The Future of Disaster Management in the U.S.

Rethinking Legislation, Policy, and Finance

Amy LePore

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2016
• Print ISBN: 9781498700016
• eBook ISBN: 9781315310756
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Politics
• Index: Politics & International Relations

U.S. congressional debates over the last few years have highlighted a paradox: although research demonstrates that emergencies are most effectively managed at the local level, fiscal support and programmatic management in response to disasters has shifted to the federal level. While the growing complexity of catastrophes may overwhelm local capacities and would seem to necessitate more federal engagement, can a federal approach be sustainable, and can it contribute to local capacity-building?

This timely book examines local capacity-building as well as the current legal, policy and fiscal framework for disaster management, questioning some of the fundamentals of the current system, exploring whether accountability and responsibilities are correctly placed, offering alternative models, and taking stock of the current practices that reflect an effective use of resources in a complex emergency management system. The Future of Disaster Management in the U.S. will be of interest to disaster and emergency managers as well as public servants and policy-makers at all levels tasked with responding to increasingly complex catastrophes of all kinds.

1
The Centralization of Emergency Management

Amy LePore

Centralization of Emergency Management

Whereas the performance of disaster-response mechanisms in the U.S. is often debated, rarely do we ever question the current delivery model. It is common to deliberate how successfully responding agencies performed, but we generally do not consider whether a federally centralized model of emergency management is most effective. What initially appears as a natural progression of institutional roles given lessons learned from Hurricane Andrew, 9/11 and Hurricanes Katrina and Sandy, has instead been a constant move forward of central planning since the 1990’s. Along this path, there have been several notable contributing factors in emergency management which have bolstered a centralized model. These factors are mechanisms of political power and have been used to reward, realign and reengage entities involved in disaster response at all levels of government. Among them, and addressed in this chapter, are the increase in disaster declarations and the utility of the declaration itself as a political tool (Sobel and Garrett 2003; Sobel and Leeson 2006; Sylves and Buzas 2007). That the trend of centralization was exacerbated by the policy response to the attacks of September 11, 2001 is also noted in this chapter. FEMA’s reduced capacity to act after natural disasters was seemingly a direct result of this transformation toward centralized planning for terrorism. In line with the theme of centralization, a direct dependence on federal grant funds to implement emergency management at the local level has been cultivated. While the advent of many of these grant programs has permitted the expansion of emergency management at the local level, it is difficult to know, given limited metrics, the actual effect of this arrangement of federal government as primary payer. These key points are matters for later in this chapter and will be offered in the context of the broader, deeper history of emergency-management centralization.

It is important to arrive at an answer to why this trend toward centralization is an issue worthy of examination and debate. Scholars generally agree that, especially after September 11, 2001, central planning of disaster response was a noted pattern (Roberts 2008; Scavo, Kearney and Kilroy 2008; Derthick 2009). FEMA itself has recognized this issue and its answer has been the Whole Community concept, as

a means by which residents, emergency management practitioners, organizational and community leaders, and government officials can collectively understand and assess the needs of their respective communities and determine the best ways to organize and strengthen their assets, capacities, and interests.

(Federal Emergency Management Agency 2011, p. 3)

However, this is not the only attempt by FEMA to attempt to harness better community participation and accountability. The Biggert–Waters Act of 2012 sought to reduce government subsidization of flood insurance rates, among other efforts, to shore up accounting. This was in response to several GAO reports listing the financial insolvency of the NFIP (Government Accountability Office 2005; Government Accountability Office 2011). Ultimately the Act was diluted by 2014 legislation which reduced the decentralizing effect. Still, there appears to be recognition by the federal government that a stronghold on responsibility for emergency management may not be the best path forward. Decidedly, if the pay arrangement does not change and responsibility continues to be centralized with the federal government, there is little chance that devolution of accountability toward lower levels of government will occur (Crabill and Rademacher 2012). What follows is an account of the two primary reasons that centralization and the proper roles of the levels of government should be closely examined for their impact on disaster management.

Alterations to the Intentions of Federalism

Dually focused on policy content and location of policy origination, critics of the current state of American federalism claim policy-making is increasingly centralized. Conversely, advocates of the broader federal role see increasing federal assistance and national policy-making as a method of solving widespread social problems and inequities. Each of these very different, very salient discussions regarding the role of government is bound not only to large and visible policy campaigns, but also to some of the most humbling and vulnerable of circumstances. Few events transpire which better frame the questions of federalism as clearly as disaster. Increasingly devastating and increasingly expensive, disasters serve to focus the nation’s attention simultaneously on individual suffering and on the intricacies of government at work.

