Description
The American private sector must be systematically integrated into the nation’s response to disasters, natural and man-made alike. Government alone cannot manage major crises nor effectively integrate the private sector after a crisis occurs.
Getting Down to Business:
An Action Plan for Public-Private
Disaster Response Coordination
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
January 2007
BUSINESS EXECUTIVES FOR NATIONAL SECURITY
1717 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW • Suite 350 • Washington, DC 20006-4620
E-mail: [email protected] • Tel: 202-296-2125 • Fax: 202-296-2490
www.bens.org
Business Executives for National Security
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Table of Contents
Preface .......................................................................................................................................... 2
Key Findings and Recommendations ............................................................................................. 4
Introduction: Background, Methods and Aims ............................................................................... 6
Chapter 1. Public-Private Collaboration ...................................................................................... 13
Chapter 2. Surge Capacity/Supply Chain Management .............................................................. 21
Chapter 3. Legal & Regulatory Environment ............................................................................... 31
Chapter 4. An Expert’s Guide to Priorities and Sequencing for the
Integration of the Private Sector into U.S. National
Disaster Response Planning and Execution ............................................................... 36
Appendices
A - Business Response Task Force Charter................................................................................... 41
B - Task Force Members, Advisors and Staff ................................................................................ 42
C - List of Survey Interviews ........................................................................................................ 44
D - Relevant Recommendations from Federal Government
After-action Reports and Other Sources ................................................................................ 46
E - Glossary of Acronyms in this Report ....................................................................................... 50
F - Public-Private Collaboration Outcomes and Drivers .............................................................. 54
G - Surge Capacity/Supply Chain Management Outcomes and Drivers ..................................... 55
H - Legal & Regulatory Environment Outcomes and Drivers ..................................................... 57
I - Priorities and Sequencing Outcomes and Drivers ................................................................. 58
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
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Preface
The 2005 hurricane season and its prolonged crisis aftermath demonstrated beyond doubt that the
United States is not adequately prepared to deal with major catastrophes, whether natural or man-made.
Coming nearly four years after the 9/11 attacks, the inadequate local, state and federal government
responses to Hurricane Katrina put the entire nation on alert that America has many problems to
overcome before being truly ready to mount a reinforced and efficient disaster response.
Not least of these problems is the systematic failure of government to integrate the resources of
America’s vast private sector into its disaster response plans, up to and including response to an Incident
of National Significance.
1
As the February 26, 2006, White House report, The Federal Response to
Hurricane Katrina: Lessons Learned, stated:
The Federal government should recognize that the private/non-government sectors often perform
certain functions more efficiently and effectively than government because of the expertise and
experience in applying successful business models. These public-private partnerships should be
facilitated, recognized, funded [and]. . . the capability to draw on these resources should inform and
be part of Federal, State, and local logistics systems and response plans.
Invited by the senior leadership of both the United States Senate and U.S. House of Representatives to offer
advice, in June 2006 Business Executives for National Security (BENS) formed a Task Force to recommend
to the U.S. Government steps to systematically integrate the capabilities of the private sector—principally
those of the business community—into a comprehensive national disaster response mechanism.
BENS did so in response not only to the federal government’s recognition of a pressing need in the
aftermath of Katrina, but also in response to the overwhelming demand of its membership. During the
summer and autumn of 2005, many BENS members experienced first-hand the reality that the role of
business in response to national disasters has not been properly thought through. In preparing this report,
the Task Force has assiduously mined the wealth of experience of its members and other executives—
completing nearly 100 interviews—in developing its findings.
This report’s recommendations fall into three substantive categories: public-private collaboration; surge
capacity/supply chain management; and legal & regulatory environment. In addition, the report
specifies priorities and sequencing for implementing its recommendations.
During the late summer and fall of 2006, the report, in draft form, was circulated widely and briefed to
federal agencies and congressional offices and staff, the White House, senior leaders at the National
Governors Association, the National Emergency Management Association and the Association of State
Attorneys General, the U.S. Northern Command, professional associations, and corporate leaders
around the country. While the conclusions are those of the Task Force, the report benefits immeasurably
from comments and suggestions made by our colleagues in government and business.
We present these recommendations in the belief that the failure so far to properly integrate the private
sector into government disaster response capabilities, while serious and pervasive, can be remedied. To
do so, however, requires a new dedication to effective public-private partnership and, we believe, a
1
An Incident of National Significance is defined in the Federal National Response Plan (NRP) as an actual or potential high-impact
event requiring a coordinated and effective response by an appropriate combination of federal, state, local, tribal, nongovernmental,
and/or private sector entities in order to save lives, minimize damage and provide the basis for long-term community recovery and
mitigation activities.
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new approach: simultaneous, integrated action from both the very top of our federal government
structure and from the state and local levels upward.
This report’s recommendations constitute the framework of an action plan to implement this new
approach. Its key proposition is that Emergency Operation Centers (EOCs), which already exist at all
levels of government to plan for, train and implement emergency responses to disaster, must include a
seat for the private sector. The private sector, in turn, must maintain parallel structures, referred to here
as “Business Operation Centers (BOCs)” that can plug-in to government operations and “scale up” with
them in a parallel and coordinated manner as government adapts to deal with disasters from small to
large. If this structural reform is adopted, it will greatly facilitate all of the other reforms recommended in
this report.
As simple and logical as this proposition sounds, formidable political, organizational and legal obstacles
now block simple and logical implementation. These obstacles can and must be overcome if we as a
nation are to seriously prepare for the next major calamity. Overriding all is the need for Congress to
recognize the value of establishing public-private partnerships in concord with state, regional and federal
entities and to provide funding through the Department of Homeland Security grant program to sustain
them.
The very sinews of American democracy have always resided in the integrity of our close-knit
communities, of which business has ever been and remains an integral part. We should not undervalue
the power of this bond in an age where our national security is being tested in new and daunting ways.
Business must be integrated into our disaster response plans not only because businesses have material
assets, money and technical expertise. American businesses are patriotic. They value their community
and their nation, and have and will willingly contribute their treasure and talent toward maintaining our
cherished way of life.
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
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Key Findings and Recommendations
This BENS Task Force Report focuses on institutionalizing an effective and sustainable role for business in
disaster response at all levels of government. To that end, it offers recommendations in three substantive
categories:
1. Public-private collaboration, to plan, train, exercise, implement and evaluate joint actions
required to facilitate effective communication, decision-making and execution;
2. Surge capacity for private-sector goods and services, and the capabilities resident in private-
sector supply chains to manage the delivery of goods and services (whether pro bono or
contracted) to and within disaster areas; and
3. The legal & regulatory environment, which can help or dramatically hinder efficient delivery
of private-sector support during a disaster.
Public-Private Collaboration
Finding: The American private sector must be systematically integrated into the nation’s response to
disasters, natural and man-made alike. Government alone cannot manage major crises nor effec-
tively integrate the private sector after a crisis occurs. The Task Force believes that building public-
private collaborative partnerships, starting at the state level, is one of the most important steps that
can be taken now to prepare the nation for future contingencies. Unfortunately, with few exceptions,
durable, collaborative relationships do not today exist.
Consistent with this finding, the Task Force recommends:
A. Creating new ways to institutionalize public-private collaboration at the state and
major metropolitan area levels;
B. Facilitating greater public-private collaboration at the regional and federal levels; and
C. Building a “Business Emergency Management Assistance Compact (BEMAC)” structure.
Surge Capacity/Supply Chain Management
Finding: America’s existing commercial supply chains can provide a wider range of goods and ser-
vices on demand than any level of government can possibly match. During national disasters, these
supply chains have provided goods and services both with and without payment from an end user.
Government at all levels should incorporate such capabilities into disaster response planning. For the
most part, government has so far failed to do so.
Consistent with this finding, the Task Force recommends continued efforts re:
A. Improving government emergency-purchasing protocols;
B. Revising deficient donations management systems; and
C. Modernizing logistics processes across the board.
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Legal & Regulatory Environment
Finding: Business requires a predictable legal regime to operate efficiently in an emergency situa-
tion, whether that business is engaged in charitable or profit-motivated activities. The current legal
and regulatory environment is conducive to neither predictability nor efficiency.
Consistent with this finding, the Task Force recommends that Congress:
A. Enact a nationwide body of “disaster law”;
B. Modify the Stafford Act
2
to include the private sector; and
C. Hold hearings to determine which Task Force recommendations can be implemented
under existing law and which require new legislation.
The Task Force urges government to move quickly to integrate business into its disaster response
planning on the federal, state and local levels, and within the operations continuums that link levels of
government together. Recognizing that the task is complex, and that political and fiscal limits make it
impossible to implement all recommendations at once, the Task Force has identified and prioritized
specific desired outcomes and policy drivers in Appendices F-I at the end of this report. This has been
done to facilitate the deliberations of political leaders, responsible government officials and private-
sector experts.
2
The Robert T. Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act (Stafford Act), 42 USC 5121-5206.
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
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Introduction: Background, Methods and Aims
Americans learn only from catastrophe and not from experience.
—Theodore Roosevelt
For a quarter century, Business Executives for National Security (BENS) has served as the principal
channel through which senior executives can help build a more secure America. As a national, non-
partisan, non-profit organization, BENS has focused on adapting successful models and practices from the
private sector to strengthen the nation’s security.
Coming four years after the September 11, 2001, attacks, the hurricanes of 2005 dramatized the frailties of
our nation’s disaster response system. As the disasters unfolded, BENS was contacted by numerous
business executives seeking help in navigating the bureaucratic obstacles impeding them from providing
private-sector goods and services to those in need. BENS tried to help, but, lacking established
relationships with public-sector responders in the Gulf, successful outcomes were largely elusive.
As the official reports concerning the disasters of the previous summer began to emerge in early 2006,
much was said about improving government responses and even about reaching out to business to help.
But while these reports were long on rhetoric and generalities, they were disappointingly short on specific
plans of action.
So BENS decided to get down to business. In June 2006, BENS chartered a Task Force [see Appendix A]
comprised of senior U.S. business leaders closely tied to disaster response functions: telecommunications,
retail and wholesale supply chains, utilities, manufacturing, real estate, financial services, management
consulting and other key industries. The goal, said Task Force Chairman Duane Ackerman, was “to ensure
that as recovery occurs at the local level, [the efficient application of private-sector capabilities and
resources] are preserved as the disaster escalates and local, state and federal officials are all at the scene
together.”
The aim of the Task Force was to build up what U.S. Comptroller General David M. Walker, during his
March 2006 testimony before the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs,
called the “total force”—by which he meant the coordinated assets of federal, state and local authorities,
the military, non-profit organizations, and the private sector.
With the support of the BENS staff and professional assistance provided pro bono by Science Applications
International Corporation (SAIC), the Task Force members [see Appendix B] laid out an ambitious agenda
for how to approach the task of integrating the private sector into our nation’s disaster response system. In
order to publish a report that captured the broadest possible range of disaster-related experiences and
recommendations, the Task Force asked the BENS staff to design and conduct a comprehensive survey.
Over a 90-day period, interviews were conducted with
nearly 100 CEOs, corporate security and emergency
management officers, and subject-matter experts with
emergency-related knowledge and perspective [see
Appendix C]. This survey data formed a baseline record
of private-sector response to crises. The survey sampled
both small and large businesses in an array of industries
and included a number of former senior government
officials and disaster response experts.
Survey questions focused on respondents’ experiences
with Emergency Operations Centers (EOCs), with the
pre-positioning of goods and services (either for their
own continuity or to assist emergency responders), with
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“We need to know how to connect
locally, so that we are not just
addressing the needs of our
employees and their families, but
the needs of the larger community.”
– Dr. Mark A. Sanna, Senior
Director, Global Security, Kraft
Foods, Inc.
3
“From Relief to Recovery: The 2005 U.S. Business Response to the Southeast Asia Tsunami
and Gulf Coast Hurricanes,” U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Business Civic Leadership Center,
March 2006.
physical access and security issues, and with the escalation of authority
from local to state to federal levels. Interviews included discussion about
broad or industry-specific legal and regulatory issues that may have
impeded the implementation of company continuity plans or the ability of a
firm to assist in its community’s recovery operations. Interviewers also
solicited specific suggestions on how to fix the problems identified.
As survey research proceeded, the Task Force organized itself into three
scoping groups to analyze lessons from recent national disasters and to
document examples of private-sector disaster response capabilities.
The Task Force survey was revealing. It reaffirmed several truths that Task
Force members recognized from their own experiences. First, disasters
happen regularly and businesses routinely plan for such contingencies.
Second, businesses in disaster-prone areas often have
extensive experience collaborating with public-sector first
responders. Third, after securing their own operations,
businesses invariably move to help ensure the continuity of the
community. As such, response from the private sector is
typically automatic, not only because businesses are citizens
of their own communities, but also because without continuity
of community no business can be done.
The evidence from the 2005 hurricane season testifies to all
these truths, particularly the final point. Private-sector
assistance during and following the major 2005 hurricanes—
Katrina, Rita and Wilma—totaled about $1.2 billion, 25 percent
of that in products and services, the remainder in cash contributions from
companies, employees and customers. At least 254 companies made cash or
in-kind contributions of $1 million or more.
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In addition, the U.S. Departments
of Homeland Security (DHS) and Commerce (DOC), as well as state
governments, relied on the business community for reliable information about
the situation on the ground. Situation reports provided by business, based on
their first-hand knowledge of local infrastructure, geography and geology,
helped to shape government’s response.
In thinking about the Task Force’s aims, it soon became clear that the key was
determining how to scale effective local responses up to a true national
response capability. The nine main themes that emerged from the survey
helped Task Force members frame their recommendations.
Preparation: The first theme to emerge from the surveys was that
companies’ experience in preparing for crises is extensive and applicable to
government preparations.
All but the smallest business organizations have a continuity plan in place.
For some, that means compiling executive phone lists, buying satellite
phones with text-messaging functions, and making contingency
arrangements with vendors. Other firms have their own 24-hour emergency
operations centers, run live crisis-scenario drills with government agencies
“We don’t count on plans, we count
on training....[W]e have regular
meetings of our emergency people.
Live exercises, table-tops, including
local first responders and local
government officials.”
– Donna Shalala, President,
University of Miami
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“You have to learn to expect the
unexpected. Not everything will be
found in your crisis management
manual. For example, nowhere in
our crisis management manual did
it demonstrate how to get a dead
600-pound sea lion out of your
parking lot.”
– Lance Ewing, VP Risk
Management, Harrah’s
Entertainment, Inc.
“[W]e had a ver y instructi ve
vantage point being the
headquarters and watching [the
response] grow, and watching the
capability and confusion at the same
time. I saw how it mushroomed:
how complicated it was, how many
players there were, how many
uninformed players there were, how
many inexperienced players there
were, how little they communicated,
and how often they changed. It’s
amazing anything got done.”
– Patrick J. Quinlan, M.D.,
Chief Executive Officer,
Ochsner Clinic Foundation
as participants, and develop emergency fall-back plans with their
competition so that business can be moved to a remote location in the
event of crisis. Nearly all companies stressed the importance of training
their employees and crisis management leaders.
Another important aspect of preparation is planning how to distribute goods
and services to the people who need them. Major retailers know to stock
up on extra supplies during hurricane season and position them just outside
the hurricane zone in order to be able to deliver them immediately after a
storm passes. Government needs to leverage that private-sector capacity
and plan for its use.
