Obstacles Of FEMA

Should the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) move out from under the DHS umbrella to become a stand alone agency? Yes. We will discuss two glaring reasons that this should take place, budget & mission statement. Will it be an easy move? No, but after working out the administrative kinks, the FEMA would operate much smoother as it's own organization.

Within the political environment there are pre-existing issues that affected the Katrina crisis and made it worst. The main issue was that of constitutional power and whether in this case Bush should seize that power. Federal, state and local powers are divided and in general state that whatever the federal government is not entrusted with the state will handle to their abilities. When issues of national importance arise the federal government can take power under the Supremacy Clause but must be justified under national importance. Though the nation as a whole may have wanted the federal government and its resources to take over Bush’s office may have faced a congressional backlash. Another issue of historical value is that of sovereignty,

The study that has been done is on Hurricane Katrina Where a previous drill was done during Hurricane Pam to prepare for a hurricane of the intensity of Hurricane Katrina.

Despite warnings of the impact, Hurricane Andrew the response was negligent and ill prepared. As predicted, the devastation was catastrophic. (20) Governor Chiles was either not informed as to how the state would be affected or was lax in his duties. The Governor waited too long before requesting help for the state. Governor Chiles felt that the state itself could handle the damages that arose after impact and refused government assistance. Once he realized the state could not handle the devastation on its own, government also waited for a formal request from the Governor before stepping in. The reaction from FEMA after the request was slow and ineffective waiting for word from Chiles. In essence, no one actually surveyed the damages caused by the hurricane and once surveyed properly; people had already waited too long and were in dire

time of crisis by R. David Paulison, who unlike Brown, has had a career focused on disaster

Whether under the Fair Housing Amendments Act of 1988 (FHA), which makes it illegal to discriminate in housing on the basis of an individual’s handicap, Ms. Mary Land, the widowed owner, manager, and landlord¬¬ of a historic building with Tiffany stained glass transforms, extinct pinewood flooring, and mahogany woodwork¬, violated the FHA by refusing to rent an apartment to Mr. Jim Rent, a potential paraplegic tenant with acute transverse myelitis (ATM), when enforcing a first-come first-served parking policy, where there are only three allocated spots available to the nine apartments, and a no-pets policy, where Ms. Land had an allergy and a tenant potential could go into anaphylactic shock, where Mr. Rent required access to a dedicated parking spot for his specially-equipped van, which allowed him to use his mobility device the iBOT™, the use of a medical alert response companion dog (MARC dog), that was certified, prescribed, and trained to assist Mr. Rent with his daily routine, and needed to make structural modifications to the apartment and bathroom, in order to insure his mobility and safety in the apartment, even though Mr. Rent, six months prior, had a history of leaving items on the stove, causing fire alarms to go off notifying the fire department, and leaving water running in the bathtub, which lead to several floods of his apartment requiring new flooring and carpeting.

The “No Child Left Behind Act” set unrealistic expectations and gave schools incentives to lie and cheat. The “PATRIOT Act” was an infringement upon individuals’ rights to privacy. And lastly, the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq were based on shortsightedness and false intelligence, and will leave a poor lasting impact in the years to come.

Individuals with disability have had a long history of maltreatment in America. From being thought of as possessed individuals in need of exorcism, targeted for heinous experiments, unknowingly sterilized, being labeled imbecile, feeble minded, and retarded, to being shipped off to state schools or mental asylums, those with disabilities were given no consideration as a valuable and able to contribute member of society. In a speech to congress, Frank Bowe, a highly educated deaf-man highlighted this claim by stating, “we are not even second-class citizens, we are third-class citizens” (Bowe, F. 1977--need citation), and Jim Cherry (2001) furthered the ideal in his words, that prior to “1970 we [disabled citizens] had no right to education, to employment, to transportation, to housing, or to voting. There were no civil rights laws for us, no federal advocacy grants. Few people looked beyond our medical needs” (Cherry, J.L, 2001 http://www.raggededgemagazine.com/0701/0701cov.htm). Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 attempted to fundamentally change how disabled people were reguarded.

