Gustav Tests Strategic Choices

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The third anniversary of Katrina arrived with Louisiana and Mississippi in Gustav's bulls-eye. Since 2005 over $50 billion in federal funding has been spent on recovery and preparedness. Unfortunately, later today the strategic choices made (and any failures to choose) will be tested.

Katrina was the test for lessons learned from Hurricane Betsy. On September 9, 1965 Betsy slammed into New Orleans with 110 mile per hour winds. Levees failed, the Lower 9th Ward flooded, and it took ten days for the waters to recede sufficiently for over 164,000 households to return. There were at least 75 deaths. Betsy was the first US hurricane to cause over a billion dollars in damages.

During the next four decades additional billions would be spent to prevent a recurrence of such a result. Katrina exposed an anemic return on investment. In recent days federal officials have been quick to promise a better result when Gustav makes landfall, projected for very early Tuesday. “What we’re seeing is a totally different response than what we had in Katrina,” said Federal Emergency Management Agency director David Paulison. (More from WDSU)

There is evidence that the combined local, state, and federal response will, in fact, be more substantial, more coordinated, and probably more effective than was the case with Katrina. (See the Nola Hurricane Center) What is not yet clear is the effectiveness of risk management and mitigation choices made over the last three years.

In June the General Accountability Office told the House Homeland Security Committee that "three key challenges exist to applying risk management to homeland security: improving risk communication, political obstacles to risk-based resource allocation, and a lack of strategic thinking about managing homeland security risks." All of these challenges have been evident in Post-Katrina decision-making.

By reading between the lines, the GAO report makes clear that the three challenges are tightly related. Strategic thinking, among other things, requires making tough choices regarding priorities. These priorities should guide risk-based resource allocation. But because the public has often not been involved in priority setting - or cannot reach agreement on priorities - it is not possible to implement a consistent risk-based approach. Resilience depends on public engagement.

GAO testimony noted, "Like the private sector, the government has to make choices about which risks to protect against—since it cannot protect the nation against all hazards. Unlike the private sector, the government has a wide responsibility for preparing for, responding to, and recovering from all acts of terrorism and natural or manmade disasters and is accountable to the public for the investment decisions it makes." Until the public is able and willing to support a strategic risk-based approach, the challenges are unlikely to be resolved.

The level of public involvement in hurricane preparedness since Katrina is a matter of controversy. The August update of the New Orleans Index tends to highlight how strong public involvement has been the foundation of progress. But Oxfam's report, Mirror on America: How the state of Gulf Coast recovery reflects on us all is critical of how the public has been excluded from key decisions.

Gustav and his aftermath may resolve the controvery over the next few days.

Federal Disaster Role Grows

Flames near Big Sur, California (June 2008)

Photo by Kurt Rogers, San Francisco Chronicle

On June 28 President Bush, responding to a request from California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, declared an emergency for seven California counties fighting wildfires. The Presidential Declaration authorized federal assistance under the Stafford Act. The Emergency Declaration succeeds a June 22 federal Fire Management Assistance Declaration for two counties in California.

This was the fifth Emergency Declaration issued by the President in 2008. According to the Department of Homeland Security the purpose of the Emergency Declaration is, "to save lives and to protect property and public health and safety, and to lessen or avert the threat of a catastrophe."

Thirty-seven Major Disaster declarations have been issued since January. (A listing of Presidential Declarations is available from FEMA.) As defined by the Stafford Act an Emergency Declaration differs from a Disaster Declaration primarily in terms of the anticipated federal expenditure. There is a $5 million cap for an "emergency" while there is no cap for a "disaster." There are also expeditious ways to exceed the cap on federal funding of emergencies. Federal funding usually requires a local funding match of 25 percent. (More information on the difference between a disaster and emergency is available from SEMP.)

The number of Presidential Disaster Declarations is increasing over time. (The total number of Disaster Declarations per year is also available from FEMA.) Between 2002 and 2007 the average number of Disaster Declarations per year was 57.4. For the prior five-year period the average was 50.6. For the period 1993-1998 there was an average of 42 Disaster Declarations per year. It is difficult to track federal expenditures for disaster response, but a recent Congressional Research Service study found that emergency supplemental funding for disasters had increased from roughly $6 billion in 1998 to over $467 billion in 2008.

Several factors have influenced the increased federal role, including the escalating impact and cost of disasters, intensive national media coverage, and the political vulnerability of appearing to be less than fully responsive to local disasters. Some express concern that federal responsiveness is discouraging more aggressive local and state action that could reduce vulnerability to disasters. (See Feds and Fire from the Los Angeles Times)

Strategic Implications of Natural Threats

Flooding of the Des Moines River at Farmington, Iowa (June 2008)

On Wednesday (June 25) the National Intelligence Council reported to the United States Congress:

We judge global climate change will have wide-ranging implications for US national security interests over the next 20 years. Although the United States will be less affected and is better equipped than most nations to deal with climate change, and may even see a benefit owing to increases in agriculture productivity, infrastructure repair and replacement will be costly. We judge that the most significant impact for the United States will be indirect and result from climate-driven effects on many other countries and their potential to seriously affect US national security interests. We assess that climate change alone is unlikely to trigger state failure in any state out to 2030, but the impacts will worsen existing problems—such as poverty, social tensions, environmental degradation, ineffectual leadership, and weak political institutions. Climate change could threaten domestic stability in some states, potentially contributing to intra- or, less likely, interstate conflict, particularly over access to increasingly scarce water resources. We judge that economic migrants will perceive additional reasons to migrate because of harsh climates, both within nations and from disadvantaged to richer countries.

(The NIC Report is classified. Congressional testimony regarding the report is available from the Director of National Intelligence' website.)

The National Security Implications of Global Climate Change to 2030 was delivered against a back-drop of seasonal - but especially harsh - climate-related disasters including floods in the American Midwest, central and eastern China, coastal Myanmar, and the Philippines; extreme drought in Spain, Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, many African regions, and Australia; and early unusually intense wildfires across the American West.

In many cases human activity is implicated in worsening the impact of natural disaster. Some have argued a haphazard approach to levee construction in the upper Mississippi River valley has amplified the impact of heavy rainfall. (See The Floods: A Manmade Disaster?)

Natural disaster is predictable. Increasing population density exacerbates the potential human impact of any disaster. Mitigation is possible. Even when the natural cause of the disaster cannot be prevented it is possible to prevent much of the harm associated with the disaster through long-term thinking, being realistic regarding our vulnerabilities, and aiming for risk-resilience rather than complete risk-avoidance.