Many interviewees stressed that continuity plans need to be flexible and
imaginative. Business employees and government officials need to be
prepared to operate in unpredictable emergency situations. This involves
devising plans that are imaginative enough to deal with a host of different
circumstances (such as the failure of levees in New Orleans) and are
flexible enough to allow individuals to deal with completely unexpected
events.
Relationships: The second theme is that relationships must be established in
advance of a crisis.
Companies pursue pre-crisis relationships for their own continuity plans by
developing lines of communication among employees and senior executives;
with neighbors, suppliers and even competitors; and with government author-
ities at all levels. Said one interviewee, “you don’t want to be handing out
business cards...in the middle of an emergency.” Many company representa-
tives complained that, based on what they witnessed during the 2005
hurricanes, government appeared to have failed to make connections even
among its own agencies, not to mention with the private sector.
The question often posed was that if cutthroat business competitors manage
to cooperate in a crisis, why can’t government agencies?
Authority: The third theme is that there is a lack of clarity about who is in
charge once governmental authority escalates from the local to the state
and federal levels.
Federal, state, and local government personnel are all on the scene
following any Incident of National Significance, and confusion among them
is common and somewhat understandable. Problems with credentialing
and permitting, fights among agencies (even those under the same
department), and problems related to commandeered goods and equipment
are omnipresent. The surveys uncovered a number of stories where a
company’s trucks were commandeered by one agency while trying to
deliver emergency supplies under contract to another. There also were
cases where vehicles credentialed by one government authority were
denied entry to the disaster area by another government authority down the
road. There were many cases where two or more agencies, regardless of
government level, would butt heads over turf issues in the midst of a crisis.
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“We’re competitors, not enemies. We
collaborate during emergencies.... We
had one competitor who gave us office
space, and we’d do the same for
them. Relationships were all in place
beforehand.”
– Gregg Jones, Chief
Administrative Officer,
Greenberg Traurig, LLP
“On the communication side: If the
land lines aren’t working—which
they are not if the power is down—
you will only have cell phones.
Whatever system you have, they have
two problems: one, the power to the
towers went down, and two, their
backup batteries only had a short
useful life.... So in any business that
is spread out...you’re basically out of
business. This season all of the senior
executives have three separate cell
phones on different systems, hoping
that at least one of the systems will
be up and operating in the areas
where we need it.”
– Gerald D. Kelfer, President &
CEO, Avatar Holdings Inc.
One organization told an interviewer that while the Federal Emergency
Management Agency (FEMA) was, figuratively, at one door to help, the
Customs and Immigration Service (CIS) was at the other, trying to remove
employees whose visas were invalidated because the organization was
closed for business (even though closure was due to the very same hurricane
that its fellow DHS agency was addressing via recovery efforts).
Communications: The fourth theme is that operational and accurate
communications are vital.
Crisis wreaks havoc with technology. From 9/11 to Wilma, we were told
that phones and computers do not work (either because of a lack of
electricity or because satellite, cellular and land lines have crashed).
People cannot physically move to back-up communications locations
because of evacuations or public-safety concerns. But the problem
transcends technology. During Katrina, even when a company could feed
into a government source or EOC, it was reported that the information
available was often confusing and inconsistent, particularly when multiple
government authorities were on hand.
Interviewees differed on what would constitute an ideal arrangement for
coordinating communications. Some preferred that one voice speak on
behalf of all government to the private sector; others preferred to gather
information from multiple sources and sort it out on their own. All concurred
on three points, however: that more organized communication between
government and business needs to occur; that government personnel must
be clear about what they need; and that officials placed in a
communications role must have the authority to make quick decisions.
Logistics: The fifth theme is that a need exists for improved methods to
deliver goods and services to the government or directly to needy
communities during crises.
Interviewees discussed at length government’s inability to accept and
distribute goods and services in an efficient manner following Katrina.
Everything from food and clothing to medical care came in, but without
control over the distribution system, ice melted, donated clothing piled up
and rotted, and medical personnel were turned away. One company had
600,000 tarps available to cover damaged roofs, but the federal
government was unable to draw on the supply chain to secure and
distribute them. Another company offered to donate three mobile
communications units, only to be told that their offer was refused and then
countered with a request to buy ten of the same. We were told by one
interviewee that a senior manager of a large transportation association
spent a full day trying—and failing—to locate a single authoritative point of
contact within FEMA to coordinate bus deployments. Numerous examples
were cited of the government’s inability to accept private-sector donations,
often because of a lack of pre-defined procedures or mechanisms for doing
so.
Interestingly, many companies we interviewed had not heard of DHS’
National Emergency Response Registry (NERR). The NERR, created during
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
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“You go to war with the army you
have. The problem in Katrina was
that the FEMA army was ill-
equipped for the job, and the lesson
we took away from it was that we
have to marry the private sector and
the public sector before the disaster
occurs, otherwise those resources will
not flow and will not be made
available. Once the disaster occurs,
it’s too late to begin to develop
personal relationships, and to put
in place the systems that are
necessary that will facilitate the
people at the federal side and state
and local sides, working with the
private sector.”
– Peter F. Carpenter, President,
INSTEDD
“Have you heard the FEMA Bob
and FEMA Joe stories?...The way
people down here learned to deal
with FEMA was to just talk to
them more than once. FEMA Joe
will tell you one day that you can’t
do this, but if you go back the next
day and talk to FEMA Bob, he’ll
tell you that you can.”
– John McFarland, Marketing
Director, The Biloxi Sun Herald
the Hurricane Katrina response, was an Internet-based system to source
goods and services to the government during emergencies. Most
interviewees expressed support for the concept but wanted to know why
the NERR was kept a virtual secret from businesses, given that DHS sought
to implement such a system. That frustration also was reflected by some in
government.
Other companies discussed concerns about government contracting, with
many stories about procurement process problems. Surprisingly, complaints
never focused on payment issues (although some companies reported very
long delays in FEMA reimbursements). Rather, many companies were
perplexed by rules requiring federal government agencies—but not states
and localities—to refuse pro bono donations and demand for-fee contracts
instead. Still other complaints noted that work offered at one fee was
sometimes rejected in favor of the same work paid at a higher fee—which
some companies regarded as unconscionable. For example, one large
restaurant chain offered to distribute boxed lunches at a price of $4.50 per
lunch but ultimately rescinded the offer when FEMA refused to pay less
than $6 per lunch. Many of these problems stemmed from government
procedures that tied the hands of FEMA officials. However, it also was
reported that many government contracting officers seemed to be unaware
of the variety of contracting vehicles available to them during crises, and
either did not know how to streamline the contracting process or were not
empowered to do so.
Business response: The sixth theme is that like government authorities,
companies also play the role of first responders and thus need to be given
priority status.
The private sector plays a critical role in post-disaster community
reconstruction. Disasters often destroy many key components of a
community’s critical infrastructure, and business continuity for companies
in those industries (such as energy and telecommunications) is an essential
component of the community’s immediate recovery. Therefore, these
corporate first responders (identified as such by the authorities and prior to
a crisis) need to be given priority status with regard to credentialing and
access to facilities, affected areas, and information. Many interviewees
also proposed that banks and waste removal services should be added to
this list of corporate first responders, since two repeatedly-mentioned areas
of post-disaster civil unrest concerned cash and garbage pick-up.
Because the private sector plays an essential role in rebuilding the
community, it is important that government agencies generally refrain from
commandeering essential goods from corporate first responders. Many
interviewees specifically complained that government officials often
commandeered their backup fuel tanks. Fuel and power frequently were
cited as the most important resources needed early in a crisis. Without
those inputs, business cannot proceed—and many continuity plans fall
apart. Some interviewees also suggested that laws be enacted to require
gas stations to install emergency generators, ensuring that they can pump
their own fuel in emergency situations.
Business Executives for National Security
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“If you start reading the 300-page
National Pandemic Flu Plan, they
categorize and prioritize different
categories in terms of what they
think is critical infrastructure—
garbage men are level 6, which is
almost at the bottom. You’d think
we’d be up there with critical
utilities because that’s basically
what we are, but we’re not. We’re
down there below everybody and
their brother.”
– Michael R. Lambert,
Corporate Director of Safety,
Republic Services, Inc.
“If you’ve got twenty employees in
your firm, and you are trying to give
them some cash so that they can take
care of their families—they might
not have a home, they might not have
a car, they might not have a place to
stay—you try and give them $500
each—that’s $10,000, and you’ve
got to fill out a...currency transaction
report—for an established
customer! That’s my pet peeve, and
you can’t get...Washington to even
think about: if it is a national
disaster, waive it for a week, waive
it for...two week for an
established customer.”
– Chevis Swetman, Chairman,
President & CEO, Peoples
Financial Corporation
FEMA: The seventh theme is that FEMA must make dramatic improvements
in the planning and coordination of its recovery efforts.
Nearly all respondents asserted that FEMA failed in its efforts following
Katrina. There were a few good stories shared, but all agreed on two points.
First, FEMA representatives were replaced far too often, which resulted in
FEMA policies being inconsistently applied and the establishment of
working relationships with FEMA on the local level becoming nearly
impossible. Second, the mechanisms for establishing two-way
communications with FEMA officials on the ground were unreliable from
the start and quickly overwhelmed.
The Good Samaritan: The eighth theme is that the vast majority of
companies—like the vast majority of citizens—will strive to “do the right
thing” during crises.
When asked about their Good Samaritan actions, most companies simply
said that they aimed to do the right thing and worried about the monetary
and regulatory implications later. When asked what aspect of previous
disaster recovery efforts they are proud of most, companies said that it was
being able to help their communities and their own employees.
One can discern from this feedback that organizational cultures that are not
risk-averse in their daily behaviors will not be inclined to be risk-adverse in
a crisis. The challenge is how to transfer this cultural insight from the
private sector to government bureaucracies.
Legal and Regulatory Barriers: The ninth theme is that regardless of
industry, size, or location, companies found significant regulatory barriers
that hindered their ability to execute their own continuity plans, to assist
within their communities, assist other communities, and work in concert
with government recovery efforts. Some of those impediments, such as
permitting and credentialing, have been mentioned above. Others involved
financial filings, gasoline mixes, health inspections, and much more. In fact,
the interviews uncovered far more than we could catalogue in this report.
In many cases, government authorities waived regulations that would prove
to be unnecessary or overly burdensome in the midst of crisis. In others, the
government did approve the waiver—but only after weeks of meetings in
Washington. Of course, there also were reports of laws and regulations not
being waived at all, leaving companies in fear of legal reprisal should they
act to “do the right thing” versus consulting their legal counsel first.
The three Task Force scoping groups set out to develop recommendations
that flowed from their own experience. Informed by these nine insights,
they focused on developing key questions for deliberation. They are:
Public-Private Collaboration
• How can business become better integrated structurally into the
disaster response effort?
• What mechanisms can improve how business and government
communicate and coordinate decision-making before, during and
after a crisis, at all levels of government?
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
12
Surge Capacity/Supply Chain Management
• How can government improve contingency contracting and pre-
qualification of vendors for goods and services that will likely be
needed?
• How can government and business facilitate and accelerate the
delivery of resources (assets and volunteers) that business offers on
a pro bono basis?
• How can business emergency-response resources be deployed and
managed by federal, state and local government agencies to
maximize speed and utility and minimize redundancy?
Legal & Regulatory Environment
• How can government improve Good Samaritan laws to better
protect businesses and their employees who volunteer to help?
• How can legislation, regulation and policy be better aligned at the
federal, state and local levels to encourage private-sector
preparedness and better mobilize the private sector in a
catastrophic event?
• Is revision of the Stafford Act desirable?
After assimilating the results of the Task Force survey, each scoping group
developed recommendations for the near term that optimize business
participation in disaster response. They also developed recommendations
for the systematic longer-term integration of the private sector into the
National Response Plan and its execution in a disaster.
These recommendations are presented in the following three
chapters. A fourth chapter—an “Expert’s Guide to Priorities and
Sequencing”—describes a path for systematic private-sector
integration consistent with the federal government’s revised
NRP; it is the Task Force’s summary statement of the actions
required to implement the recommendations in this report.
Business Executives for National Security
13
“Public-private partnerships are
truly the best way for America to
imagine solving its problems down the
road, [including both] the simplest
notion of a standard setting
responsibility, being that of the
federal government, and the real
generation of solutions to problems
being forthcoming from the private
sector–the link between the two is the
ultimate public-private partnership
that will be the answer to so many
of our challenges.”
– Admiral James M. Loy, USCG
(Ret.), Senior Counselor, The
Cohen Group
4
Critical infrastructure includes: 1) Agriculture, food (meat, poultry, egg products); 2) Public health
and healthcare; 3) Food (other than meat, poultry, egg products); 4) Drinking water and wastewater
treatment systems; 5) Energy, including the production, refining, storage, and distribu-tion of oil
and gas, and electric power (except for commercial nuclear power facilities); 6) Banking and finance; 7)
National monuments and icons; 8) Defense industrial base; 9) Information tech-nology; 10)
Telecommunications; 11) Chemical; 12) Transportation systems; 13) Emergency services; 14) Postal
and shipping; 15) Dams; 16) Government facilities; 17) Commercial facilities;
18) Nuclear reactors, materials, and waste.
5
The Disaster Response Supply Chain consists of commercial suppliers, distributors, and vendors
at the wholesale and retail level.
6
Non-governmental and charitable organizations are also critically important to disaster-response
efforts, but their role is beyond the scope of this Task Force.
Chapter 1. Public-Private Collaboration
Finding: The American private sector must be systematically integrated
into the nation’s response to disasters, natural and man-made alike. Gov-
ernment alone cannot manage major crises nor effectively integrate the
private sector after a crisis occurs. The Task Force believes that building
public-private collaborative partnerships, starting at the state level, is one
of the most important steps that can be taken now to prepare the nation
for future contingencies. Unfortunately, with few exceptions, durable, col-
laborative relationships do not today exist.
Consistent with this finding, the Task Force recommends:
A. Creating new ways to institutionalize public-private
collaboration at the state and major metropolitan area levels;
B. Facilitating greater public-private collaboration at the regional
and federal levels; and
C. Building a “Business Emergency Management Assistance
Compact (BEMAC)” structure.
Local, state or regional public-private partnerships are vital to filling gaps in
homeland security and disaster response that neither government nor
business can manage alone. These partnerships mobilize private-sector
cooperation—including the supply of material assets, volunteers,
information and expertise—that strengthens our nation’s capability to
prevent, prepare for, and respond to catastrophic events.
For responding to disasters, the private sector encompasses the for-profit
business community in all its aspects. Those aspects include critical
infrastructure,
4
the disaster response supply chain,
5
and other business
sectors (e.g., architecture and engineering firms, the hospitality industry,
mortuary services) that may be called on for support in a crisis or that are
necessary for the continuity of community in the aftermath of a disaster.
6
Ensuring continuity of community is essential for recovery from disaster in
all forms. Good will aside (and there were innumerable examples of
companies acting out of nothing more than corporate citizenship), although
most businesses plan for rebuilding and restoration of operations and for the
safety and security of employees, they also recognize the
interdependencies that exist in communities. A functioning community is
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
14
best defined by its natural commercial and social relationships, and can be
a locality, a state, an urban area within a state, or multiple states. If business
is to reconnect with its customer base, care for employees, restore
operations, and recover quickly from a catastrophic event, it has a clear
incentive to participate in the community response to disaster.
