 National
Dam Safety Awareness Day occurs each year on May 31 and serves to promote individual and
community responsibility and best practices for dam safety, and what steps
people can take to either prevent future catastrophic dam failures or lessen the
impact if a failure was to occur.
National
Dam Safety Awareness Day commemorates the failure
of the South Fork Dam in Johnstown, Pennsylvania on May 31, 1889. The
Johnstown disaster was the worst dam failure in the history of the United
States with more than 2,200 lives lost.
For more information on National
Dam Safety Awareness Day, visit fema.gov/dam-safety.
FEMA and its partners
released the 2016 National
Preparedness Report (NPR) on May 31. The NPR is an annual status report
summarizing the nation's progress toward reaching the National Preparedness
Goal of a secure and resilient nation. To
achieve the National Preparedness Goal, the nation must continue to build on
the significant progress to date and address identified areas for improvement.
The NPR presents a national perspective, highlighting the
contributions to preparedness made by the whole community—namely, federal,
state, local, tribal, and territorial governments, the private and nonprofit
sectors, faith-based organizations, communities, and individuals. Findings are
derived from quantitative and qualitative data submitted by 241 urban areas,
states, territories, tribes, and Federal departments and agencies. The
NPR uses over 450 distinct data sources to report on the state of national
preparedness at the local, state, tribal, territorial, and federal levels. The
report also integrates data from the annual Threat and Hazard Identification
and Risk Assessment process and State Preparedness Reports from the 56 states
and territories.
For a comprehensive summary of the report, fact sheets and
a copy of the full report, visit https://www.fema.gov/national-preparedness-report.
From May 24-26, FEMA’s Emergency
Management Institute hosted the National Preparedness Symposium, Building
National Capabilities through Requirements-based Investments. More than 220
federal, state, local, tribal and territorial emergency management
representatives were in attendance, including representation from the ten FEMA
Regions.
The symposium provided a forum for sharing
programs, case studies and best practices in training and exercises from all
levels of government. During the symposium, participants identified tools,
resources, processes, and methods for determining capability gaps in their
jurisdiction that can be filled through training and validated by exercises. In
addition, attendees identified the tools for planning, executing, and
evaluating training and exercise programs to close identified gaps.
For more information,
contact National Training Liaison, Dan Lubman, at 301-447-1364 or send an
email to daniel.lubman@fema.dhs.gov. The symposium is
held each year. The next symposium will be held in Anniston, Alabama, at FEMA’s
Center for Domestic Preparedness, May 9 - 12, 2017.
FEMA congratulates 29 students who graduated from the National
Emergency Management Advanced Academy on May 20, 2016, at the Emergency
Management Institute on the campus of the National Emergency Training Center.
Graduates represented emergency management professionals from federal, state,
and local government, along
with the first two graduates from a tribal community representing the Alutiiq
Tribe of Old Harbor, Alaska.
FEMA’s National Emergency Management Advanced Academy is
designed for mid-level managers seeking to advance their skills, and provides
the strategic level training and education essential for emergency management
professionals to effectively design and lead cutting-edge programs. Students
learn skills critical to performing mid-manager responsibilities such as:
program management and oversight, effective communication at all levels,
integrated collaboration, and strategic thinking. The Advanced Academy provides
students the opportunity to demonstrate their critical thinking ability through
a guided research project.
The Advanced Academy is the second of a three-level Academy
series in the Emergency Management Professional Program (EMPP). The EMPP
curriculum is designed to guide and educate emergency management professionals
as they progress through their careers, providing a lifetime of learning for
emergency management professionals. The EMPP includes three separate, but
closely threaded training programs; building from the Basic Academy; to the
National Emergency Management Advanced Academy, and culminating in the National
Emergency Management Executive Academy.
The Basic Academy is a program that offers the tools to develop
comprehensive foundational skills needed in emergency management. The Advanced
Academy is a program to develop the next generation of emergency managers who
are trained in advanced concepts and issues, management, strategic/critical
thinking, and problem solving. The Executive Academy is a program designed to
challenge and enhance the talents of the nation’s emergency management senior
executives through critical thinking, visionary strategic planning, challenging
conventional concepts, and negotiation and conflict resolution applied to
complex, real-world problems. Emergency management professionals should
visit www.training.fema.gov/empp
for more information about which academy best suits their needs.