The Creation of FEMA started out as a beautiful theory. Before FEMA we had an Acts constructed to make the situation better but FEMA was constructed to assistance the situations first hand so that the American people were catered to at a quicker response and in a manner that was assessed for safety situations. “On April 1, 1979, President Jimmy Carter signed the executive order that created the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). From day one, FEMA has remained committed to protecting and serving the American people. That commitment to the people we serve and the belief in our survivor centric mission will never change.” This is stated on fema.gov; this shows that FEMA was designed to be the leaders in effect for disasters that

According to Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), there are many factors that will affect the direction of emergency management in the coming years. These can be classified as global challenges, global opportunities, national challenges, national opportunities, professional challenges, and professional opportunities. Global Challenges include some issues like global climate change, increasing population and population density, increasing resource scarcities, rising income inequality, and increasing risk aversion. Global Opportunities has to do with increased scientific understanding of the hazards and societal responses, as well as revolutionary technologies. National Challenges involves increasing urbanization and hazard exposure, interdependencies in infrastructure, continued emphasis on growth, rising costs of disaster recovery, increasing population diversity, terrorist threats, low priority of emergency management, legal liability, and intergovernmental tensions. Due to these factors that will affect the direction of emergency management in the coming years, there is need for us at emergency management division to adjust operational plans to meet these challenges and especially changes emanating from constant changes expected in technology and other threats we face.

After years of discrimination, it looked as though people with disabilities would finally fine justice. In 1968 a bill was proposed that would enable people with disabilities to seek protection from the government. One would think that this bill would be welcomed into our society, but the events that followed proved quite the contrary. It took five years, three changes of administration and two presidential vetoes to pass the Rehabilitation Act. President Richard Nixon signed the bill into law on September 26, 1973. This act was designed to protect the rights of persons with disabilities. Proceeding the signing of the bill a federal campaign was launched to eliminate discrimination

through filthy, contaminated water with no help. Yet, how to get to those who needed assistance was going to be a challenge within itself. There was going to have to be a plan for transportation.

Federal policy has attempted to address the issue of discrimination in housing choice with the enactment of the Fair Housing Act (United States Department of Housing and Urban Development, 2010). In fact, “in 1988, the Fair Housing Act expanded protection to include persons with mental and physical disabilities” (Ziaja, 2002, p. 313) in an effort to thwart discrimination in housing choice for disabled individuals. Ziaja (2002) noted that the enactment of the Fair Housing legislation has led to other federal policies dedicated to ensuring the rights of disabled individuals, such as the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA); however, disabled adults continue to experience discrimination in housing

The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) is a body under the United States Department of Homeland Security that was created in 1978 to improve the safety of the American residents, especially during disasters. FEMA has a primary mandate of coordinating the response to any disaster that may occur in the U.S. and that overwhelms both local and state authorities’ resources. FEMA comes in to aid only after the governor of the involved state has declared a state of emergency and has made a formal request. However, there is an exception to the gubernatorial declaration requirement, when an emergency occurs on a federal property such as the Space Shuttle Columbia experienced in the 2003 return-flight disaster ("About the FEMA Agency", 2016).

After the world wars and Vietnam War, there were many disabled American veterans who faced challenges and prejudice they had not experienced before. Alongside those fighting in the Civil Rights Movement were disabled veterans and other people with disabilities. They too were fighting against inequalities and discrimination. The Disability Rights Movement occurred due to several issues rooted in structured inequalities. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 was an example of inequality built into legislation as it prohibited discrimination based on “race, color, religion, or national origin”(Cornell), but did not address discrimination based on disabilities. Inaccessibility and negative societal views excluded those with disabilities from their rights. There was a need for a policy written specifically for the protection of persons with disabilities.