Whether activating established distribution networks or deploy-
ing aid quickly in the aftermath of a disaster, the private sector
can play a critical role in securing communities nationwide. The
private sector also needs—and can provide in return—disaster
information, coordination of access, protection and prioritization
of resources (e.g, fuel). A further benefit is that private sector
emergency resources can improve overall situational aware-
ness—if they are tied into the local, state and federal systems.
Established partnerships work because they enable business and
government leaders to work together not just once but on an
ongoing basis across many initiatives and all industry sectors.
Government and business know intuitively that they need to work together
during crisis, but how to do so does not come without effort on both sides.
Business-government collaborations require a level of trust and agility that
is easiest to build at the local, state and regional levels and possible at all
levels. It is important that local communities be as self-supporting as
possible in their crisis-response capacities, putting a high premium on the
efficiencies to be gained through cooperation; federal response capabilities
may be quickly overwhelmed if Washington were faced with several
simultaneous incidents.
At the same time, business must adopt new methods of cooperation to
support federal emergency response efforts. New structures are needed for
this purpose, and among these, regional public-private partnerships can be
critical in helping to sort through the multiple and overlapping requests from
federal, state and local government agencies that arise in a crisis. Regional
arrangements can allow business and government leaders to better
coordinate requests from multiple government agencies and to develop
coherent disaster response plans according to the needs and priorities of
their respective regions.
A. Institutionalizing Public-Private Collaboration at State and Major
Metropolitan Area levels
The purpose of state Emergency Operations Centers (EOCs) is to facilitate
coordination among essential government personnel during a crisis.
Through its emergency and disaster grants program, the federal government
has encouraged states to develop EOCs.
7
Many states and cities have
indeed developed such capabilities, as have major utility companies. The
Task Force recommends that those states, cities and other critical
infrastructure entities that have not should do so promptly.
7
Public Law 107-206, “2002 Supplemental Appropriations Act for Further Recovery From and
Response To Terrorist Attacks on the United States.” Phase 1 grants of $50,000 to each state are
used for an initial assessment of the hazards, vulnerabilities and resultant risk to existing EOCs. Phase
2 grants address the most immediate deficiencies and require a 50 percent non-federal cost share.
“[Y]ou have to recognize the
strengths of the various
areas...And those strengths are not
the same. [T]here is no reason to
expect government...to be as good
at military deployment as the
military is. The point is that
businesses are better able to execute
on certain things, the military is
better able to execute on some
things, and government is better
able to execute on some things. And
the question is how you link them
up and take advantage of those
various strengths. The failure was
access to tremendous resources that
were just under-utilized or never
accessed because there was no
communication and there was no
imperative to pull them in.”
–Thomas A. Oreck, President,
Oreck Corporation
Business Executives for National Security
15
Like government, most major (and many smaller) retailers and vendors in
the disaster supply chain have their own emergency operations centers.
These centers provide a location where employees in charge of emergency
management can communicate with the workforce and make important
business continuity decisions. Among the companies that do not have
EOCs, most still have emergency communications, protection, and
restoration plans. The extent of business continuity planning varies among
industry sectors and among individual businesses.
Because government has EOCs to coordinate emergency response, and
because the private sector has its own EOCs and emergency restoration
plans, it seems logical that government should use its EOCs to tap into the
vast organization of emergency resources and communication networks the
private sector can offer. Thus, the Task Force recommends that every state
and major metropolitan EOC offer a seat at the table—or broaden
representation if it already exists— for at least one business representative to
serve as liaison to the business community at large. This representation
should complement, not replace, presence in the EOC granted currently to
public utilities. Further, the Task Force recommends that a Business
Operations Center (BOC) be established to operate in conjunction with each
EOC, to provide a forum for collaboration, coordination, and decision making
between the public and private sectors.
Participation in the BOC should represent critical infrastructure and other
industries/companies vital to community viability and continuity in crisis
situations. Recognizing that it is not possible for all businesses to participate
at the “table” at once, the Task Force recommends that BOC membership be
generally rotating and structured in three tiers:
1) Critical infrastructure owners and operators as permanent members;
2) Other sectors or companies deemed critical to restoring the
continuity of community, represented as necessary (these
seats could be rotating or permanent, based on the number
of such businesses or the nature of the functions they
provide to the community); and,
3) Entities representing business at large within the
community (Chambers of Commerce, professional or trade
organizations, or civic clubs, e.g., Rotary), as rotating
participants that can reach back to their business
membership for help or information sharing.
The BOC concept creates an operational capability that
integrates private-sector resources into emergency response plans. It is
precisely this operational capability that is missing from the National
Response Plan as currently constructed—despite the frequent exhortations
in federal reports that the private sector be included. A BOC, connected
structurally to its corresponding EOC, will greatly enhance disaster-
response capability by providing a vehicle to include the private sector in
planning, preparation, training, exercises and execution.
8
“A new topic [in disaster response]
is ‘cross-industry response.’ The
telephone companies can only do so
much on their own, because
eventually they rely on the power
companies, who in turn rely on some
other industr y such as the
transportation industry. [W]e need
to consider what happens to the
other related industries such as the
financial industr y, [which is]
dependent on the transmission of
data among their various sites.
Working together on a cross-industry
basis is the only truly complete
solution.”
– Larry Babbio, Vice Chairman
and President, Verizon
Communications, Inc.
8
Although outside the Task Force’s purview, our assessment suggests that EOCs also should have
substantial non-governmental organization (NGO) representation. Many EOCs have a seat for the
American Red Cross and Voluntary Organizations Assisting in Disaster (VOADs), which include
NGOs and faith-based organizations; however, participation is not consistent across the country.
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
16
The Task Force believes that to ensure that the BOC concept spreads nation-
wide, the Congress should direct DHS to create guidelines and funding for
states and urban areas to build BOCs. Public-private communications sys-
tems and data interchanges may require direct appropriation. However,
sustaining funding through the DHS Grants & Training program should be
tied to the states and urban areas developing, training and exercising the EOC-
BOC collaboration.
The state of Georgia has developed and is exercising the BOC concept.
The Georgia BOC will be operated by a team of representatives from
corporations, trade associations and chambers of commerce. The BOC
will have about 30 organizational representatives who will be aligned
with the state’s Emergency Support Functions (ESFs), as defined in the
National Response Plan. BOC representatives must maintain an exten-
sive knowledge of a company’s operations and possess the authority to
quickly commit company resources. In addition, the BOC will have a
team of analysts with broad understanding of multiple commercial sec-
tors and the ability to rapidly define problems and propose solutions for
them. It is likely that one to two full-time employees with relevant emer-
gency management experience will be required to adequately manage
and sustain the BOC.
The Georgia BOC will initially operate virtually, using teleconferencing,
email and other web-based tools for communication, with the exception
that the BOC manager and analysts will co-locate at or near the Georgia
Emergency Operations Center (GEOC).
One also can look to similar examples in Florida, Massachusetts, Texas,
Utah, Los Angeles, New York City and the San Francisco Bay Area. All
are organized somewhat differently according to the particular require-
ments of the jurisdictions they serve, but the overriding theme in each is
the presence of the private sector in each phase of operation, from plan-
ning through execution.
Recommendation:
A. Integrate business into existing and prospective Emergency Operations
Centers (EOCs) of states and large urban areas through the
establishment of Business Operations Centers (BOCs).
1. Formalize a business presence in state and urban emergency
operations centers, to include emergency planning, training and
testing through periodic drills.
2. Include Critical Infrastructure sectors, if not already represented, and
those industry sectors not classified as critical but typically a part of
the disaster response supply chain (e.g., retail and wholesale), and
other critical businesses, such as the service and hospitality
industries. Businesses need cross-sector links to one another and the
credentials and clearances to operate with state and local EOCs
before, during and after a catastrophic event.
Business Executives for National Security
17
3. Congress should tie this requirement to receipt of federal homeland
security grants/funds.
4. Require testing, training and exercising of a formal business
presence in state and local emergency operations centers to ensure
proper functioning in a crisis.
5. Ensure that the BOC remains a permanent entity by codifying it in
the National Response Plan, sustained by the DHS-sponsored grants
program.
B. Facilitating Greater Public-Private Collaboration at Regional and Federal
Levels—Scaling-up to an Incident of National Significance
Unless their operations are compromised or incapacitated, state and local
governments are likely to have the first look at what goods and services are
needed during a crisis. They are responsible for transmitting this information
to public and private relief organizations.
If, however, a disaster rises to the level of an Incident of National
Significance,
9
the resources of the federal government are brought to bear.
The introduction of federal resources and authority presents the challenge of
“scaling-up” to accommodate a new set of players without loss of
efficiency.
Within the National Response Plan, the mechanism for this “scaling-up”
process is the Joint Field Office (JFO). Before we face another disaster, it
“Prior to the federal government
getting involved, most communities
have a local plan that has local
players that have relationships and
know what to do, especially around
critical infrastructure. Once that
process is overwhelmed, that’s where
the issue begins to get
complicated....That’s when...the
problem escalates in terms of degree
of complexity, and all the
relationships between the federal
government and the state, the federal
government and the private sector,
[and] the federal government and
the city become the issue at hand.”
– Duane Ackerman, President &
CEO, BellSouth Corporation
9
The National Response Plan recognizes the potential magnitude of threats from weapons of
mass destruction and severe natural disasters by adoption of a new term, the Incident of
National Significance. An Incident of National Significance is described as an incident with high
impact requiring an extensive and well-coordinated response by federal, state, local, tribal, and
nongovernmental authorities to save lives, minimize damage, and provide the basis for long-
term community and economic recovery.
Figure 1. Business Operations Center Concept
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
18
must be resolved how business will “plug in” to the plan as DHS
organizations and the U.S. Northern Command (NORTHCOM) come into
the mix through the JFO. To smoothly transition from local and state
operations to federal presence, business-government relationships and
roles within the JFO must be more than predetermined; they must be
practiced.
This recommendation sounds straightforward, but in truth, the task is both
challenging and complex. Government and the private sector must work
together to identify, in advance, governmental needs and the resources
available to match them. Roles on both sides must be clear, and each entity
must play to its strengths with as little mutual interference as possible. When
possible, government must provide information on required goods and
services, access to disaster sites, and security for relief workers in the area of
operations. The private sector must in turn be prepared to execute its supply
chain operations according to established procedures, with the least possible
regulatory interference and with reasonable protection from legal liabilities.
DHS recently established a liaison to the critical infrastructure
Emergency Support Functions (ESFs).
10
The JFO has a critical
infrastructure liaison position intended to interface with all
critical infrastructure companies—but one individual cannot
handle all of the activity generated in a crisis. That is why
DHS should establish a private-sector position linked to a
BOC-like concept in the JFO and establish an ongoing public-
private relationship in each of the ten FEMA regional offices.
In both cases, two conditions must be met for the liaison to be
effective: the business designee(s) must have sufficient
authority to commit the businesses they represent to take action; and the
government, especially in the JFO, must recognize that BOC input deserves
serious and high-level attention.
The Task Force believes that to build enduring public-private collaborations
at the regional and federal levels Congress needs to direct DHS to create
guidelines and provide funding for such entities.
Recommendation:
B. Facilitate greater public-private collaboration that will continue as
disaster response and recovery activities escalate to include federal
components under a Joint Field Office structure.
1. Establish long-term solutions that fully integrate the private sector
with regional entities and federal agencies, including creation of a
Business Operations Center (BOC) model at the JFO and/or FEMA
regional level. Recognize that a single event spanning multiple
regions or multiple events in different regions may require the
operation of more than one JFO/FEMA-BOC structures.
2. Establish a common set of private-sector expectations and “rules of
engagement” consistent with local, state and federal roles,
10
Emergency Support Function 15 – External Affairs has been modified (July 2006) to include
the private sector.
Business Executives for National Security
19
responsibilities and methods of operation. Broadcast these standards
widely and conduct necessary training and practical exercises, so
that they are thoroughly understood in advance of an actual disaster.
3. Weave the above recommendations into a strong fabric of business-
government collaboration on a nationwide basis:
a. Create regional partnerships with common elements and local
flexibility to provide the resources, structure and local
commitment needed to implement and exercise Task Force
recommendations on a sustainable basis.
b. Ensure BOC personnel understand and complete training under
the National Incident Management System (NIMS).
c. Provide outcomes-based federal funding to enable regional
partnerships to implement and exercise the above
recommendations and share best practices across the country.
C. A Business Emergency Management Assistance Compact
A successful example of a national mechanism for matching needs with
available resources is the state mutual-aid program known as the
Emergency Management Assistance Compact, or EMAC. EMAC currently
enables affected states to request government resources from non-affected
states, and it obliges non-affected states to comply if they are able.
The EMAC program could and should be expanded to include private-sector
resources. An expanded EMAC program could knit together a fabric of state-
based Business Operations Centers to create a scalable, flexible and robust
“[EMAC has] existed since
Hurricane Andrew. We test it every
year, we exercise, we have written policy
manuals, guided direction; it really can
serve as a model for that kind of
provision. It’s simple but robust, and
that’s ultimately what we’re talking
about when it comes to private-public
partnership.”
– Mike Sherberger, former
Director, Georgia Office of
Homeland Security/Georgia
Emergency Management Agency
Figure 2. BOC concept at the FEMA/JFO level
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
20
“network of networks.” Trained private-sector representatives would work
alongside emergency management leaders to coordinate government and
private-sector resources using interoperable processes and technical tools
(e.g., same communication systems, same data exchange systems, etc.). This
program would provide the mechanism for identifying in advance and rapidly
deploying billions of dollars of business resources on a nationwide basis.
The Task Force will nominate a team to work with the National Emer-
gency Management Association (NEMA) to explore application of the
Emergency Management Assistance Compact (EMAC) model to the task
of identifying, cataloguing and requesting private sector-resources for use
by government.
Recommendation:
C. Build a Business Emergency Management Assistance Compact
(BEMAC) Structure.
1. Expand existing FEMA and state models to better forecast the
resources and capabilities that are critical in the early stages of a
disaster.
2. Create state and regional resource registries of private-sector
resources, including resources government expects to purchase and
those that business expects to provide on a pro bono basis during
catastrophic events.
3. Create a mechanism similar to EMAC to connect business resources
in unaffected states to states in the disaster zone.
4. Create business support teams similar to EMAC “A-teams,” which
send emergency management officials from outside the disaster
zone to the affected state(s).
5. A BEMAC system should complement, not replace, existing mutual
aid processes like those in place in the public utilities sectors.
Business Executives for National Security
21
“If something is disrupted, [there
must be a] plan for reconstitution
that makes sense, rather than ‘first
come, first served’ or ‘we’re bigger
than you are.’ ”
– Bruce Townsend, Corporate VP,
Security, FedEx Corporation
Chapter 2. Surge Capacity/Supply Chain
Management
Finding: America’s existing commercial supply chains provide a wider
range of goods and services on demand than any level of government
can possibly match. During national disaster, these supply chains have
provided goods and services, both with and without payment from an
end user. Government at all levels should incorporate such capabilities
into disaster response planning. For the most part, government has so far
failed to do so.
