Online Custom «Course Project Final: FEMA FY 2009 EOC Grant Program» Essay Sample

Investment Impact

According to the information available on the Emergency Operations Center Grant, it is evident that the FY 2009 EOC Grant Program should enhance emergency management and preparedness capabilities. These improvements should happen by supporting supple, justifiable, protected, and interoperable EOCs. The focus is to address perceivable insufficiencies and needs. Section 614 of the Robert T. Stafford’s Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act authorizes the Grant Program. Documentations show that the Fiscal Year 2009 EOC Grant Program will offer $34, 002,500 for the development or repair of a state, local, or tribal federal government’s major EOC. From this amount of money, $21,645,000 in non-competitive financing will be invested in the local EOC projects undertaken in the entire country (Nemeth, 2013). The rest of the funding will be competitively allocated for the eligible state, local or tribal government’s major EOCs.

For purposes of efficiency, qualified EOCs requiring competitive funding may request up to $1,000,000 for the development projects, or around $250,000 for the renovation activities through the FY 2009 EOC Grant Program. Every state government and region should designate a SAA to apply for and administer the budget provided under the FY 2009 EOC Grant Program. For purposes of cost effectiveness, the SAA is the only qualified body capable of applying for the available financing on behalf of each eligible state, local, and tribal government’s principal EOC (Federal Emergency Management Agency, n.d).

It is clear that in order to be eligible for obtaining the FY 2009 EOC Grant Program financing, any agency should meet NIMS compliance requirements. Consequently, the process is applied the NIMSCAST in order to report the FY 2008 compliance for the FY 2009 readiness funding qualification. In this case, all state and regional grantees had to submit their compliance evaluation through the NIMSCAST by September 30, 2008 to qualify for the FY 2009 readiness programs.

FEMA acknowledges that each State, local, and tribal jurisdiction has extraordinary emergency management needs. Therefore, development and renovation projects will be assessed according to their compliance with the following criteria: state-recognized priorities, quality of justification, and pre-existing planning. It is clear that applications will depend entirely on completeness, adherence to structural guidelines, feasibility, and the effective way, in which investment justification addresses the improvement of emergency management and preparedness capabilities.

Identifying the inadequate amount of competitive financing available, there will be concerns connected with the EOC projects that currently lack development and refurbishment financing from the FY 2008 EOC Grant Program, Fiscal Year 2009 non-competitive EOC Grant Program, or the FY 2009 EMPG.

Pre-Existing Planning

Pre-existing planning inclines to the review of the application as the initial stage. Based on this fact, applications of the Grant will be assessable in two stages to leverage local skills and knowledge of the applicant’s emergency control as well as readiness capabilities. It will also assure coordination and alignment with federal, state, and local readiness efforts. In the planning process, it is indicative that all the competitive and non-competitive Investment Justifications have to be submitted by the qualified state, local, or tribal administration’s main EOC to SAA.

Government, state, tribal, and local government planning is critically supportive. Planning for low-probability, high response incidences is a federal concern and supplements a state, tribal, and local consideration in more likely and regularly perceived small-scale scenarios (McCarthy, 2011). It may be argued that planning in all operations is an inevitable responsibility of every level of government. FEMA fosters unity of effort for emergency activities planning through provision of a balanced doctrine and purpose. In this case, a plan comprises a continuous, changing tool of expected actions that optimize chances and guide response operations. Since planning is a continuous process, a plan is a provisional product according to the current information and knowledge being also a subject to revision. For this reason, plans are living documents.

Planning offers three major benefits. First, it allows jurisdictions to influence the shift of activities in an emergency through determination of the actions, policies, and procedures to be followed in advance. Secondly, FEMA pre-existing planning guides other readiness operations. Lastly, it facilitates unit of effort through the provision of a common framework for events in case of any emergency. Planning is a basic component of both preparedness and response. Consequently, it is a critical homeland security operation. Emergency planning is a national priority, as indicated in the FY 2009 EOC Grant Program and the National Preparedness Guidelines.

Concerning the FY 2009 EOC Grant Program, it is evident that FEMA has accomplished a great deal in establishing laborious national preparedness architecture. The architecture enables all structures of government to plan effectively for response operations. The moves have caused the National Preparedness Guidelines, the National Infrastructure Protection Plan (NIPP) and 17 sector-particular plans to safeguard important framework. It also safeguards the National Incident Management System (NIMS), National Continuity policies and directives, and ensures a collaborative National exercise plan. Lastly, these efforts support emergency preparedness through a comprehensive portfolio of Grant Programs.