The level of centralization present in U.S. disaster management has breached the bounds of a traditional federalism. The disconnect between the intent of a federal system and the ways in which current policies are implemented at all levels is laid bare with the example of emergency management. Local governments—comprised of we the people, and to which all matters not addressed in the constitution should be left—are the recipients of billions of dollars of assistance to increase preparedness levels. Sullivan (2003, p. 1936) reminds us that the Tenth Amendment “endows the people with the right to choose and define their local government.” In exercising this right, the people must also consider what priority programs should exist at the local level and practice the self-determination required to sustain these programs. However, in response to a 2013 survey of emergency managers nationwide, respondents overwhelmingly report that their office would not be sustained at the local level if federal dollars disappeared (Crabill 2015). Thus while there is no shortage of support from federal avenues, emergency management lacks the staying power of local support. This is the essential federalism disconnect that is further frayed by centralization. The federal mechanism for funding has aided in the removal of financial responsibility at the local level, and has dismantled local ability to make sound decisions (Crabill 2015). The states have varying degrees of involvement in programming funds, but have also seen their authority reduced by the Stafford Act, which places the federal government as primarily responsible for disaster. It is in this culture of dependence and misplaced roles that the future of emergency management rests.

Using Policy as Incentive

Federal grants have historically been used to achieve national goals. Sundquist and Davis (1969) argued that the relationships surrounding intergovernmental financial exchange have therefore been considered assistive in nature. Lovell (1981) points out, however, that federal grants-in-aid, often used to support local functions in lieu of local operating funds, have bred dependency. The debate over assistance versus dependence is alive and well. At the crux of this argument exists the question of whether or not federal policy—via grants—can effectively incentivize, and, if so, what is the societal tradeoff?

Federal grants provide leverage to the federal government for implementing national goals; the financing of local operations post-September 11, 2001 is an excellent example of this relationship. Most scholarship on this matter has focused primarily on centralized control of emergency management, and less on the impact of grants as incentive. That the primary disaster-response mechanisms still rest at the state and local levels is offered by Scavo, Kearney and Kilroy (2008) as proof that federal centralization has been resisted. However, this is contrary to the actual experience of local emergency management. Resistance to this effort of centralization would have likely been indicated by rejection of the grant funds that paid for this effort. Instead, state and local governments have taken in $35 billion in the decade after the 2002 inception of DHS grant programs (Federal Emergency Management Agency 2012). There is further evidence that not only grants, but funding in general, are expected from the federal government. As Birkland and DeYoung (2011) point out, one of the major complaints by the state and local governments regarding the federal response to the oil spill in the Gulf was that the “amount and speed of federal aid” was insufficient to meet their needs. Further, there is evidence that local governments alter their modes of operation based on the federal assistance. Donahue and Joyce (2001, p. 477) point out that “local governments still bear considerable responsibility for response and recovery efforts, but they may modify their activities in these areas to conform to federal criteria to secure as many resources as possible”. This expectation of federal resources is not only occurring among practitioners but is further reflected in the literature, as Roberts (2008) believes that there was insufficient funding in the post-9/11 era. It remains to be seen if this process of modifying local activities to meet federal requirements for financial incentives is ultimately a best practice.

If local governments are not taking measures to increase their own resiliency in the form of ability to maintain the emergency-management function, can we soundly charge our nation’s disaster resiliency to these offices? As federal policy has failed to incentivize strong and locally appropriate emergency management, Lovell (1981) might have argued instead that dependence has been bred. Further, if local entities do not believe that emergency management is a priority sufficient to provide funding, then we must consider: to what end is it maintained by taxpayers not proximal to the entity and instead rely on Federal taxes levied on jurisdictions from throughout the U.S.?

Overview of Methods of Centralization

History of Relief Spending

It is critical to show how state and local governments, and individual community members, have come to rely on the federal government for disaster-relief efforts. A brief history of how disaster relief has come to thrive is important to understanding current policy’s inability to encourage independence from federal resources. Chiefly, this overview of the system of relief spending describes the way in which this relationship has been established, and how expectations have been cultivated, set and broken. An assessment of federal relief spending reveals an unexpected backdrop against which relief programming has grown. At first blush, one might assume that disaster relief is an extension of pre-existing social programs that assisted citizens who become homeless, displaced or unemployed. Instead, however, in the early years of the formation of the republic, relief spending to assist citizens plagued by disasters became the springboard for other types of general welfare spending (Dauber 2005). It is a wholly understandable association to have made, as certainly those affected by various social problems were pointed to as victims of circumstance in the same right as those victimized by hurricanes. But while debate over who was or was not actually a “victim” of disaster occurred with healthy vigor in the pre-New Deal era, there lacked a debate over the constitutionality of relief spending. Instead, disaster relief became the basis on which federal government spending and the welfare state was cultivated and grown. In Sympathetic State, Dauber (2005, p. 391) writes: “The very durability of disaster relief as a precedent had long made it a tempting ally for those seeking federal aid for other purposes…” Thus various occurrences of flood, fire and earthquake relief became the benchmarks for a way to frame problems such as illiteracy and poverty that were seen as imposing themselves on victims of circumstance. And while helpful at the time, in some sense, any opportunity to look at social afflictions in a different way was absconded by the early and little debated premise that most social problems can be solved via federal spending. Thus, the histories of federal disaster-relief funding and general welfare spending on social problems are intertwined. In each area we have seen the role of the federal government grow and, as in the case of disaster, overpromise and underdeliver. Because they are intertwined via their lengthy institutionalization, the histories of disaster relief and welfare spending inhibit interventions to limit and more accurately communicate the role and capability of the federal government. Therefore changes to the trend of centralization will not be simple.

