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On March 15, FEMA released its 2018-2022
Strategic Plan which seeks to unify and further professionalize emergency
management across the country, helping us build a stronger agency and a more
resilient nation.
When disasters strike, FEMA cannot succeed alone in the mission of helping
people. We need to work in coordination with our partners and
stakeholders to ensure that response and recovery is federally coordinated,
state managed, and locally executed. This strategic plan strives to rally all
our stakeholders and the Agency around the three goals of preparedness,
catastrophic readiness, and reducing complexity.
The Strategic
Plan outlines three ambitious, but achievable goals for the next five years:
- Build a culture of preparedness. Every segment of our society, from individual to
government, industry to philanthropy, must be encouraged and empowered
with the information it needs to prepare for the inevitable impacts of
future disasters.
- Ready the nation for catastrophic disasters. FEMA will work with its partners across all levels
of government to strengthen partnerships and access new sources of
scalable capabilities to quickly meet the needs of overwhelming
incidents.
- Reduce the complexity of FEMA. FEMA must continue to be responsible stewards of
the resources we are entrusted to administer. We must also do everything
that we can to leverage data to drive decision-making, and reduce the
administrative and bureaucratic burdens that impede impacted individuals
and communities from quickly receiving the assistance they need.
These goals, and their supporting objectives, reflect recommendations and
perspectives from conversations with disaster survivors and communities, and
from what FEMA learned from the recent historic disaster season, through
insights shared in collaborative Discovery Change Sessions with employees, and
an online IdeaScale campaign. The plan is available online at FEMA.gov/strategic-plan.
In support of FEMA’s Strategic Goal to build a culture of
preparedness, FEMA hosted the first Community
Resilience Technical Exchange (CRTE) on March 9, 2018 at Argonne National
Laboratory’s Washington, D.C. office. More than 30 individuals involved in
managing and implementing federally-sponsored community resilience programs
attended the event.
Representatives from Argonne National Laboratory, the
Chester County (Pennsylvania) Department of Emergency Services, the Department
of Homeland Security’s Office of Infrastructure Protection, the Federal
Emergency Management Agency, the National Institutes of Standards and
Technology, and several university partners presented on
initiatives that help state, local, tribal, and territorial governments become
more resilient. The CRTE culminated in a facilitated discussion regarding
knowledge and resource gaps, points of duplication, and areas for
collaboration. FEMA will release a CRTE summary report in a few weeks.
FEMA will use the results of the CRTE to inform
the development of an upcoming multi-jurisdictional Community Resilience
Technical Assistance (TA), which will launch in the fall of 2018. Questions regarding the CRTE or the planned community
resilience TA may be directed to the Director of FEMA’s National Integration Center,
Daniel Alexander, at Daniel.Alexander@fema.dhs.gov.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) has placed a notice in the Federal
Register officially releasing the 2019 National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP)
Write Your Own (WYO) Arrangement, which begins October 1, 2018. FEMA
administers the NFIP which works closely with private insurance companies, also
known as WYO companies, to sell and service federal flood insurance under their
own business name.
FEMA has made enhancements to the 2019 Arrangement.
FEMA believes the changes support the vision of closing the insurance gap and
doubling the number of flood insurance policies to create a nation of
preparedness against the damaging effects of flood. It is anticipated that the
2019 changes will help increase the number of property owners that have flood
insurance nationally. A few noteworthy changes are as follows:
- The WYO compensation was lowered by
one (1) percentage point and is now 30 percent.
- The “non-compete” clause
was removed allowing WYOs to sell primary flood insurance that in the past competed
with the NFIP product.
- WYOs are now required to
submit an operational plan that outlines how they will operate their
business in support of the NFIP.
- WYOs also have new
requirements to support FEMA in order to ensure the required timelines are
met for the claims appeals process.
It is expected all the 2019 Arrangements will be officially
signed by both FEMA and the WYOs that elect to participate prior to the
beginning of the new Arrangement.
FEMA, in partnership with organizations that collectively represent the
emergency management profession, released today the sixth video presentation
from the inaugural PrepTalks Symposium, Francis Ghesquiere’s “The Making of a
Resilient Future: Disaster Risk in Developing Countries.”
In his PrepTalk, Ghesquiere presents a
global perspective on the need to improve disaster resilience. He highlights
the scale of the challenge, from rapid urbanization in areas at risk of
earthquakes and floods, to the increasing frequency and intensity of storms. He discusses the need for all
sectors to participate in planning and to incorporate future trends in
population growth, urbanization, and increasing risk due to future environmental
conditions.