Consistent with this finding, the Task Force recommends continued efforts re:
A. Improving government emergency-purchasing protocols;
B. Revising deficient donations management systems; and
C. Modernizing logistics processes across the board.
In the wake of recent national disasters, government agencies at all levels
have tried to prepare themselves for future contingencies by forecasting
needs and arranging to secure resources. Unfortunately, with the exception
of critical infrastructure, the role of the private sector remains unscripted
and untested—despite the fact that the private sector is the ultimate source
of the materiel and commercial services that will be needed.
The nation must do much more to develop the “emergency marketplace” in
advance of the next crisis. To do so, four overarching principles should apply:
• The private sector routinely operates efficient supply chains;
government should not be expending time, effort, and money to
build its own.
• The goal is to get product to the disaster zone quickly and at fair
market price.
• In the disaster zone, the private sector must be granted access and
know that adequate security will be provided.
• More planning needs to be put into “last mile logistics.”
A. Improving Emergency-Purchasing Protocols
Business prepares for disaster by developing relationships with public
officials in the community and knowing what emergency services are
locally available. It plans for protection of its business infrastructure and
merchandise, as well as for the safety of its employees. Many businesses
have methods of maintaining or re-establishing contact with employees so
that business continuity can be readily restored. When warning is available,
major supply chains, using point-of-sale data from previous disasters, begin
moving necessary products towards a disaster zone in advance of need.
They also develop contingency contracts or agreements to obtain goods and
services that are likely to be needed in case of emergency.
Like business, government can predict some (but not all) of its needs prior to
a crisis. And like business, government can and should plan ahead to have
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
22
those needs filled in the wake of a disaster. To do so, it must communicate its
projected resource requirements to its suppliers. Armed with such
information, commercial relationships between the private sector and
governments at all levels can be pre-negotiated for those goods and services;
examples include electrical power, communications capabilities,
engineering/construction, equipment maintenance, field services (e.g.,
lodging, food services and sanitation), security, medical services, mortuary
services, supply operations, and transportation.
Many localities and states have already entered into contracts with the
private sector to provide these crisis and post-crisis goods and services.
Likewise, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) has
contracts in place to provide the most common commodities (like water and
ice) that are needed following a disaster.
The disaster recovery agencies should establish blanket purchase
agreements with the suppliers of emergency materials, thus making the
contracting process quicker and more efficient. Regardless of the type of pre-
qualified government contracting vehicle, however, the contracting officers
must be trained, ready, and authorized to make quick decisions within the
bounds of those arrangements.
In November 2006, the General Services Administration (GSA) consolidated
its emergency response resources into a new Office of Emergency Response
and Recovery, providing a central location from which it can support first
responders, emergency workers and recovery teams. For both routine
purchasing and emergency contracting, some companies have elected to
become certified suppliers to the federal government through the GSA
Federal Supply Schedule. This mechanism avails the federal purchaser
access to thousands of pre-qualified vendors who hold “schedule” contracts
with GSA that establish purchasing mechan-isms and commercial pricing
similar to catalog buying. By virtue of pre-certification, GSA Schedule
vendors will likely be preferred by government purchasers and receive “first
bite.” To further consolidate buying opportunities, GSA introduced a Disaster
Relief and Emergency Preparedness Category to its popular online storefront,
GSA Advantage!
®
Of note, the FY 2007 National Defense Authorization Act
(PL 109-364, Sect. 833) allows states and localities to purchase from the GSA
Schedule to facilitate recovery from natural disasters (as declared by the
President), terrorism and certain types of attacks.
Beyond that GSA Schedule pool, there is an even larger vendor market that
must be accessible in a crisis. In the first week after a crisis, materials availa-
bility is paramount. Many capable vendors in a disaster area may not have
undergone a GSA certification, and those that have may no longer have the
capability to deliver on their pre-crisis agreements and contracts. This Task
Force recommends that in addition to the multiple contracting schedules,
government must improve its access to the national commercial marketplace
for additional support in a crisis. For example, FEMA should pre-qualify
vendors after studying the use of qualified bidders lists (QBL) in accordance
with the authority established in the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR).
The supply chain would benefit from a rigorous and adaptable qualifying and
pricing process identified and implemented in advance of the need.
“I find it sadly humorous that the
media was so surprised that some
great American companies... were
really good at the logistics of this.
What do you think these people do
for a living? They’re not $200 billion
companies because they’re stupid!”
– A restaurateur affected by
Hurricane Katrina
Business Executives for National Security
23
Also, the public sector should recognize and capitalize on the ubiquity of
large-scale retailers likely to be in or near the disaster zone. Such retailers
should be preferred when they are unmatched in terms of materials
availability and quick delivery, advantages that are not readily duplicated in
the public sector.
Contracting officers also must become better at using the emergency
contracting authorities available to them in the FAR. In May 2003, the Office
of Federal Procurement Policy (OFPP) published guidance on the use of
emergency procurement flexibilities to help ensure that agencies could
effectively meet the demands associated with fighting terrorism. The OFPP is
currently updating its guidance to also address flexibilities relevant to other
emergency situations. With the guidance in place, it is important for
contracting officers to be trained and tested, just the same as first responders,
in any emergency preparedness exercises conducted at local, state and
federal levels.
While pre-contracting for emergencies has been improved—especially at
the federal level, in the wake of Katrina—the Task Force believes that more
can be done to leverage the vast resources of the private sector in a crisis.
The mechanism most in need of development between government and the
private sector is a means to deliver commercial goods in a crisis in a timely
and cost-effective manner. As stated at the outset of this chapter, existing
commercial supply chains provide a wider array of goods and services than
the government can match. It is not evident that government has fully
leveraged these private-sector resources in its planning. This process must
allow for the effective use of vendors present in affected areas that have the
existing/surviving infrastructure to deliver within the “last mile.”
A consistent criticism of government buying in a crisis is that emergency
procurement rules are scattered throughout thousands of pages of federal
regulations and, thus, are obscure and hard to locate. Consequent to Katrina,
in July 2006 the government issued an interim rule concerning the Federal
Acquisition Regulation (FAR) that has the effect of providing a single refer-
ence to acquisition flexibilities that may be used to facilitate and expe-
dite acquisitions of supplies and services during emergency situations.
Specifically, this rule revises FAR Part 18 to provide a single reference to
the acquisition flexibilities already available to expedite acquisitions of
supplies and services during emergencies. For ease of use, the flexibilities
are divided into two main groups: “Available Acquisition Flexibilities,”
which may be used anytime and do not require an emergency declara-
tion; and “Emergency Acquisition Flexibilities,” which may be used only
after an emergency declaration or designation has been made by an
appropriate official. The second group is further divided into three sub-
groups: contingency operation; defense or recovery from certain attacks;
and incidents of national significance, emergency declaration, or major
disaster declarations.
This addition to the FAR adds no new rules and regulations.
“We had to fight for fuel with the
government and [other companies]
– even though we were all on the
same team. We’re all calling the
same five guys to get the same things.
It would be far better if there were
a pre-positioned supply chain.”
— Robert S. Boh, President and
CEO, Boh Bros. Construction
Co., LLC
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
24
Recommendation:
A. Improve forecasting for emergency goods and services, putting more
pre-contracts in place and pre-qualifying vendors.
1. Have FEMA, with the help of state emergency organizations, other
DHS offices and the private sector, improve forecasting models for
the most critical items needed during the initial response to the most
likely emergencies/crises:
a. The models should be data-driven from recent experience. Most
major retailers have vast point-of-sale databases that capture the
consumable items most in demand before, during and after a
crisis. These could be provided to modelers through industry trade
organizations.
b. Engage major retailers, or their association representatives, in the
construction of scenarios covering a variety of events and
magnitudes.
2. With the above list, FEMA should work with vendors to establish
pricing mechanisms that would set prices during the crisis period at
the market price in effect immediately preceding the emergency.
Electronic markets exist so that price lists for some commodities could
be updated routinely to address normal pre-emergency price
fluctuations. States and local municipalities would agree to use these
price lists in time of emergency (an example is the routinely updated
system of “Average Wholesale Price” used in the pharmaceutical
industry).
a. Establishing a schedule, whether derived from “Average
Wholesale Price” or another method, works well in stable times
and for certain product categories. AWP is a “warehouse” price
and is not applicable to retail pricing, however. As described in
the FAR, schedule pricing cannot change just because of a crisis;
rather, in order to increase pricing, the contract would need to
contemplate the increase.
b. For many “consumable” categories, like groceries, implementing
a schedule or price list is not feasible. Commodity prices can
fluctuate rapidly based on changing market conditions after a
crisis. Likewise, transportation costs also may change significantly
due to the rising cost of fuel, contributing to an overall rise in the
cost of commodities. As a result, schedule pricing could cause
product shortages in a true catastrophe or in a crisis of long
duration. Therefore, FEMA should work with vendors to establish a
business-oriented pricing mechanism allowing the government to
make rapid product selection decisions. The system should
involve pre-qualification of the prospective vendors and then take
into account the factors of 1) vendor’s stated price, 2) vendor’s
availability (when can it be delivered in the desired amount at the
desired location?), and 3) government’s assessment as to the
reliability of the vendor. With the proper pre-qualification of
vendors (e.g., use of a QBL), requests by government can be
Business Executives for National Security
25
transmitted and vendor responses received and processed
quickly.
3. Many major retailers and some states already have pricing policies
that take effect automatically in a declared disaster zone. States,
working through national organizations like the NGA, should take the
lead in developing pricing mechanisms to be implemented in disaster
situations and areas. Decisions to implement pricing policies can be
tied to a state or national declaration of emergency. Rules should
stipulate the duration of the pricing policy and procedures to modify
the duration if conditions change or do not materialize. The decision
to return to normal operation can be made by the states, in
conjunction with the private sector. (As a rule, price blocks should be
geographically based on where the crisis exists. Different areas
reconstitute more quickly than others and can be released from price
blocks more quickly). Such “anti-gouging” regulations should aspire
to national standards to both streamline and simplify their
implementation, but states—not the federal government—should take
the lead in their development.
4. GSA Schedule vendors may opt to take increased inventory positions
on certain Stock Keeping Units (SKUs)
11
prior to forecast events (e.g.,
hurricanes) or long shelf-life items for other kinds of emergencies.
FEMA and/or state EOCs would work with the private sector to assess
and monitor pre-emergency inventory buildup:
a. The private sector will pre-stage appropriate inventory levels
when possible before the event and will be moving inventories
rapidly after the event. Effective communication between the
private sector and government is essential to ensuring that the
right amount of product ends up in the right place.
b. It is imperative that government enable the private sector to
leverage the flexibility of its supply chain to meet crisis needs.
Creating large “stockpiles” of government purchased and
warehoused merchandise is neither effective nor advisable.
5. The government, through the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) or
other relevant authorities, should consult with private-sector groups
as needed to review the list of required items developed in
recommendation A.1 above to determine and grant conditional
waivers to any trade and regulatory restrictions. For example,
provisions of the Trade Agreement Act and Buy America Act may
restrict rapid responses to crisis. These waivers must be pre-defined
so that they can take effect automatically upon declaration of an
emergency.
6. To increase the pool of vendors, government should establish
mechanisms for pre-qualifying non-GSA vendors prior to a crisis and
for qualifying non-GSA vendors during a crisis:
11
SKU: An identifier used by merchants to permit the systematic tracking of products and
services offered to customers
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
26
a. For purposes of pre-qualifying vendors, the Federal Acquisition
Regulation provides authority for agencies such as FEMA to use
QBLs. FEMA should explore the use of QBLs or similar
mechanisms for pre-qualifying vendors.
b. For the purposes of qualifying vendors during a crisis, a
simplified certification process based on business information
maintained by commercial analysis firms (such as Dun &
Bradstreet) and a civil/criminal background check could be
employed. Qualification requirements should be tailored to
maximize the purchaser’s access during a crisis to vendors with
product availability and quick delivery windows. The emphasis
must nevertheless be on pre-qualification because it is
inherently difficult to qualify vendors during a crisis.
c. In extremis, FEMA and first responders should retain the
flexibility to purchase from any vendor at their discretion if
events preclude even simplified qualification processes.
7. Government should establish more effective vendor selection
mechanisms. Price may not be the first determinant in a crisis;
availability and delivery window may take precedence. It is
important, therefore, that the purchaser have access to the widest
range of goods and services possible. Therefore, if pre-certified or
otherwise qualified vendors cannot meet the requirements,
procedures should not preclude making other sources available to
the purchaser.
a. This system must, however, be open, transparent and self-
auditing in the interest of integrity and fairness.
b. At the same time, privacy protections must be incorporated into
the system to ensure that participating vendors cannot access
competitor information through this process.
8. Vendors should list their disaster-related inventory positions or build-
up on state (or regional) registries. The number of potential disaster-
related products is large, with a very dynamic fluctuation in what is
in-stock. So it is probably advisable to limit registry to just those items
expected to be in short supply. Additionally, this approach does not
address the “deconfliction” of competing requests for the same stock.
For example, a state or city may request all of a given product in
stock. In the end, businesses will decide how to distribute stock
within their own systems. With accurate registries, however,
government will have better insight into where resources are
available.
9. In addition to pre-registering items expected to be in short supply, states
and regions should implement “reverse auction” systems, in which the
public sector list its needs and invites private sector bids. FEMA is in the
process of developing this capability for its own use. GSA vendors
could respond to these orders, and those not filled by pre-qualified
Business Executives for National Security
27
vendors would be sent to the “open market” for others to fill. The price
would be the one established in recommendation 2 above.
B. Revising Deficient Donations Management Systems
In a disaster, experience shows that volunteerism and pro bono donations
on behalf of the private sector—businesses, non-governmental and
charitable organizations combined—are the norm. The challenge for
government and the private sector is to ensure that donated goods and
services from the latter support, rather than interfere with, efficient public
response and recovery. Many public-sector entities prefer not to deal with
private donations because they add to the complexity of and often duplicate
the public response mechanism.
Dismissing private-sector donations is not a realistic or necessarily
desirable goal, however. Moreover, the real impediment generally is a lack
of government capability to match its needs with what the private sector
has and is willing to donate. That shortcoming can and must be rectified if
for no other reason than to allow the government to better plan for using the
full range of resources that can be made available.
It is not this Task Force’s intent to prescribe how non-governmental (NGOs)
or charitable organizations should factor into a crisis response, except to
note that they will play a major role and must be integrated along with
business into the nation’s response mechanisms (as the American Red Cross
[ARC], as a special case, long has been).
As an example, an organization known as Aidmatrix (www.aidmatrix.org)
has been working since 2000 to build global relief networks connecting
people in need to surplus products and goods. It claims links with over
35,000 charitable organizations worldwide. FEMA is working with
Aidmatrix to leverage their resources to respond to future US domestic
disasters.
The key is to get in front of volunteerism from business and the NGO
community in advance of a crisis so that those groups become effective
partners and not unwanted guests.
Recommendation:
B. Improve planning, forecasting and use of assets and volunteers that
businesses, NGOs and charitable organizations make available on
a pro bono basis.
1. State operations centers should add representatives from a few
key NGO and charity groups to participate in planning,
exercising and operations. (Businesses would coordinate
donations through the Business Operations Center [BOC]
concept described in Chapter 1.)