The focus of FEMA FY 2009 EOC Grant Program on preparedness is critical in developing capabilities that empower the framework and response planning. NIPP is involves preparedness activities executed in the absence of a particular threat or hazard. The Grant utilizes these programs and investments to develop the capability to respond to all kinds and sizes of catastrophes. The planning process has four critical elements.

• The National Preparedness Vision, which offers a succinct statement of the major readiness goals for the nation
• The National Planning Events that are tools that represent a minimum number of credible scenarios. They portray a variety of possible terrorist threats and natural disasters, as well as related effects faced by the country. They form a foundation for integrated federal planning, training, and exercise.
• The Universal Task List, which is a framework of extraordinary activities that relate strategies to prevention, protection, response, and recovery actions for the main incidences represented by the National Planning Scenarios. It provides a basic vocabulary of imperative activities that support establishment of important capabilities among the agencies at all levels. The list serves to assist in establishing the Target Capabilities List.
• The Target Capabilities List outlines specific capabilities, which should be adapted by all branches of the government so that they respond efficiently to the incidents.

The federal planning framework supports the program and the state, tribal, and local planning structure through FEMA, including the National Planning scenarios and major capabilities, the NIMS, the NIPP and sector-particular plans, federal strategic and concept plans for each form of National Planning Scenarios (Nemeth, 2013). These scenarios are the concern of the federal planning activities. They reveal dangers faced in the United States of America and render the highest priority for government planning. Utilizing an integrated set of scenarios offers a common framework for establishing the manner of attaining expected outcomes.

According to the FY 2009 EOC Grant Program, simply documenting preparedness plans can give a negative perspective of readiness. As opposed to paper readiness, the program proposes mounting of an efficient response after terrorist attacks, which requires frequent exercising of the plan and establishing organizational and personal resilience. Pre-existing planning with regard to mitigating and management of terrorism threats can be accomplished through creation of public awareness. The EOC Grant Program advocates for public awareness concerning the impending effects of terrorism and how people can manage the aftermath of such incidents (Lake, 2010). Through the respective program, the community learns some possible pointers on terror incidences. Information is provided in the manner, in which people can seek early interventions to curb the occurrence of terror attacks. Additionally, the Grant provides training programs that can help people overcome the after-effects of such incidence. For example, drills and tabletop exercises are the key tools for enhancing boundaries and connectivity by facilitating imminent activity response personnel to place disaster preparedness into practice.

The FY 2009 EOC Grant Program proposes that all health care practitioners should have the necessary skills to exercise and implement specialty-appropriate readiness. These practices should comprise the types of potential patients, simulating well both actual victims and the worried (Steinhardt, 2010). Consequently, they should incorporate all emergency response stakeholders from public, private, society, and governmental bodies. In the planning process, the community is mostly the first preventer and responder to any catastrophes. It is crucial for the members of the public to be incorporated into the terror attack preparedness and response. Planning a medical response to a terrorist attack should be comprehensive and inclined to the needs of the community. The planning process calls for a clear channel of communication with the public, before, during, and after the disaster.

Similarly, it is acknowledgeable that planning involves protection of the community. In this case, the Federal Insurance and Mitigation Administration operates closely with communities in the nation to assist them in analyzing risks and prioritize their mitigation moves. The FEMA’s hazard mitigation Grant Programs, establishing science capability and even flood insurance programs, help the community authorities in their move to ensure better disaster management (McCarthy, 2011). Therefore, the Grant Program allocates enough funds to protect the community against all the forms of catastrophes. Under this community protection program, more than 20,000 communities, in collaboration with the state and local organization, actively manage their flood risk with hazard maps. More than 5.6 million Americans protect their residents and families from the fiscal loss with insurance from the National Flood Insurance Program. Communities from all over the country implement strong hazard-resilience building code policies and follow complex hazard alleviation guidelines to monitor establishment.

FEMA’s Risk Assessment Division utilizes engineering, planning, and complex technology to determine the potential effect of natural disasters. Through the technology, FEMA develops techniques to control the risk associated with this hazards. Risk assessment incorporates evaluating critical information both before and after a disaster occurs, establishing and maintaining a unique inventory of flood maps and providing support to the mitigation strategies.

Conclusion

FEMA FY 2009 EOC Grant Program provides financial support to help deal with impending disasters at national, local, and tribal level. Notably, through this investment, the grant supports supple, justifiable, protected, and interoperable EOCs. It should be noted that identifying the inadequate amount of competitive financing available, there will be concerns connected with the EOC projects that currently lack development and refurbishment financing from the FY 2008 EOC Grant Program. Planning is an imperative aspect of the EOC Grant Program to ensure that the project is cost effective. It involves establishment of policies and frameworks that determine the manner of fund allocation for different programs.