Social Vulnerability

Chapter seven of Social Problems by Joel Best was about how policies are made and the process of getting a policy noticed. The chapter explains what policy domains are (201). Best also explains Kingdon’s policy stream model (204-207). Best goes on to explain the pressures put on policymakers (211). Best ends the chapter talking about the rhetoric of policymaking (216).

Tragic events that cause damage to property and life may destroy the social, cultural and economic life of a community. Communities must be engaged in the various phases from prevention to recovery to build disaster resilient communities. In order to do this, there must be a disaster preparedness plan in place that involves multiple people in various roles.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) would become the central point-of-contact within the national government in responding to incidents. Since formation in 1979, FEMA’s core missions were to enhance the government’s ability to survive a foreign attack, and to assist state and local authorities in disaster response (Carafano, 2005). And while the two core missions seem heterogenous in scope at times from an outside perspective, the biggest difference between the two tasks is duration. A man-made disaster may be over in a matter of minutes as compared to a hurricane lasting several days, but in both instances the road to recovery is long. In order to streamline response and recovery in either scenario, FEMA was reorganized with new directives to support comprehensive emergency management practices (CRS, 2006). Today, FEMA provides the standard approach and guidance that many local communities may not have due to funding, training, and

Ensuring Resilience to Disasters has more tasking’s than another mission and involves many different agencies to accomplish those tasks. The four tasks are to mitigate hazards, enhance preparedness, ensure effective emergency response, and rapidly recover. The main agency that is responsible for these tasking’s is FEMA. FEMA’s mission is to “reduce the loss of life and property and protect communities nationwide from all hazards, including natural disasters, acts of terrorism, and other man-made disasters” (FEMA, 2017, p.2). FEMA works with federal and State services to assist them in accomplishing their goals. They also assist local services by assisting in setting up emergency management agencies (LEMA) and set guidance for Emergency Operations Planning (EOP). EOP’s are “plans that provide an overview of the jurisdiction’s preparedness and response strategies. It describes expected hazards, outlines agency roles and responsibilities, and explains how the jurisdiction keeps the plan current.” (FEMA, 2010,

This chapter provides an overview that describes the basic types of hazards threatening the United States and provides definitions for some basic terms such as hazards, emergencies, and disasters. The chapter also provides a brief history of emergency management in the federal government and a general description of the current emergency management system—including the basic functions performed by local emergency managers. The chapter concludes with a discussion of the all-hazards approach and its implications for local emergency management.

and Dentistry and Director of the Program in Disaster Mental Health in the Department of Psychiatry and the UR Center for Disaster Medicine and Emergency Preparedness. For over a decade, he has responded to numerous national disasters as a volunteer with the American Red Cross. He has also developed comprehensive disaster mental health training programs for the New York State Office of Mental Health and the New York State Department of Health currently being disseminated throughout every county, state psychiatric center and acute healthcare facility throughout New York State.

The constant threat of focusing events, places a high level of pressure on emergency managers to respond appropriately to various levels of complex disasters. Past focusing events, highlight the importance of communication and coordination before and after disasters. Consequently, citizens expect emergency responders and government agencies to be accountable for rapidly responding to disasters in an organized manner. Prior to a focusing event, it is beneficial for emergency mangers to determine disaster risk prioritization. I present methods that emergency mangers can use to determine these priorities. Lastly, I discuss the integration of geographic information systems (GIS) to identify hazard zone areas.