Federal Mitigation Investment Strategy National Engagement Period Ends June 7
On May 10,
the federal government launched a 30-day, national engagement period to
receive stakeholder input on designing and implementing a new Federal
Mitigation Investment Strategy (FMIS). The purpose of FMIS is to
identify, prioritize and guide federal investments in disaster
resilience and hazard mitigation-related activities, and to make
recommendations to the President and Congress on how the nation should
prioritize future disaster resilience investments. The national
engagement period will conclude June 7, 2016 at 5:00 pm EDT.
In
response to Hurricane Sandy, the federal government found that no
coordinated federal investment strategy exists for resilience and
mitigation. FMIS provides an opportunity to be more intentional about
setting resilience and mitigation investment priorities. It will
increase the ability of federal departments and agencies to plan and
justify budgets and resources. Learn more about the FMIS effort, the MitFLG and the National Mitigation Framework by visiting http://www.fema.gov/national-mitigation-framework/. To provide input and influence FMIS design and implementation, submit the FMIS Stakeholder Input Template to FEMA-FMIS@fema.dhs.gov by June 7, 2016.
Emergency Alert System Test Scheduled for June 15
FEMA, in
coordination with state, local, tribal, and territorial emergency
managers and state broadcasters’ associations, will conduct a test of
the Emergency Alert System (EAS) in nine states on Wednesday, June 15, 2016 at 4:20 p.m. EDT. Broadcasters
from the following locations are voluntarily participating in the test:
California, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, North Dakota, Oregon, South
Dakota, Wyoming and Washington. The EAS test might also be
seen and heard in states and tribal areas that border the participating
states, as well as in Canada and Mexico. The EAS test is made available
to radio, broadcast and cable television systems and is scheduled to
last approximately one minute.
The test will verify the delivery and broadcast, and assess the readiness for distribution of a national-level test message. The
next national test is scheduled for September 28, 2016. Results from
this test will support preparations and improvements leading up to the
national test. More information on the Integrated Public
Alert and Warning System and Wireless Emergency Alerts is available at www.fema.gov/ipaws or www.ready.gov/alerts.
Hazard Mitigation Assistance Grant Applications Due June 15
FEMA announced the Notice of Funding Opportunities (NOFO) for the FY 2016 Pre-Disaster Mitigation and Flood Mitigation Assistance
grant programs. These two grant programs assist state, local, tribal
and territorial governments in strengthening our nation's ability to
reduce the potential cost of natural disasters to communities and their
citizens. The NOFO for each program is posted on Grants.gov and contains the key program priorities and application requirements. Applications are due by 3:00 p.m. EDT on June 15, 2016.
Emergency Management Institute's Master Exercise Practitioner Program Application Period Ends July 1
The Master Exercise Practitioner Program application period is open until July 1, 2016. Participants in the program are assigned to an exercise
planning team where they are challenged to: demonstrate their expertise
at all levels of exercise design and conduct; apply best practices and
lessons learned from their organizations and experience; and use the
concepts from the curriculum for their exercise planning team
assignments. Contact fema-emi-iemb@fema.dhs.gov for more information.
FEMA Tribal Consultation Period on Hazard Mitigation Planning Continues Until July 8
FEMA is updating
its policy that guides how Agency officials interpret regulatory
requirements in their review and approval of tribal mitigation plans.
FEMA is seeking feedback from tribal
governments regarding this updated policy, “Tribal Mitigation Plan Review Guide.” Tribal officials’ suggestions and comments will inform
further development of the Tribal Mitigation Plan Review Guide.
Tribal officials can submit comments on the Tribal Mitigation Plan Review Guide: Key Concepts document until July 8, 2016, either by e-mail to tribalconsultation@fema.dhs.gov
or by mail to ATTN: Tyler Corson-Rikert, Federal Insurance and
Mitigation Administration (FIMA), DHS/FEMA, 400 C Street SW, Suite 313,
Washington, DC 20472-3020. Visit FEMA’s Tribal Affairs web page for more information on the tribal consultation period for this policy.
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