Ghesquiere heads the Global Facility for Disaster Reduction and
Recovery (GFDRR), a global partnership hosted by the World Bank with programs
in more than 80 countries. In a recent report, "The Making of a Riskier Future:
How Our Decisions are Shaping Future Disaster Risk," the GFDRR demonstrates how, it says,
“tomorrow’s risk is being built today. We must therefore move away from risk
assessments that show risk at a single point in the present and move instead
towards risk assessments that can guide decision makers towards a resilient
future.” Ghesquiere focuses on the importance of this future perspective in his
PrepTalk.
Ghesquiere’s
presentation, the question-and-answer session that followed, a discussion
guide, and additional reference materials are
available at https://www.fema.gov/preptalks. This is the sixth video of eight being produced from the PrepTalks
Symposium held in Washington, D.C. in January. The
next PrepTalks Symposium is tentatively scheduled for fall of 2018.
Upcoming PrepTalk video
topics include lessons learned from disaster survivors and financial
literacy. The next PrepTalks video is currently scheduled for release later this
month.
PrepTalks are a
partnership between FEMA, the International Association of Emergency Managers,
the National Emergency Management Association, the National Homeland Security
Consortium, and the Naval Postgraduate School Center for Homeland Defense and
Security.
FEMA is pleased to announce that the
Federal Insurance Directorate created a new resource for State Insurance
Commissioners and all others who work within the flood insurance field.
The National Flood Insurance Program Desk Reference provides an overview of the
National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) and is in three distinct parts: Before
the Flood, During the Flood, and After the Flood. Each part will provide
valuable resources on what you need to know, what you need to share with flood
insurance policyholders and property owners, and who to contact. FEMA organized
this guide to provide you the information you need to know when you need to know
it most. FEMA has published it only electronically to ensure easy updates as
the NFIP evolves. (FEMA will not be printing it.) https://www.fema.gov/media-library/assets/documents/157006.
FEMA is seeking applicants for the Youth Preparedness Council, which brings together teens from across the country who are interested and engaged in community preparedness. Council members are selected based on their dedication to public service, their efforts in making a difference in their communities, and their potential to expand their impact as national leaders for preparedness. Students in 8th through 11th grade are eligible to apply.
Youth interested in applying to the Council must submit a completed application form, provide two letters of recommendation, and academic records. All applications and supporting materials must be received no later than March 30, 2018, 11:59 p.m. PDT. New council members will be announced in May 2018. To access the application materials, read about the current Council members, and for more general information about the Youth Preparedness Council visit www.ready.gov/youth-preparedness-council.
Learn How to Strengthen Your Organization’s Cybersecurity
FEMA invites
you to a cybersecurity webinar on Wednesday, March 28, 12:00 – 1:00 p.m. ET. Speakers will provide overviews of:
incident response resources, hands-on technical assistance, and information
sharing resources available from the Department of Homeland Security’s
Critical Infrastructure Cyber Community (C3) Voluntary Program, and, the
Financial Services Information Sharing and Analysis Center (FS-ISAC), a global,
non-profit organization consisting of 7,000+ members from throughout the
banking, securities, and insurance industries. Learn how to connect the FS-ISAC trusted network to crisis
planning, exercising, and response and recovery activities to your organizations.
How to Join the Webinar:
- Please register for the event using the Adobe
Connect registration web link.
- Be sure to test
your Adobe Connect connection prior to the meeting.
This webinar will offer captioning.
2018 National Preparedness Symposium Promoting Whole Community Preparedness Through Unity of Effort
FEMA's Emergency
Management Institute (EMI) will host the 2018 National Preparedness Symposium
from May 21-24. The symposium provides federal, state, tribal, territorial, and
nongovernmental training and exercise officials the opportunity to discuss
current and future training and exercise programs and to share case studies,
lessons-learned, and smart practices. The theme is “promoting whole community
preparedness through unity of effort,” with a focus on promoting a culture of
preparedness in America.
The event will be held at
the National Emergency Training Center, 16825 South Seton Avenue
Emmitsburg, MD 21727-8998. Applications for registration must be received by
April 9, 2018. To apply and for more information, visit https://training.fema.gov/nationalpreparednesssymposium/
or contact the EMI National Training Liaison Dan Lubman at daniel.lubman@fema.dhs.gov.
Property Acquisition Open Space Collection Comment Period
FEMA recently listed a Federal Register Notice
for public comments about information collection. In accordance with the
Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995, this notice seeks comments concerning the
process of property acquisition and relocation for open space as part of FEMA's
mitigation grant programs, monitoring requirements after a receiving a grant,
and a direct grant to property owners for acquisition and demolition of severe
repetitive loss structures. Comments may be submitted through the Federal
Register at www.federalregister.gov/d/2018-03949 until April 30, 2018.
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