2. FEMA should, as part of the modeling effort described in
Recommendation A, improve forecasts for the most likely
charitable needs for a range of scenarios, to allow the various
NGOs to plan their own responses in advance of need.
“We had a number of people
donating things to New Orleans.
There’s no mechanism in place to
coordinate those things. You want to
have a real transparent process in
place, but you also want to utilize
the gifts that are being offered.”
– Dickie Brennan, Managing
Partner, Dickie Brennan &
Company
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
28
3. State (or regional) registries should be created for pro bono
resources not normally for sale, like warehouse space, buses, or
volunteers. Such registries should include both business and
NGO/charitable organization resources. They should be
combined with the for-sale registries described in A.8 above.
4. A reverse auction capability attached to the system described
above can also be applied to unanticipated needs for pro bono
goods and services. This area is ideal for management by a
council of key NGOs. However, it should be integrated and not
separate from the mechanisms established for governmental and
private-sector response.
5. State coordinators representing charitable and NGO
organizations should work within their respective national
infrastructure to fully utilize their organizations for tasks like
sorting and storage, rather than pushing these burdensome tasks
on to people in the affected area. They also should develop their
own operating plans at the state level. Questions of storage
facilities, logistics, housing, and so forth should be addressed in
advance.
6. DHS should develop nationwide education programs for the
private sector on how best to prepare its people for volunteer
efforts—like dispensing of medications—giving them required
training, inoculations, and other preparatory skills.
C. Logistics Processes
Throughout this report, the underlying stipulation has been that the private
sector operates efficient, resilient supply chains that cannot and should not
be duplicated by the government. However, there are ways that the private
sector, working with government, can improve the functioning of these
logistics processes in a crisis.
If, as recommended in Chapter 1, the full integration of the private sector into
EOC operations at all governmental levels is achieved, it will overcome the
major coordination obstacle: determining how government and business
gather information, communicate, analyze problems, propose solutions,
deconflict and make decisions. That is why the EOC/BOC partnership
described earlier is so central to the success of the action plan described in
this report. What remains is improving the “rules of the road” in effect during
crisis response, thus clearing the way for the private sector to operate its
supply chains effectively.
Businesses, working with government, can improve the effectiveness of
logistics processes during a disaster. Here are some considerations:
Preparedness. To ease the strain on the supply chain in advance of and
during a crisis, businesses need to educate their employees on emergency
preparedness and encourage them to stockpile certain goods. Government
also plays a role in educating the public-at-large on the need to prepare.
Such preparedness can lessen peak demand during the first 72 hours of a
“You have the most phenomenal
logistics network in the United
States that exists anywhere in this
world. Why in the world does the
gover nment insist on tr ying to
replicate that at a much higher cost
[knowing] they couldn’t anticipate
where the need is?”
– Ken Senser, Senior Vice
President, Global Security,
Aviaton and Travel, Wal-Mart
Stores, Inc.
Business Executives for National Security
29
crisis, which may be the time required to get the supply chain back into full
operation.
Business closure. In disasters that come with some pre-warning (e.g., a
hurricane), state emergency officials must weigh public safety against the
need to keep major supply-chain retailers open as long as possible to provide
customers with emergency services and supplies. Shutting down prematurely
impedes the ability of a retailer’s customers to prepare their own homes and
businesses for an impending crisis. It also affects retailers’ ability to protect
stock and employees if the notice to shut down is immediate. Here, as in
other areas involving prudential judgment, reasonable balances must be
struck.
Credentialing. A major effort also must be mounted to address the permitting
and credentialing process imposed by public authorities in the aftermath of a
crisis. In the Katrina disaster, nearly all businesses reported this
shortcoming as a major impediment to restoring business
continuity of community. The first issue is resolving the
restrictions on professionals licensed in one state from practicing
in another. The second is granting access into a disaster area for
Critical Infrastructure and Key Resources (CI/KR) owners and
businesses to inspect, repair and re-establish their services. The
government has made headway in the second area, but both
remain key prerequisites if the professional and private sectors
are to quickly resume operations.
Point-of-delivery. Conceptually simple but practically
demanding “last mile logistics,” otherwise known as point-of-delivery issues,
also must be resolved. Commercial supply chains do not possess company-
controlled offload and distribution capabilities aside from those associated
with their own fixed facilities. Such capabilities therefore must be provided by
recipients, and since the ability to do this is by no means easily assured in
most crises, it must be planned. Finally, business-owned or chartered transport
should not be used to warehouse emergency supplies because the efficiency
of the supply chain hinges on keeping these transportation assets in motion.
The Task Force believes that involving the private sector in the planning,
exercising and execution of local, state and regional emergency response
plans can identify and solve these current shortcomings in crisis-response
logistics processes. If the private sector is not integrated in the planning
process, we believe that government will make the same mistakes
repeatedly.
Recommendation:
C. Improve the management by federal, state and local governments of
business emergency response resources to maximize speed and utility
and minimize redundancy.
1. Test, validate and use the EOC, BOC and BEMAC models described
above to minimize physical and regulatory roadblocks and help
facilitate the operation of business supply chains.
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
30
a. The proliferation of EOCs and BOCs recommended here may
overburden the trained emergency response personnel available
to individual private-sector organizations. A virtual presence can
overcome the need to staff the BOCs 24/7. Also, periodically
rotating the businesses supplying personnel to the BOC can ease
the burden.
b. Plans must include a physical back-up in the event of
communications or other data-sharing disruptions.
2. In order to lessen peak demand during a crisis, employers should be
encouraged to develop programs that help their employees
stockpile personal emergency supplies. The additional benefit is that
it frees the employee to return to work sooner.
3. Improvements to the permitting and credentialing process must
continue. States, working with appropriate local authorities, must
create agreed standards and protocols. These procedures must be
communicated to and practiced with private-sector supply chain
operators.
4. For GSA-qualified companies, and others as the state crisis teams
see fit, develop a system of pre-certification of the transportation
fleet so that supply chains can be restarted as soon after the event as
possible and can flow as freely as is practical.
5. Transfer capability to the BOC for members of state departments of
transportation, law enforcement, and the private sector to
coordinate movement of business-owned vehicles with critical
supplies into impacted areas as efficiently as possible. This
capability already exists in many state EOCs, but it needs to be
applied consistently and properly on a statewide basis and should
be a function of the BOC.
6. The transportation command-and-control model adopted should be
consistent across states; current differences often obstruct seamless
end-to-end supply chain operation when multiple jurisdictions are
transited.
7. Local, state and regional authorities must take responsibility for “last
mile logistics,” which will then allow the private-sector supply
chains to play to their strengths in responsiveness and agility.
8. Businesses should take the lead in educating local, state and
regional entities on private-sector surge/supply chain management
best practices to ensure they are not forced to operate inefficiently
and, therefore, ultimately at greater cost to government.
Business Executives for National Security
31
“Business normally conducts [its]
activities in an environment which
is governed by civil authority and
provided access to resources through
the commercial marketplace. In a
disaster where civil authority is
overwhelmed and normal
commercial activity disrupted,
assistance at the federal level may
be necessary in order for private
sector entities to perform expected
disaster response functions.”
– Duane Ackerman, President
& CEO, BellSouth Corporation
Chapter 3. Legal & Regulatory Environment
Finding: Business requires a predictable legal regime to operate effi-
ciently in an emergency situation, whether that business is engaged in
charitable or profit-motivated activities. The current legal and regula-
tory environment is conducive to neither predictability nor efficiency.
Consistent with this finding, the Task Force recommends that Congress:
A. Enact a nationwide body of “disaster law”;
B. Modify the Stafford Act to include the private sector; and
C. Hold hearings to determine which Task Force
recommendations can be implemented under existing law and
which require new legislation.
Action by Congress and the Executive Branch is essential for putting into
place a legal and regulatory environment in which the private sector can
become a full partner in the national response to disasters. We can and
must ensure that federal, state and local emergency planners include the
private sector in the preparations, testing, training, and execution of their
responsibilities. We also must rethink the not-inconsequential issue of the
legal allocation of risk through the civil justice system, most importantly tort
law, as well as through regulation.
The Task Force understands that a comprehensive review of the legal and
regulatory environment surrounding emergency response will require
considerable time and effort, and we urge Congress to schedule hearings to
deal with longer-term issues. But we also urge government to concentrate
initially on specific short-term objectives so that an adequate private-sector
response is available for the next disaster—not one that may befall us years
from now.
One example of an important short-term action would be to implement the
critical EOC/BOC partnership concept discussed earlier. That action could
be done through a mandate to DHS under existing law, even as other long-
term legislative solutions are being considered.
Another important action would be to adopt immediate legislative fixes to
the Stafford Act (such as those included in “The Post-Katrina Emergency
Management Reform Act of 2006” [S. 3721], introduced by Senator Susan
Collins on July 25, 2006).
A. National Disaster Law
Major disasters are a national issue, and uniformity of law across states is
essential to the efficient leveraging of the nation’s business assets in dealing
with them. During the Katrina response effort, many out-of-state businesses
that tried to help had little or no familiarity with the laws of Louisiana,
which hurt their efforts and hurt the people of New Orleans. While we must
respect the purposes and value of federalism, we should nevertheless
explore whether we need a body of federal disaster law to preempt the
heterogeneous patchwork of state law in this particular context.
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
32
Two basic principles should guide us in thinking about such a body of law:
• Things should get easier, not harder, and better, not worse, during a
local/regional disaster or incident of national significance.
• Individuals and businesses acting in good faith should be able to
confidently provide assistance based on a predictable set of rules and
responsibilities governing their conduct.
Following the hurricanes of 2005, a great number of laws and regulations
necessarily were waived, suspended or modified—HIPAA (Health
Insurance Portability and Accountability Act) privacy provisions being a
case in point. This body of waiver authority should be kept “on the shelf”
for consideration in future disasters. However, to be effective when
invoked, government must communicate with the private sector in advance
of and during the crisis to set a level of expectations sufficiently high so that
the predictability standard is met.
Recommendation:
A. Congress should hold hearings and produce legislation for a
nationwide body of “Disaster Law.”
1. Considerations for such legislation are: 1) lack of predictability, 2)
differences between laws applicable to pre-disaster agreements and
those applicable to people and organizations who deliver goods
and services voluntarily after a disaster occurs, and 3) variations in
state law.
a. With respect to liability, Congress should improve protections
with the aim of ensuring predictability of liability for private-
sector entities and citizens providing Good Samaritan (no
reimbursement to the provider) goods and services, particularly
when those goods and services are specifically requested by the
government, e.g., FEMA or a state or local government:
1. Safe harbor provisions in existing law should be reviewed
and cataloged in a Stafford Act provision (see
Recommendation B below);
2. Good Samaritan activities deemed appropriate to federal
protection but not covered in current law should be
identified.
2. Congress should clarify and standardize to the extent possible the
liability of professionals acting in good faith during disasters.
a. Examine the need for government-backed secondary insurance,
or some other type of indemnification mechanism (perhaps
analogous to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation
[FDIC]), to mitigate some of the potential private-sector risk in
emergency response situations.
b. Investigate the effect of federal law, regulations and standards
for disaster response on the liability insurance coverage to
businesses.
Business Executives for National Security
33
c. Review federal laws, regulations and standards regarding
medical response to disasters to determine where revisions can
improve the effectiveness, safety and efficiency of medical care
delivery and the protection of medical facilities and
professionals in those circumstances. For example:
1. Triage: The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS)
could set triage standards to be used as the benchmark in
determining negligence by health care providers dealing with
mass casualties and by emergency medical responders to
disaster scenes. HHS currently provides only voluntary triage
standards and supporting tools. Moreover, many different
triage systems are in use nationwide, setting up the certainty
of problems when medical augmentation teams from outside a
disaster area support a local triage system different than the
one in which they are trained.
2. Lack of Adequate Vaccines and Medicines: Protection for
healthcare providers needs to be established in case a
scarcity of effective vaccines and other medicines early in a
crisis requires experimental and out-of-formulary treatments.
3. Transportation of Patients in Non-Standard Vehicles:
Protection needs to be established for medical facilities and
transportation providers who through necessity use
emergency vehicles not normally suitable to the purpose for
transporting injured or sick persons.
d. To the maximum extent possible, facilitate ordinary rules of risk
and liability allocation being applied to emergency situations.
e. Provide for a predictable, single (and probably federal)
jurisdiction for hearing disputes arising in the course of response
to an Incident of National Significance.
3. With regard to regulation, federal agencies with oversight/regulatory
authority over the private sector need to clarify and promulgate
procedures that allow the agencies to quickly implement
discretionary authorities for the relaxation of regulations in the event
of an emergency. These authorities need to be pre-packaged as much
as possible so that they can be triggered by an appropriate declaration
of emergency. Examples include:
a. Antitrust: DHS should take advantage of the “voluntary agreements”
section of the Defense Production Act, PL 81-774, which allows
competitors (with government notice and clearance) to allocate
certain resources.
b. Effects on the Environment: The entire body of environmental impact
laws and regulations can usefully be reviewed to determine if
standard waivers need to be developed to cover disaster situations.
c. Licensing: Develop uniform rules concerning interstate recognition
of business and professional licensing during times of emergency,
“Some agencies like the Department
of Education get very high marks,
but one problem was that the
agencies did not seem to speak with
one another. While we had FEMA
and others at one door helping us
to re-open, we had the immigration
service at another talking about
deporting our foreign students
because they weren’t in school.
These were regulations that could
have been suspended given the
situation.”
- Yvette M. Jones, Chief
Operating Officer and Senior
Vice President for External
Affairs, Tulane University
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
34
perhaps incorporating a trigger mechanism activated by the
Governor of the state where the emergency situation exists.
d. Privacy: Rules governing the release of personal data by competent
authority during a crisis should be reviewed and clarified. During
Katrina, much confusion and concern was generated because of
statutes (such as HIPAA) that appeared to prohibit the release of
personal data.
e. Service delivery: We must review and if necessary revise laws and
policies concerning how and when providers of goods and services
during a catastrophe can terminate service after a crisis has
passed—especially laws that would affect providers of free or
discounted goods. Companies providing services such as medical
care or housing after Katrina found that they could not terminate
services once a patient/tenant was in the system, even if that
patient/tenant abused or violated the terms of service.
f. Trade restrictions: Review the Trade Agreement Act (19 USC 2501,
et seq.) and the Buy America Act (41 USC 10a - 10d) to determine if
waiver authority is warranted to ensure these laws do not restrict
government’s purchasing from non-domestic sources in an
emergency.
g. Regulatory agencies should establish and test contact procedures
and empower federal regulators to respond quickly to private sector
requests for regulatory relief when a crisis has occurred.
B. Revise the Stafford Act
The Robert T. Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act
(Stafford Act), 42 USC 5121-5206, is a federal law designed to bring an
orderly and systematic means of federal natural disaster assistance to state
and local governments in carrying out their responsibilities to aid citizens.
The Stafford Act is a 1988 amended version of the Disaster Relief Act of
1974, Public Law 93-288. The amended act created the system in place
today by which a Presidential Disaster Declaration of an emergency
triggers financial and physical assistance through FEMA. The Act gives
FEMA the responsibility for coordinating government-wide relief efforts and
includes the contributions of 28 federal agencies and non-governmental
organizations, such as the American Red Cross. In October 2000, Congress
amended the law with passage of the Disaster Mitigation Act of 2000,
Public Law 106-390, which permitted contributions of federal resources to
private nonprofit entities under certain conditions.