This fundamental belief in general welfare spending on disaster, engrained in U.S. society from the earliest legislation, has ensured that so many disaster survivors had the opportunity to rebuild their lives. Unfortunately, this same programming has seen many citizens rebuild in the same hazard-prone areas with insufficient mitigation. On the surface, relief programming seems benign and benevolent, and in many cases, it is the only form of protection and recovery available to residents or businesses in the aftermath of disaster. The problem comes, however, when the message being sent is that the federal government will act as a safety net when, in fact, centralized government programming drives increased risk. An optimal outcome of disaster efforts at all levels would have been some transformation over the past 200 years toward risk reduction, community empowerment and state, local and individual responsibility. Instead, as an outgrowth of reliance, there has been little increase in independence from federal resources.

Event-Driven Centralization

After the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, an increased level of attention was paid to the management of domestic emergencies. It is often argued that planning for emergencies in the years between the attacks and Hurricane Katrina is best characterized as terror-focused, with reduced concentration on natural-hazards planning (Birkland and Waterman, 2008; Scavo, Kearney, and Kilroy, 2008). Several additional phenomena were at play between the attacks of 2001 and Hurricane Katrina. First, despite organizational upheaval in 2002, FEMA handled a series of four hurricanes in 2004 with very little public complaint, and thus there was little existing reason for concern about its capabilities (Derthick 2009). Second, despite years of warnings by meteorologists, government officials at all levels were caught off guard by this mega-storm. In fact, similar storms had served as the basis for recent exercises and planning scenarios, yet there was a clear lack of awareness of the potential for destruction (Nathan and Landy 2009). Within this context, Hurricane Katrina devastated the Gulf Coast. Whereas there was little focus on the successes or failures of state and local government or individuals, the outcry about the role of the federal government was deafening. Birkland and DeYoung (2011) point out that this outcry was mirrored again after the Gulf Oil Spill. Despite the well-known shortcomings in FEMA’s response to Katrina, Americans came to believe that FEMA has powers and capabilities that are far greater than those specified in the Stafford Act. That FEMA is the public face of all federal emergency response efforts caused the public—and many state and local officials—to believe that the federal government should issue some sort of “disaster declaration” for the oil spill. As has generally been the case, the failures at the federal level were resolved by writing new policy, which in turn only further solidified the centralized approach to emergency management in the U.S. (Crabill and Rademacher 2012). While there is now a turn toward all-hazards planning, the years during which funding was tied to terrorism-related preparations did indeed further centralize traditional emergency management (Birkland and Waterman 2008; Derthick 2009).

The Declaration Process

The years that followed the Stafford Act have seen a marked increase of declarations for disaster. While the declarations ranged in scope and nature, in 2012 the federal government spent $267,370,298 on public assistance—those funds reimbursed to state and local governments and non-profits—alone (Federal Emergency Management Agency, 2013). Surely, the new century has been marked by huge tragedies, including the attacks of September 11, 2001 and Hurricanes Katrina and Sandy, which account for much of the federal funding. Yet, this is but one method of funding transfers. While seemingly benevolent, the steady increase in declarations since the 1990’s is reason enough to examine the decision-making process. Multiple studies have shown the distribution of federal funds post-disaster to assist with relief to be a highly political process (Sobel and Garrett 2003; Sylves and Buzas 2007). Further, Leeson and Sobel (2006) have identified a relationship between federal relief funding given to states and corruption. They write that this relationship is colored in part by the fact that “The incentive of political actors is to help themselves by distributing money in ways that benefit them and their political careers” (p. 8). Thus the literature points toward an unequal process which permit...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• List of Figures
• List of Tables
• About the Contributors
• Acknowledgments
• 1 The Centralization of Emergency Management
• SECTION I Legislation
• SECTION II Policy
• SECTION III Finance
• Index