Natural disaster threats accompany people practically everywhere and often people are unaware of the fact that one day the disaster may strike and change their life drastically, such as the ones that can occur in Huskietown. In such a situation, it is important to get prepared for potential disasters and know how to act and behave in different situations. To make it clearer, it is necessary to have a clear plan of action in case of a disaster and, what is not less important, it is necessary to clearly understand what real natural disasters can really occur in the given area. In such a way, it is obvious that in order to come prepared to a disaster it is necessary to know as much information about the disaster itself, its effects

The differing needs of a vulnerable population have to be addressed in order to alleviate issues that were noted after Katrina. In particular, the needs which are known prior to a disaster, such as evacuation for the infirmed, elderly, impoverished, and those who lack the means to evacuate. The Department of Homeland Security represented a solution to addressing these needs via a three phase response: “pre-event planning and preparation, the event, and recovery” (Dept. Homeland Security, 2008). It has been widely studied that residents of a vulnerable community may be impacted more severely and are disproportionately affected than those with means following a disaster. Assessing how to prepare for each of the phases represents an issue for emergency managers especially when it comes to those who lack the means to prepare for themselves. Quickly rebuilding homes in a devastated area won’t help a community when a disaster strikes again. Platt stated that “disasters offer a window of opportunity to strengthen communities”, via “construction and change land uses to prevent a recurrence of a disaster”. (Platt, 1998) It also can be argued that following a disastrous event, this is when a true opportunity arises, by providing an opportunity to work through solving the societal issues that are the basis for a vulnerable populous via comprehensive political reforms and

The burden of emergency management has grown great deal in the last few decades. We have seen an increase in natural disasters, a new threat of terrorism on our front door and an increase in manmade disasters. All of these have tested emergency management in a number of cities and towns across the nation. It is not always disasters that present problems for emergency managers. We have to look beyond our traditional view of emergency management of helping us during times of disasters and view what issues they consider may affect their emergency response. Issues that emergency management see that are moving into the critical area are issues of urbanization and hazard exposure, the rising costs of disaster recovery, and low priority of emergency management.

rather than the conditions themselves. [5] This examination will often take the form of case

The analysis and the mapping of social vulnerabilities have been successfully used in many countries as a tool for the development of emergency management plans. One of the most consistent methodologies is the Social Vulnerability Index (hereafter defined as SoVI®), initially constructed to compare U.S. counties (Cutter et al., 2013). The SoVI® provides a social vulnerability map by synthetizing socio-economic and demographic factors based on the principal component analysis [see Dunteman (1989) for further details]. In the recent years, this approach has been utilized in various geographical settings, different time periods and accounting different variables for the identification of social vulnerabilities for effective management of disaster-related

The social vulnerability was assessed with the SoVI® approach developed by Cutter, Boruff and Shirley (2003). The statistical approach undertaken has been followed stricly to those explained by the authors. After collecting the variables and checking for missing values, the data were normalized according to a z-score normalization (mean of zero and a standard deviation of one) to be able to observe them in incomparable units (Yoon 2012). In some cases it may happen that variations of an explanatory variable may be completely explained by variations of another explanatory variable. For that reason we performed a multicollinearity analysis. Given the multidimensional nature of social vulnerability, the principal component analysis (PCA) was used to transform the raw dataset to a new set of independent variables (principal components) (Chen et al. 2014). The PCA was applied using a varimax rotation and a Kaiser criterion for component selection (with eigenvalues greater

Risk for disasters is a part of life; emergency situations occur more frequently than many people believe. A wise person plans for the worse, and hopes for the best. After a disaster, how well a community can recover will depend largely on how well they prepared in advance. Risk management includes identifying any potential risks to a community and proactively planning to minimize the threat. Proactive organization of resources and people to respond to emergencies can mean the difference between a community’s ability to regroup and recover, and the loss of life. To better

The Topsham community in Portland, Maine pertinent risks and hazards will be discussed. It 's current state of readiness is exceptional. The purpose of the Topsham community Hazard Mitigation Plan is to provide a comprehensive set of guidelines for hazard response and mitigation in the community. The plan identifies potential risks with appropriate mitigation responses to significantly reduce loss of life, injuries, economic costs, and destruction of natural and cultural resources. As the occurrences of the hazards identified in this plan are unpredictable, the plan itself will continue to evolve and be evaluated. With this, the mitigation strategies and maintenance process will be labeled as ongoing. The mitigation strategies and maintenance of the plan provide direction for the future of mitigation activities within the state and the process will continue until changed for any valid reason. The community has made progress on