The SAFE Port Act of 2006 (PL 109-347, Sect. 607) extends the Stafford Act
to include the private sector, but only to the extent that it precludes the
head of a federal agency from denying or impeding essential service
providers
12
access to the disaster site or impeding them from performing
restoration or repair services.
12
Essential Service Providers include entities that provide telecommunications, electrical power,
natural gas, water and sewer services or any other essential services as determined by the
President. They include municipal, nonprofit and private, for profit, entities in the act of
responding to an emergency or major disaster.
“People need cash. Law enforcement
needs to...partner up with the banks
so that as branches are opened
without power, you’re not putting
employees at risk. [T]hey (law
enforcement) think it’s a business
thing: ‘I’m not going to help you at
Bank United.’ [But]our service is
essential to the community, and if I
[open] a branch without any alarm,
without any cameras, and you’re
looking at $80,000 in your teller
drawer, and you’ve got a line of
people, you’re not going to feel too
good.”
– Ramiro Ortiz, Chief
Operating Officer, BankUnited
Financial Corp.
Business Executives for National Security
35
Several recent congressional actions have proposed changing the Stafford
Act yet again, but none of these efforts have been successful. The Task
Force believes that Congress should extend coverage of the Act beyond
state and local government to include the private sector, with particular
attention to the provision of security or protection of private-sector personnel
and assets operating in a disaster zone. Authorities should be automatic upon
presidential declaration of a national disaster, but protections offered should
be specific and limited to situations where it is impractical or impossible for
the private sector to provide for its own security.
Recommendation:
B. Congress should revise the Stafford Act to designate the private sector as
a critical component of a comprehensive disaster response mechanism.
1. Such provision in law can usefully support designated categories of
private-sector partners:
a. To participate as full partners in the planning, training, equip-
ping, certification, exercise and execution of disaster response;
b. To be afforded federal assistance when necessary to carry out
disaster responsibilities, e.g., providing escort and security so
that emergency repairs, etc., can be effected in a disaster zone;
c. To coordinate and request assistance directly through the
appropriate federal agency (such as designated Source
Selection Authorities [SSAs] and NRP-designated lead agencies)
without having to work through third-party (i.e., FEMA) officials.
C. Congressional Hearings
While remedies to the private sector’s full participation in the nation’s
disaster response capabilities are urgent, such remedies should not be
taken hastily. Adequate consideration and deliberation before deciding to
legislate is in order—once in place, law is hard to undo. The Task Force
therefore urges Congress to review carefully the body of existing law
pertaining to disaster response and the agencies of government responsible
for carrying out that law. The initial focus of its investigation should be to
determine which of the recommendations of this Task Force can be
implemented under existing statute, and which require new legislation.
A series of hearings, early in the 110
th
Congress, can build momentum for
systematically integrating the private sector and its resources into the
national response to disaster in the near term, even as longer-term new
legislation is being crafted.
Recommendation:
C. Congress, early in its 110
th
session, should hold hearings to determine
which remedies suggested by this Task Force can be implemented
under existing law and authority, and which may require new
legislation.
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
36
“You want to re-center from a
government-dominated, marginally
assisted system to a genuinely
collaborative partnership, because in
fact the private sector brings more
speed and more resources and more
capability than government has
internally.”
– Newt Gingrich, former
Speaker of the U.S. House of
Representatives
Chapter 4. An Expert’s Guide to Priorities and
Sequencing for the Integration of the Private Sector
into U.S. National Disaster Response Planning and
Execution
Government should move quickly to integrate business into its disaster
response planning, doctrine, exercises and operations and ensure that
adequate resources are devoted to implementing Task Force recommenda-
tions at the state and regional level on a sustainable basis.
The recently released National Infrastructure Protection Plan (NIPP)
acknowledges that Critical Infrastructure and Key Resources (CI/KR) are
essential to the nation’s security, public health and safety, economic viability,
and way of life. Natural or man-made disasters that weaken or destroy CI/KR
will significantly disrupt the functioning of government and business alike,
producing cascading effects far beyond the targeted infrastructure and
physical location of the incident. Direct attacks, natural disasters or technolo-
gical hazards could produce catastrophic losses and will require the
coordinated collaboration of the whole of society—public and private
sectors—to put the country back on its feet.
The Business Response Task Force recommendations proposed in this report
are directed toward creating mechanisms that would integrate the full
capabilities of the private sector as a critical component of a comprehensive
national disaster response. This chapter addresses the priorities and
sequencing necessary to put those steps into action.
Federal Plans and the Private Sector
The federal government, through DHS, has done a good job developing the
policy frameworks to be used in all aspects of protection and disaster
management. The National Response Plan (NRP), National Incident
Management System (NIMS) and the NIPP together provide for a
comprehensive approach to ensuring the viability of the national
community from a structural and policy perspective. What is still missing,
however, are the operational components and mechanisms that allow all
members of the community to participate as required to fulfill the objectives
of the risk management framework described in the NIPP.
DHS’ risk management framework addresses economic sectors in a vertical
fashion, but in real economies businesses operate within a community, not
an industrial sector. Communities are not only customers; they also make
decisions that affect businesses’ ability to function. Likewise, communities
cannot return to normal function without the private sector, which owns or
operates 85 percent of U.S. critical infrastructure. Figuring out how to
reconcile the top-down federal sectoral view with the bottom-up
community-centered perspective of business means that determining where
the private sector should plug into federal doctrine is a complex but vital
undertaking.
Business Executives for National Security
37
While that process plays out—as it must—we must do what we can on
other fronts, and the actual community level is the best place to start.
The Near Term
The Task Force recommends that the near-term focus be centered on imple-
menting the Business Operations Center (BOC) concept described in Chapter
1. The EOC/BOC partnership model provides the operating processes neces-
sary for private sector-involvement in the risk management framework,
focused initially on immediate response. The BOC provides a basis for public-
private collaboration that creates the necessary level of trust needed for full
integration of the private sector to succeed. This is most easily achieved at
the state and local levels because, in most cases, such relationships already
exist organically as part of normal social life—it’s “the community thing.”
Does that mean that we have to create 55 separate BOCs, one for each
state, federal jurisdiction and territory? Ideally, yes; but achieving this goal
will depend on the political and business leadership at the state level. The
same is true for BOCs in major urban areas. New York City and Los
Angeles County are creating their own versions, and others should follow.
There also is a question of resources. In the end, it is hard to see any other
way to proceed than to have some federal dollars, through some
combination of grants, credits or offsets, or by direct appropriation, support
the EOC/BOC concept.
A private-sector presence also should exist at the regional level. The June
2006 DHS Nationwide Plan Review Phase 2 Report suggests that a new
DHS-directed regional system is needed.
13
Were such a capability
developed, the inclusion of a BOC would be an important component.
Establishing BOCs in each of the ten current FEMA regions would at least be
a good start.
The creation of state and major metropolitan area BOCs should be put on
the fast track for— deployment, training and exercising before the end of
2007. Regional BOCs will follow on the success of deployment at the state/
major metropolitan area levels.
The Horizon
Doctrine development. The longer-term objective is to formalize private-
sector participation in the National Response Plan and other doctrine.
Ultimately, the private sector needs a permanent presence at the regional
and federal doctrinal development level. Task Force members are participa-
ting in the current revisions of the NRP and NIMS and will seek to codify
the public-private partnership collaborations recommended in this report.
Capabilities-based resource planning. To begin, the private sector needs to
have a large role in the current development/revision of the Universal Task
List (UTL) and Target Capabilities List (TCL). The UTL and TCL were
developed at the direction of Homeland Security Presidential
Directive(HSPD) 8: National Preparedness with the participation of federal,
13
U.S. Department of Homeland Security, Nationwide Plan Review: Phase 2 Report, June 16, 2006.
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
38
state and local government representatives and professional associations
representing government responders. The TCL provides the basis for
preparedness for all of the national planning scenarios and each of the major
missions of prevention, protection, response and recovery.
The TCL tiering summary chart assigns capabilities, outcomes, capability
resources, and roles to government, non-governmental organizations, the
private sector, and citizens. On cursory review, the Task Force believes the
private sector can make major contributions in the planning, management
and support of at least the 25 of the current 37 target capabilities in the TCL.
Further, we believe that the current tiering summary chart under-represents
the contributions the private sector can make to national preparedness,
thereby both raising the cost of public-sector investment in such capabili-
ties and reducing the effectiveness and efficiency of preparedness efforts.
The development and maintenance of TCL capabilities by federal, state and
local governments is supported by congressional appropriation. Where capa-
bilities are assigned to the private sector in the TCL, government could
likewise support the development and maintenance of such capabilities in
federal equipment, training, certification, credentialing and exercise programs.
Another area for private-sector inclusion is in the development and
implementation of changes to the National Incident Management System
(NIMS). The NIMS reflects the doctrine contained in HSPD 5: Management
of Domestic Incidents. Of the three NIMS components, only the Incident
Command System (ICS) is defined and, as yet, does not clearly indicate
where or how the private sector plays in its execution.
Likewise, as the other two components of NIMS are defined (the Multi-
agency Coordination System [MACS], which describes the relationships
among the operations centers at all levels, and the Public Information
System [PIS]), inviting early private-sector participation will ensure that its
views are reflected in the final products. Moreover, creating an enterprise
architecture for the NIMS will complete the development cycle by defining
public- and private-sector concepts of operations, organizational relation-
ships, activities, information needs, rules and supporting systems. DHS may
want to consider separate development of an enterprise architecture to
support the NRP.
Similarly, federal agencies should coordinate with those private-sector
entities governed by the National Infrastructure Protection Plan (NIPP) and
its sector-specific supporting plans to develop a process and schedule for
affected private-sector entities to come into compliance with those plans.
Operations planning. In the case of operations planning, DHS Secretary
Michael Chertoff has told Congress that the system is broken and cannot be
fixed without a major investment. A new National Planning System (NPS)
for coordinated federal, state, tribal, local and NGO/private-sector planning
has not yet been authorized or funded. This is a clear opportunity to get the
legislation right the first time relative to private-sector participation. In the
meantime, the private sector needs to make its voice heard on Capitol Hill
to give substance to a requirement for private-sector participation that is
currently defined only in the broadest terms.
Business Executives for National Security
39
In addition to establishing private-sector participation in planning at the
national level, the NPS should carve out room for business-to-business
efforts. Many areas of response and recovery are most effectively and
efficiently organized and implemented by the affected private sector, not as
a government-controlled activity. An excellent example is the mutual aid
pacts in place among the utility companies in the southeastern United
States. The planning system should be sensitive to and try to identify areas
of the economy that are best restored by the private sector itself in the
event of a disaster. In doing so, government should encourage and support
processes by which industry groups can organize and plan—and publish
those plans as part of the NPS.
Having the private sector commit resources and aggressively pursue
ongoing participation in thousands of local, state and federal contingency
planning efforts will never be fully achievable. But inclusion of the private
sector in the NPS can probably be accomplished at the federal and state
levels, in the largest urban areas—and at the regional level. The business
case for doing this planning is the basis for this report, and it is, to the Task
Force, compelling.
Training and exercises. As stated repeatedly in this report, repetitive,
detailed training and exercising of the plans developed for public-private
collaboration are essential for such operations to work efficiently in an
actual disaster. Some members of the Task Force feel that a major national
exercise that truly strains the system must occur in the near term if we are
to honestly confront the shortfalls and unknowns that exist in our current
plans. To encourage public-private collaboration, DHS grant funding to the
states and other entities must be contingent on demonstration of significant
participation by the private sector in disaster training and exercises.
Operations. Based on the successful outcome of private-sector and
government collaboration on implementing the recommendations in this
report, in an actual disaster the private sector would be able to carry out
the roles it had equipped itself for based on capabilities-based planning,
defined in doctrine, planned in contingency and crisis action plans, and
trained for in exercises.
Lessons-learned assessments. The operations continuum is not a circle but
a never-ending spiral. The impetus for change in doctrine and operations is
the assessment program. The private sector must play its role here as well.
As a consequence of scale, the most extensive and expensive commitment
required is at the local and state levels. Once again resources for this
activity must come from federal, state and private coffers.
Resourcing Private-Public Collaborative Relationships
Finding the resources to implement the recommendations in this report will
be difficult but doable if we proceed gradually from what now exists to the
achievement of the ideal. As reported here, many examples of state EOCs
exist. In a few, the BOC concept has been implemented. As the concept
scales up to the regional or federal level, new sources of funding will have
to be identified.
“Congress can and should encourage
DHS to provide grant funding to
implement the recommendations of this
report. Without strong Congressional
action, public-private collaboration in
crisis management and response will
remain an afterthought.”
– Former Sen. John Breaux (D-LA)
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
40
Along the operations continuum, doctrine development, capabilities-based
planning, and operations planning require an excess of brainpower over
cash. The major investment is talent and time, and the Task Force believes
that the private sector is willing to commit those resources if it is given its
seat at the table. The true costs occur during the training, exercising,
operations and assessment phases. The current grant program is geared
largely to funding one-off exercises.
The Task Force urges Congress to commission DHS to begin development
of an architectural framework linked to or as part of the NRP to ensure that
fully functional and staffed BOCs can be maintained in each state, urban
area and region.
Recommendation:
Ensure that adequate resources are devoted to implementing Task Force
recommendations at the state, regional and federal level on a sustainable
basis.
Appendices F through I at the end of this report identify and prioritize
specific desired outcomes and policy drivers keyed to the Task Force
recommendations.
Business Executives for National Security
41
Appendix A – Business Response Task Force Charter
June 2006
CHARTER
BENS Business Response Task Force: BENS has formed a Task Force to review and
recommend to the U.S. Government steps to systematically integrate the capabilities of
the private sector—principally that of the business community—as a critical component
of a comprehensive disaster response mechanism. Membership is comprised of senior
business leaders from U.S. industries closely tied to disaster response:
telecommunications, supply chain logistics, utilities, real estate management, and so
forth. Business leaders understand the need to ensure the continuity of their community
in order to maintain their own business continuity, but business-government
collaboration in major disasters is largely disorganized.
BENS: For nearly 25 years, Business Executives for National Security has served as the
primary channel through which senior executives can help build a more secure
America. BENS is a national, non-partisan, non-profit organization that harnesses
successful business models from the private sector to help strengthen the nation’s
security.
Scope: We propose to collect lessons learned during the responses to Katrina, 9/11, and
other incidents of national significance. We believe that the experiences, reactions, and
responses to catastrophic events apply equally to other kinds of national disasters and
are, therefore, appropriate exemplars for our review. The Task Force will focus on the
time between when the hurricanes were first predicted to make landfall in the U.S.
through the response phase of operation.
Process and final report: The Task Force will analyze lessons from these disasters to
recommend reforms enabling future improved public-private collaboration and
coordination. The Task Force will provide examples of response functions for which it
makes sense to rely on the private sector, and will offer policy recommendations to
optimize the contributions of business during national disasters. It will propose a
program leading to an architectural framework to integrate private sector participation
into disaster response at all levels—local, state, and regional—and under the execution
of the National Response Plan.
