Our research team assisted the Natori cityadministration to introduce a casemanagement support system, which
NoFirst Time?
Review Service History
Yes
consisted of 1) the formation of a multiorganizational case management network
Assessment/
Rapport Buildingof formal/informal departments/agencies,
Identify Tasks in termsof Wants & Needs
Case Management2) a disaster case management cycle
Support Module
Multi‐Network ServiceDesign Individualized
standard operation procedure (SOP), 3) theCoordination Meeting
Support Plans
use of commonly used technologies such
Formal/Informal
Service Provision
Resources
as ecomaps and genograms, 4) training andMonitoring
exercise procedures, and 5) theEvaluation
More support Needed
NoYes
introduction of Plan-Do-Check-Action
Disaster Victim
Termination/Follow‐up
Registry Data Base
cycles for operational improvements. A
prototype ICT module as shown in Figure
Figure 6: Disaster Case Management Cycle Standard Operation Procedure
6 was developed and utilized in order tofacilitate the standardized case management cycles while maintaining each case’s common
operational picture that was to be shared among those who were involved and providing
corresponding services from different departments or agencies.
Identify Any Individuals inNeed through Survey,
Interview or Phone Call

Case Management
Module Items

Overview
Detailed Description
Ecomap
Genogram

Subjective Wants
Objective Needs

Long‐Term Goals
Short‐ Term Goals
Actions/Services
Next Review Time
Coordinator

Service Record at t1::
Service Record at tn

Achieve Long‐Terms Goal?
Achieve Short‐Terms Goal?

Acknowledgments
This research project was supported by JST, RISTEX.
References
1.

Tanaka, S., and Shigekawa, K. Housing recovery processes of the temporary housing dwellers for the 2011 greateast japan earthquake: Natori city case study. Proceedings of the 3rd International Conference on Urban DisasterReduction. 2014.

2. Tatsuki, S., 2007, Long-term life recovery processes among survivors of the 1995 Kobe Earthquake: 1999, 2001,
2003, and 2005 Life Recovery Social Survey results. Journal of Disaster Research, 2(6), 484-501.