Pretty good article Larry, lots of good points and recommendations.   I
am on the regional emergency operations team here, and we have regularly
scheduled training and drills at the EOC.  The first responders to any
major emergency are, in priority and order:
1. first         Local
2. second,  State
3. third,      Federal

We need to first focus on recovery and relief to the areas and people
affected.

With Hurricane Katrina, it appears that we had lack of preparedness,
breakdowns, or abject inaction, in # 1, failures in communications and
collaboration between 1 to 2, in # 2, and communications and
collaborations in 2 to 3.  I will not defend FEMA, but there are real
reasons why their action was delayed by several days.  The media will,
of course, be sensationalistic in their reporting, including being quick
to blame without knowing all the facts, and without knowing how the
preventation and recovery PROCESS is supposed to work.   They are the
media, and thus they do not have to be fair and impartial.

However, there is opportunity for vast improvements at all levels,
including communications and  coordination between all.  I am wondering
if the governments, at all levels, will put the preventative and
reactive resources necessary to improve the responses. As predictions
from the Bible come to pass, we will have more and more natural and
man-made disasters to deal with in the next several decades.  It is time
to get our collective stuff together, so to speak.

This is personal....;
I still wonder why the state did not, in the first day after the flood,
confiscate fleets of school buses from unaffected areas, go to grocery
stores and stock up bottled water and food items, send them to the super
dome and distribute, then haul people out of there as fast as possible.
Notwithstanding local, state, or any possible federal responsibilities
and how the chain of activities are supposed to work, I would have
ordered that done.  However, I am not a politician and perhaps practical
solutions and actions are not part of the political process.

I am leaving for Chi town in the morning.  I am sure Gail Ann, Carrie,
and other RIM professionals from the affected areas will have good
disaster prevention & recovery presentations and case studies for next
year's ARMA conference.

Best regards, Steve
Steven D. Whitaker, CRM
Records Systems Manager; City of Reno

>>> Larry Medina <[log in to unmask]> 09/13/05 03:09PM >>>
Okay, so the writers go a bit broad in their perspective on who needs
to do
what, but it gives you something to think about....

The Next Big One
 Where America is most vulnerable and how the nation can better manage
the
risks ahead.
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/05_38/b3951001.htm


--
Larry Medina
Danville, CA
RIM Professional since 1972

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