Timing: The Task Force intends to complete work within approximately 45 days from
the start date.
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
42
Christopher C. Melton
Managing Director
The White Oak Group, Inc.
Robert Nardelli
Chairman, President and CEO
The Home Depot, Inc.
David Ratcliffe
Chairman and CEO
Southern Company
William J. Rouhana, Jr.
Managing Member
WS Management, LLC
Roger Staubach
Chairman and CEO
Staubach Companies
Paul G. Stern
Chairman
Claris Capital, LLC
Tom Fricke
Vice President Asset Protection
The Home Depot, Inc.
Rahul Gupta
Director
PRTM
William I. Hancock
Fellow, Integrative Center for Homeland Security
The Bush School of Government and Public Service
Texas A&M University
Scott Hefter
Director, Government Sector Lead
PRTM
Mike Hickey
Vice President
Government Affairs, National Security Policy
Verizon Communications Inc.
Frank W. Jenkins
Senior Vice President
Science Applications International Corporation
Charles Lathram
VP Security and Business Control
BellSouth Corporation
Appendix B – Task Force Members, Advisors and Staff
Task Force
F. Duane Ackerman (Chairman)
President and CEO
BellSouth Corporation
The Honorable John Breaux (Co-chair)
Senior Counsel
Patton Boggs LLP
The Honorable Newt Gingrich (Co-chair)
The Gingrich Group
Lawrence Babbio
Vice Chairman and President
Verizon Communications, Inc.
General Charles G. Boyd, USAF (Ret.) (Ex Officio)
President & CEO
Business Executives for National Security
Guy F. Budinscak
Atlanta Managing Partner and
Regional Managing Partner, Strategic Clients
Deloitte & Touche LLP
The Honorable Sidney Harman
Executive Chairman
Harman International Industries
Advisors
Richard Andrews, Ph.D.
The National Center for Crisis and
Continuity Coordination
Anthony D. Begando
Chief Executive Officer
Tenon Consulting Solutions, Inc.
Peter Carpenter
Founder, Mission and Values Institute
Steve Carpenter
Director, Customer Service and Support
DataPath, Inc.
Dr. Scott S. Cowen, Ph.D.
President
Tulane University
Cherie Curry
Stock Plan and Communications Manager
Harman International Industries
General Ralph E. Eberhart, USAF (Ret.)
President and CEO
AFBA
Steven Cash
Principal/Counsel
PRTM
Business Executives for National Security
43
Ken Senser
Sr. Vice President - Global Security, Aviation & Travel
Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.
Brian Spickard
Director, Business Assurance
Southern Company
Lacy Suiter
Director of Executive Education Programs
Center for Homeland Defense and Security
Naval Postgraduate School
Scott Louis Weber
Patton Boggs LLP
Danielle D. Camner
Director of Policy
Michael Doubleday
Sr. Vice President, Policy
Anne Ferris
Regional Director, California
Walter Gramm
Executive Director
New Jersey Business Force
David Guthrie
Director
Mid-America Business Force
Don Hays
Chief Operating Officer
Travis Hill
Intern
Lynne Kidder
Vice President
National Business Force
Appendix B – Task Force Members, Advisors and Staff (cont’d)
Thomas Lee
Director, Business Development
Monogram Systems
Admiral James M. Loy, USCG (Ret.)
Senior Counselor
The Cohen Group
William G. Raisch
Director
International Center for Enterprise Preparedness (InterCEP)
New York University
Michael Sherberger
Former Director, Georgia Office of Homeland Security/
Georgia Emergency Management Agency
Staff
Business Executives for National Security
Lauren Armistead
Deputy Director, Homeland Security
Advisory Council
Ken Beeks
Vice President, Policy
Ern Blackwelder
Sr. Vice President, National Business
Force
Jason Blake
Intern
Laura Bondesen
Intern
Colin Bucher
Policy Analyst
Joe Byrne
Director, Homeland Security Advisory
Council
Conrad H. Busch, Jr.
Director, Metro Atlanta
William F. Lawson, III
Director, Kansas City
Clinton E. Long
Director for Publications/Web
Melita Leoussis
Intern
Linda Moseley
Executive Asst. to the President &
CEO
Peter Ohtaki
Director
Bay Area Business Force
Paul Taibl
Vice President, Policy
Kiersten Todt Coon
Vice President, Policy
John H. H. Turner, III
Director/Program Manager
Georgia Business Force
Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC)
Lindsey E. Arnold
Program Manager
M. Wendy Reid
Senior Analyst
Pat A. “Doc” Pentland
Program Manager
James C. Sherlock
Program Development Manager
Julie C. Simpson
Policy Analyst
Donald C. Snedeker
Senior Analyst
Kenneth B. Van Dillen
Project Lead
Editor
Adam Garfinkle Paul Taibl
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
44
Exponent, Inc.
FedEx Corporation
Food Lion, LLC
Food Marketing Institute
Gene Matthews
General Electric Company
Greenberg Traurig, LLP
Harman International Industries, Incorporated
Harrah’s Entertainment, Inc.
The Home Depot, Inc.
INSTEDD
Intel Corporation
International Business Machines Corporation
iWave, Inc.
J.B. Hunt Transport Services, Inc.
Johnson & Johnson
JPMorgan Chase & Co.
Keefe, Bruyette & Woods, Inc.
Kraft Foods Inc.
Lacy Suiter
Laitram L.L.C.
Lockheed Martin Corp.
The Macerich Company
Marriott International, Inc.
McKesson Corporation
Miami Herald
Michael Sherberger
Monogram Systems
NC4 (The National Center for Crisis
and Continuity Coordination)
Appendix C – List of Survey Interviews
Admiral Jim Loy, USCG (Ret.)
ALZA Corporation
Armed Forces Benefits Association
AutoNation, Inc.
Avatar Holdings Inc.
BankUnited Financial Corp.
Baptist Health South Florida
BellSouth Corporation
The Biloxi Sun Herald
Boh Bros. Construction Co., LLC
Burger King Holdings, Inc.
CACI International Inc
Cargill, Incorporated
Chevron Corporation
Cisco Systems Inc.
Citigroup Inc.
City National Bank
Coca-Cola Enterprises Inc.
Colonial Pipeline Company
ConAgra Foods, Inc.
Cushman & Wakefield Inc.
Darden Restaurants, Inc.
DataPath, Inc.
Deloitte & Touche LLP
Deutsche Bank AG
Dickie Brennan & Company
D.J.’s National Food Service
The Dow Chemical Company
Dr. Kathleen E. Toomey, M.D., M.P.H.
Durr Heavy Construction, LLC
Business Executives for National Security
45
St. Barnabas Health Care System
Steven Cash
Tenon Group Plc
The Staubach Company
Toll Brothers, Inc.
Tulane University
United States Northern Command
University of Miami
Verizon Communications Inc.
Wachovia Corporation
Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.
The Westfield Group
The White Oak Group, Inc.
William I. Hancock
WS Management, LLC
Appendix C – List of Survey Interviews (cont’d)
Ochsner Clinic Foundation
Oreck Corporation
Patton Boggs LLP
Peoples Financial Corporation
Pfizer Inc.
Raymond James Financial, Inc.
Republic Services, Inc.
Richard Andrews
Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd.
Ryder System, Inc.
Sandler O’Neill & Partners, L.P.
Science Applications International
Corporation (SAIC)
The Honorable John Breaux
Southern California Edison
Southern Company
The Honorable Newt Gingrich
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
46
Appendix D – Relevant Recommendations from Federal Government
After-action Reports and Other Sources
Numerous reports have reviewed the response to Hurricane Katrina. Many of these reviews, including
those conducted by Congress and the White House, favor improving emergency preparedness,
response, and recovery via improved partnerships with the private sector.
1. The White House report entitled The Federal Response to Hurricane Katrina: Lessons
Learned enumerated specific recommendations to be implemented by collaboration with the private
sector. The White House report recommended that private-sector organizations “actively participate in
all phases of a Federal Disaster response.” The House of Representatives’ report, A Failure of
Initiative, provided anecdotal evidence of failures in collaboration. The report of the Senate
Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, A Nation Still Unprepared,
“examined in detail the actions of officials of local, state and federal government departments and
agencies.”
Public-Private Collaboration
The House report stated that critical elements of the National Response Plan (NRP) were unsuccessfully
executed during Hurricane Katrina. Gaps in the National Communications System, a component of the
NRP, resulted in miscommunication and slow response in delivering relief supplies. The report illustrated
how communications inoperability led to issues with command and control and situational awareness.
Another recommendation, according to the Senate A Nation Still Unprepared report, is “to enhance
regional operations to provide better coordination between federal agencies and the states and establish
regional strike teams.” Among their other duties, the regional offices should “enhance cooperation with
NGOs and the private sector, and provide personnel and assets, in the form of Strike Teams, to be the
federal government’s first line of response to the disaster.”
The White House report recommended actively engaging the private sector in reviewing the NRP and
the NIMS and finalizing the Interim National Infrastructure Protection Plan. Both Congress and the
White House suggested that slow delivery of relief commodities can be remedied via more robust
relationships with the private sector. The report recommended that DHS mandate “pre-competed”
private-sector contracts for arranging advanced communications capabilities.
Surge Capacity for Goods and Services
The House Katrina report also detailed problems with medical response, including inadequate
communications equipment, confusion relating to hospital evacuations, and problems with
credentialing. The report referenced failures in advanced contracting, which led to hasty acquisitions
and vulnerability to fraud. One company tasked with supplying temporary housing experienced
contracting issues when the requirements for the work order changed midway through their response.
The White House report specified that HHS arrange “pre-configured” teams of health care
professionals, including volunteer health professionals from the private sector. DHS should partner with
the private sector to develop a scalable, flexible, and transparent logistics system for the procurement
and delivery of goods and services. DHS should pre-identify private-sector resources to provide
disaster support. Also, states are encouraged to enter into contractual arrangements with private-sector
companies for procurement and delivery of goods prior to a disaster.
Business Executives for National Security
47
Legal and Regulatory Framework
The House report cited exemplary companies with existing emergency preparedness plans. The White
House suggested that DHS overhaul regional disaster plans by collaborating with the private sector and
by setting standards for private-sector preparedness against which regional plans can be measured.
The White House recommended that DHS lead an interagency effort to remove federal and legal
liability obstacles to utilization and coordination of private-sector resources during a disaster. Private-
sector actors also are encouraged to plan their “giving streams” at the local level.
2. The DHS “Lessons Learned Information Sharing” report on public-private partnerships for
emergency preparedness explains the need for coordination between public safety agencies and private
sector entities. Public-private relationships must be established prior to emergencies. Familiarity of the
two sectors with each other’s capabilities and response procedures is paramount. The private sector
plays a vital role in emergency situations; it employs most of the nation’s workforce, owns 85 percent of
critical infrastructure, and produces essential goods and services. The public sector often
underestimates the private sector’s involvement in emergency preparedness, while the private sector
often overestimates the capabilities of the public sector. Collaboration by public groups with the private
sector is imperative to ensure emergency preparedness and safety.
Public-Private Collaboration
Many public- and private-sector groups have established partnerships to improve emergency prepared-
ness, prevention, mitigation, response, and recovery efforts. This allows the public- and private-sector entities
to share risk, vulnerability, and threat information; coordinate response and recovery operations; develop
all-hazards plans to pool resources and information; and share educational and training opportunities.
However, many communities have failed to establish such partnerships, either because they are viewed
as costly and time-consuming or because the public-private relationships lack the necessary trust and
understanding to exchange sensitive information and allocate valuable time and resources.
The section on developing partnerships outlines possible steps toward establishing long-lasting
relationships with public-or private-sector groups. The steps include:
1. Clearly define purpose and objectives
2. Identify partners
3. Develop incentives to try to persuade potential partners to join.
4. Secure commitment, usually by developing personal relationships with individuals at the senior
level and with individuals responsible for mitigation, response, and recovery operations.
5. Initiate dialogue to discuss capabilities, resources, and opportunities for mutual assistance.
6. Build the partnership by establishing objectives that reflect the interests of all members, identifying
leaders, forming a plan or task force around each objective, and planning regular activities to
ensure long-lasting relationships.
Surge Capacity for Goods and Services
Large-scale incidents can quickly deplete response resources, leading to a surge in demand for goods
and services. Sharing resources is often prevented by questions surrounding liability, cost, and
availability of resources. In order to overcome these obstacles, public-private partnerships must identify
available member resources and then develop procedures to manage and share them.
According to the report, resource sharing plans should accomplish the following:
• Define how partners borrow and/or expend resources during emergencies.
• Include agreements on inventorying, requesting, allocating, using, and returning resources.
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
48
• Include qualifications that must be met in order for resource sharing to occur. Such qualifications
can include:
- prior depletion of public sector resources
- expected impact of the incident on the private sector group’s area of concern
• Hold public-private training exercises that include resource sharing plans so partners can practice
requesting, locating, using, and returning resources.
• Include agreements on liability and reimbursement.
• Establish a single resource inventory for the responding agency.
• Establish resource request procedures.
• Develop rules for resource allocation, usage, and return.
Legal and Regulatory Framework
An important obstacle to public-private partnerships is the hesitancy to share sensitive or proprietary
information. At the federal level, DHS has undertaken various initiatives to provide secure ways to share
information. Many local communities have not taken such initiatives, and fears persist concerning
improper dissemination and/or the cost of secure sharing. Private groups also occasionally lack clearances
to view necessary information. In order to build partners’ trust in each other’s ability to protect sensitive
information, the report suggests formalized information sharing networks with security features that protect
and limit the dissemination of and access to sensitive information. The report also suggests assigning a
single public safety agency to disseminate all threat notifications to guarantee accuracy and reliability.
The report lauded a number of Presidential Directives and national strategies that have encouraged public-
private partnerships. Most such initiatives focus on establishing relationships between public and private
groups on a national level and facilitating information sharing among industries and federal agencies. On a
local level, however, public safety agencies and private sector groups in many communities do not
collaborate effectively. DHS has established initiatives to help foster local partnerships, and other
developmental programs exist in some areas through non-profit associations. Additionally, many industries
face local pressure or are legally obligated to enact safety and preparedness measures that require
coordination with the public sector. The report also encourages communities lacking such programs or
initiatives to dedicate time and resources to establishing public-private partnerships.
3. Government Accountability Office (GAO) testimony, “Hurricane Katrina: Planning for and
Management of Federal Disaster and Recovery Contracts,” April 10, 2006, contains many cogent
observations about what went right and what went wrong.
Public-Private Collaboration
Government contracts have long been a mainstay in public-private enterprise, but they now face new
challenges. In the face of unexpected contingency scenarios, an adequate response is of paramount
importance, but efficiency and avoiding waste cannot be overlooked. Contracts were inked hastily and
oversight was lacking, as there was an insufficient number of trained personnel to conduct oversight, as
well as unclear definitions and delegations of responsibility. The agencies scrutinized by this report–
FEMA, GSA, and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers–have high-risk acquisition practices that equate to a
“vulnerability to fraud, waste, and abuse.” The efficiency owed to taxpayer dollars can be better
facilitated with advanced planning and pre-arranged contracts.
Surge Capacity for Goods and Services
A lack of communication between agencies at the federal level and between levels of government, as
well as a failure to anticipate needs, led to the inefficient acquisition and allocation of goods and services.
