1: Whole Community Approach
Foster a Whole Community Approach to Emergency Management Nationally Other Information:
FEMA recognizes that it takes all aspects of a community (volunteer, faith, and community-based organizations, the private
sector, and the public, including survivors themselves) -- not just the government -- to effectively prepare for, protect
against, respond to, recover from, and mitigate against any disaster. It is therefore critical that we work together to enable
communities to develop collective, mutually supporting local capabilities to withstand the potential initial impacts of these
events, respond quickly, and recover in a way that sustains or improves the community's overall well-being. How communities
achieve this collective capacity calls for innovative approaches -- from across the full spectrum of community actors, including
emergency management -- to expand and enhance existing practices, institutions, and organizations that help make local communities
successful every day, under normal conditions, and leverage this social infrastructure to help meet community needs when an
incident occurs... Through these activities, FEMA seeks to spark dramatic expansion and transformation of current community
engagement strategies in the field of emergency management, promoting approaches that position local residents in leadership
roles in planning, organizing, and sharing accountability for the success of local disaster management efforts. We believe
that Whole Community Emergency Management is a philosophy that should be applied to everything we do as an agency and as a
field of practice. To that end, FEMA will lead the development of guidance, tools, training, and educational programs to enable
effective engagement and integration of the entire community into local emergency management activities to strengthen resilience
and improve outcomes.
Stakeholder(s):
- Emergency Managers: Emergency managers have historically focused on managing the impacts of disasters, both before and after they occur. While
these efforts are essential, they represent only one end of a broad continuum of actions that build sustainable and resilient
communities. At the other end of this continuum are activities that focus on the development, health, and long-term success
of those communities. For example, by strengthening underlying community conditions disaster resilience can be improved. Activities
that aim to provide good jobs, expand housing and transportation choices, plan for future community development, or improve
energy sustainability can also provide direct and indirect benefits that enhance disaster resilience. Applying the core competencies
of emergency management -- communicating, coordinating, and collaborating -- to engaging with the many groups and organizations
that are already working in these and other areas is key to building the capacity of American society to be resilient.
- Communities: Communities will organize themselves to deal with crises in much the same way as they organize to deal with daily challenges.
By working together with new partners and focusing on strengthening what works well in communities on a daily basis, we can
advance creative solutions that build collective Whole Community disaster management capabilities and help strengthen the
Nation's resilience.
- Individuals: The ways in which individuals and communities engage with each other and with government are changing. The NSS and the QHSR
recognize community engagement as a foundational principle for strengthening national preparedness and resilience. This will
require emergency managers at all levels to engage proactively with businesses, neighborhood associations, community groups,
faith-based and community-based organizations, ethnic centers, and other civic-minded organizations that have routine, direct
ties and established trust with the individuals who live in their communities, and that can mobilize their networks to build
community resilience and support local emergency management needs.
- Governments: FEMA's approach seeks to work with the state, local, tribal, and territorial governments to encourage emergency managers at
all levels to engage more effectively with and support local communities in activities that, directly or indirectly, build
preparedness and resilience.
- Communities: The aim is to foster development of a community-oriented model for emergency management that emphasizes understanding community
complexity and how social activity is organized on a "normal" basis and planning for the actual makeup of our communities.
- FEMA Partners: This means building partnerships to engage effectively with the full spectrum of community residents and members (including
but not limited to people speaking diverse languages or from diverse cultures or economic backgrounds, all ages from children
and youth to seniors, people with disabilities, others with access and functional needs, and populations traditionally underrepresented
in civic governance), realigning emergency management practices to support local needs, and working to strengthen the institutions,
assets, and networks that work well in communities on a daily basis. The core proposition underlying this approach is that
resilience depends on the success of collective action and local institutions before an incident.
- Children
- Youth
- Seniors
- People with Disabilities
- Underrepresented Populations
- Neighborhood Institutions: A Whole Community model that works to strengthen local collective action, public engagement, and neighborhood institutions
offers an effective path not only to building resilience, but to helping local communities become integral members of the
emergency management team.
- Foundations: Additionally, FEMA will establish partnerships with foundations and community-based organizations that can act as third-party
intermediaries and encourage local communities to engage in creative activities that enhance disaster resilience by building
on and addressing local needs. Working through these partnerships, FEMA will assist in the implementation of programs designed
to stimulate, support, and expand the scale of existing, successful community activities and to encourage local residents
to design new collaborative initiatives that will enhance community resilience.
- Community-Based Organizations
Objective(s):
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