Specifically, the need for temporary housing was underestimated, and for other goods and services that
Business Executives for National Security
49
were anticipated, the mechanisms by which to acquire them, legal and logistical, were neither fully
understood nor well lubricated. Furthermore, the GAO report notes tensions in upholding Stafford Act
preferences to engage contracts with businesses in the affected area (e.g., contracting with Gulf region
business in recovering from Hurricane Katrina). The difficulty of taking the initiative to engage local
businesses instead of falling back on national contractors, coupled with the fact that there was vast
confusion among GSA and FEMA officials about the actual Stafford Act preferences and how to apply
them, resulted in local businesses often being overlooked in taking advantage of government contracting
opportunities. GSA officials state that they plan to review the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) to
clarify Stafford Act guidance.
Legal and Regulatory Framework
Along with Stafford Act implications and oversight complications, other legal and regulatory issues were
factors in the response to Hurricane Katrina. The Army Corps of Engineers noted a hindrance to pre-
arranged contracts in that funding must be secured for a particular mission before formal preparation
can ensue. Regarding communication and continuity, especially in contract oversight, turnover and
transition can pose problems, and the Corps disclosed its policy to rotate personnel every 29 days to
minimize costs due to regulations under the Fair Labor Standards Act. To combat these problems, FEMA
stated that it is implementing a process to better distribute work and information among rotating
personnel, and GSA is investigating alternative options for smoother contract oversight.
4. The Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) Report, “Neglected Defense: Mobilizing the Private
Sector to Support Homeland Security” by Stephen Flynn and Daniel B. Prieto, March 13, 2006, offers
ten clear recommendations.
Public Private Collaboration
- Change policy paradigm from telling companies to protect themselves to offering leadership in
securing critical infrastructure.
• Current attitude is that the there are enough market incentives for the private market to provide
levels of security commensurate with the threat of catastrophic incidents–but this is untrue. The
government must take an active role understand how the private sector operates and then use this
understanding to encourage the private sector to provide more security.
- Create a national list of priorities, as mandated by law, as appropriate for government to do, and as
requested by various industries.
• Mandated by Homeland Security Act of 2002, but will likely not reach completion by end of 2006.
Therefore Congress should commission a rapid-turnaround study to be conducted by the NAS with
input from the private sector to compile a list of national priorities
• Then these priorities should be used as a guide for allocation of resources and as a measure of
effectiveness and progress toward bolstering national security.
- Strengthen DHS management and personnel experience, specifically by sponsoring and facilitating a
personnel exchange with private sector.
• DHS is currently plagued by high turnover, low morale, making it difficult to realize long-term
initiatives – it needs experienced managers
• Such an exchange program can be modeled after those employed at the Federal Reserve
- Improve information sharing with private sector, and government must be held accountable for doing it.
• Private sector should be fully integrated, but there are reservations: businesses fear if they share
information with the government it will be mishandled and could place them at a competitive
disadvantage, and the government worries about leaking classified information to the private sector.
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
50
Appendix E – Glossary of Acronyms in this Report
AAF – Available Acquisition Flexibilities – form of acquisition flexibilities available in the Federal
Acquisition Regulation (FAR) to facilitate and expedite acquisitions of supplies and services during all
types of emergencies. “Available Acquisition Flexibilities’’ identifies the flexibilities that may be used
anytime and do not require an emergency declaration.
ABA – American Bar Association – a voluntary bar association of lawyers and law students, which is not
specific to any jurisdiction in the United States. The ABA’s most important activities are the setting of
academic standards for law schools and the formulation of model legal codes.
ARC – American Red Cross – a humanitarian organization that provides emergency assistance, disaster
relief and education inside the United States, as part of the International Federation of Red Cross and
Red Crescent Societies.
AWP – Average Wholesale Price
BENS – Business Executives for National Security – a national, non-partisan, non-profit organization
that harnesses successful business models from the private sector to help strengthen the nation’s
security.
BOC – Business Operations Center
CFR – Council on Foreign Relations – an American foreign policy think tank based in New York City. It
describes itself as being “dedicated to increasing America’s understanding of the world and contributing
ideas to U.S. foreign policy.”
CI/KR – Critical Infrastructure/Key Resources – According to the Homeland Security Act of 2002,
“critical infrastructure” refers to “systems and assets, whether physical or virtual, so vital to the United
States that the incapacity or destruction of such systems and assets would have a debilitating impact on
security, national economic security, national public health or safety, or any combination of those
matters.” The term “key resources” means “publicly or privately controlled resources essential to the
minimal operations of the economy and government.”
DHS – Department of Homeland Security – a Cabinet department of the Federal Government of the
United States with the responsibility of protecting the territory of the United States from terrorist attack
and responding to natural disasters. The department was created from 22 existing federal agencies in
response to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.
EAF – Emergency Acquisition Flexibilities – a form of acquisition flexibilities available in the Federal
Acquisition Regulation (FAR) to facilitate and expedite acquisitions of supplies and services during all
types of emergencies. “Emergency Acquisition Flexibilities” identifies the flexibilities that may be used
only after an emergency declaration or designation has been made by the appropriate official.
EMAC – Emergency Management Assistance Compact – an interstate agreement that streamlines the
assistance one governor can lend another after a natural disaster or terrorist attack by providing a
framework for flexible response. EMAC was first introduced to the states in 1993, and the program is
administered by the National Emergency Managers Association (NEMA).
EOC – Emergency Operations Center – the central command and control facility responsible for
carrying out emergency preparedness and emergency management or disaster management functions
at a strategic level in an emergency situation, and for ensuring the continuity of operation of the
company or political subdivision. The EOC is responsible for the strategic, or “big picture” of the
disaster and does not normally directly control field assets but makes strategic decisions and leaves
tactical decisions to lower commands.
Business Executives for National Security
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ESF – Emergency Support Function – a mechanism that consolidates multiple agencies that perform
similar or like functions into a single, cohesive unit to allow for the better management of emergency
response functions.
FAR – Federal Acquisition Regulation – the Federal Acquisition Regulations System is established for the
codification and publication of uniform policies and procedures for acquisition by all executive
agencies. The Federal Acquisition Regulations System consists of the Federal Acquisition Regulation
(FAR), which is the primary document, and agency acquisition regulations that implement or supplement
the FAR.
FDIC – Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation – the FDIC preserves and promotes public confidence in
the U.S. financial system by insuring deposits in banks and thrift institutions for at least $100,000; by
identifying, monitoring and addressing risks to the deposit insurance funds; and by limiting the effect on
the economy and the financial system when a bank or thrift institution fails.
FEMA – Federal Emergency Management Agency – an agency of the Department of Homeland
Security (DHS) within the Emergency Preparedness and Response Directorate. FEMA’s purpose is to
coordinate the response to a disaster that has occurred in the United States and overwhelms the
resources of local and municipal authorities.
FTC – Federal Trade Commission – an independent agency of the United States government,
established in 1914 by the Federal Trade Commission Act. Its principal mission is the promotion of
consumer protection and the elimination and prevention of anticompetitive business practices.
GAO – Government Accountability Office – the non-partisan audit, evaluation, and investigative arm of
Congress, and an agency in the Legislative Branch of the United States Government. According to
GAO’s current mission statement, the agency exists to support the Congress in meeting its Constitutional
responsibilities and to help improve the performance and ensure the accountability of the federal
government for the American people.
GEOC – Georgia Emergency Operations Center – the central command and control facility responsible
for carrying out the principles of emergency preparedness and emergency management or disaster
management functions for the state of Georgia.
GSA – General Services Administration – an independent agency of the United States government,
established in 1949 to help manage and support the basic functioning of federal agencies. The GSA
supplies products and communications for U.S. government offices, provides transportation and office
space to federal employees, and develops government-wide cost-minimizing policies, among other
management tasks.
HHS – Health and Human Services – a Cabinet department of the United States government with the
goal of protecting the health of all Americans and providing essential human services.
HIPAA – Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act – law requiring HHS to establish national
standards for electronic health care transactions and national identifiers for providers, health plans, and
employers. It also addresses the security and privacy of health data.
ICS – Incident Command System – a management system used within the United States, parts of
Canada, the United Kingdom and other countries to organize emergency response, designed to offer a
scalable response to incidents of any magnitude. As part of FEMA’s National Response Plan (NRP), the
system has become part of the National Incident Management System (NIMS). The system is designed
to grow and shrink along with the incident, allowing more resources to be smoothly added into the
system when required or released when no longer needed.
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
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INIPP – Interim National Infrastructure Protection Plan – the Base Plan that provides the framework and
sets the direction for implementing a coordinated, national effort in the event of an incident. It provides a
roadmap for identifying CI/KR assets, assessing vulnerabilities, prioritizing assets, and implementing
protection measures in each infrastructure sector.
JFO – Joint Field Office – a temporary federal multiagency coordination center established locally to
facilitate field-level domestic incident management activities related to prevention, preparedness,
response, and recovery when activated by the Secretary.
MACS – Multiagency Coordination System – the combination of personnel, facilities, equipment,
procedures, and communications integrated into a common system. When activated, the MACS has the
responsibility for coordination of assisting agency resources and support in a multi-agency or multi-
jurisdictional environment.
NEMA – National Emergency Management Association – a non-partisan, non-profit 501(c)(3) association
dedicated to enhancing public safety by improving the nation’s ability to prepare for, respond to and
recover from all emergencies, disasters, and threats to America’s security. The state directors of
emergency management are the core membership of NEMA.
NERR – National Emergency Response Registry – permanent Internet-based system to source goods and
services to the government in emergencies
NGO – Non-governmental organization – a non-profit group or association that acts outside of
institutionalized political structures and pursues matters of interest to its members by lobbying,
persuasion, or direct action.
NIMS – National Incident Management System – a system that integrates effective practices in
emergency preparedness and response into a comprehensive national framework for incident
management. The NIMS is meant to enable responders at all levels to work together more effectively to
manage domestic incidents no matter what the cause, size or complexity.
NIPP – National Infrastructure Protection Plan – a document called for by Homeland Security
Presidential Directive 7 which aims to unify Critical Infrastructure and Key Resource (CI/KR) protection
efforts across the country.
NORTHCOM – U.S. Northern Command – a Unified Combatant Command of the United States Military
created in 2002 in the aftermath of the September 11th attacks. Its mission is to protect the United States
homeland and support local, state, and federal authorities, and it is responsible for U.S. military
operations in the United States.
NPS – National Planning System
NRP – National Response Plan – a comprehensive all-hazards approach to enhance the ability of the
United States to manage domestic incidents. The plan incorporates best practices and procedures from
incident management disciplines—homeland security, emergency management, law enforcement,
firefighting, public works, public health, responder and recovery worker health and safety, emergency
medical services, and the private sector—and integrates them into a unified structure. It forms the basis
of how the federal government coordinates with state, local, and tribal governments and the private
sector during incidents.
OFPP – Office of Federal Procurement Policy – policy office within the Office of Management and
Budget that plays a central role in shaping the policies and practices federal agencies use to acquire the
goods and services they need to carry out their responsibilities. OFPP was established by Congress in
1974 to provide overall direction for government-wide procurement policies, regulations and procedures
and to promote economy, efficiency, and effectiveness in acquisition processes.
Business Executives for National Security
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QBL – Qualified Bidders List
SAIC – Science Applications International Corporation – Although SAIC is a large technology firm with
numerous federal, state, and private sector clients, its traditional expertise has been supporting the
United States Department of Defense and the Intelligence Community, including the National Security
Agency.
SKU – Stock Keeping Unit – an identifier that is used by merchants to permit the systematic tracking of
products and services offered to customers. SKUs are not always associated with actual physical items,
but more appropriately billable entities.
SSA – Sector Specific Agency – Federal department or agency responsible for the overall coordination
of planning, preparedness, and protection-related activities within each of the 17 CI/KR sectors.
TCL – Target Capabilities List – list of capabilities developed by the Department of Homeland Security
that are required to prevent, protect against, respond to, and recover from incidents of national
significance.
UTL – Universal Task List – a list of every unique task that was identified from the suite of Common
Scenarios developed under the leadership of the Homeland Security Council. The fifteen scenarios
address a range of probable threats from terrorists, natural disasters and other emergencies.
VOAD – Voluntary Organizations Assisting in Disaster – a coalition of various volunteer organizations
with formal disaster response plans. These organizations share information about their capabilities,
resources, and special areas of expertise in order to foster cooperation and reduce duplication of effort.
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
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Appendix F – Public-Private Collaboration Outcomes and Drivers
State & Local Collaboration
Outcome:
• Build a “Business Operations Center” (BOC) capability in states and urban areas
- Include critical infrastructure, disaster supply chain businesses and other critical businesses
Driver:
• Congress directs DHS to create guidelines and funding for states and urban areas to build BOCs
• Congress considers funding public-private communications systems and data links with direct
appropriation; funding BOC sustaining costs through the federal grant program
• Congress directs DHS to tie receipt of funds to training and exercising
Achievability: High
Regional and Federal Collaboration
Outcome:
• Create an escalation process for public-private collaboration when increased federal participation
is necessary
Driver:
• Congress directs DHS to create guidelines and funding for regional and federal BOCs (FEMA,
JFO, other)
Achievability: High
Outcome:
• Integrate the BOC concept into the National Response Plan (NRP)
Driver:
• DHS to invite private-sector participation in developing and integrating the BOC concept into the
NRP
Achievability: Moderate
“Business EMAC”
Outcome:
• Work with National Emergency Management Association (NEMA) to explore application of
Emergency Management Assistance Compact (EMAC) model to private-sector resources
Driver:
• Task Force to nominate team to:
- Validate “Business EMAC (BEMAC)” concept with NEMA
- Seek support from the National Governors Association
• Congress provides funds through DHS to states for implementation
Achievability: High
Business Executives for National Security
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Appendix G – Surge Capacity/Supply Chain Management Outcomes
and Drivers
Emergency Purchasing
Outcome:
• Improve forecasting for emergency goods and services
Driver:
• FEMA improves forecasting model with other DHS offices and private-sector input and
collaboration
Achievability: High
Outcome:
• Have pre-contracts in place and vendors pre-qualified
Driver:
• FEMA improves contracting and qualification mechanisms
Achievability: High
Outcome:
• Establish prices at the vendors’ then-current market prices
Driver:
• FEMA and vendors establish pricing mechanisms
Achievability: Moderate
Outcome:
• Develop pricing mechanisms to be implemented in disaster situations
Driver:
• States take lead, working through affiliate associations to approach a national standard
Achievability: Moderate
Outcome:
• Establish mechanism for pre-qualifying before a crisis and for qualifying non-GSA or otherwise
qualified vendors during a crisis
Driver:
• Governments create streamlined mechanisms for emergency certification
Achievability: High
Outcome:
• Establish more effective vendor selection mechanisms
- Must have transparency of transactions
- Be self-auditing
Driver:
• Governments develop mechanisms that include other vendor sources if pre-certified or otherwise
qualified vendors cannot meet availability and delivery requirements.
Achievability: Moderate
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
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Outcome:
• Further develop online “reverse auction” system for meeting ad hoc needs
Driver:
• Congress provides funding for NEMA to implement as part of “Business EMAC”
Achievability: Development of system: High; Funding: Moderate
Donations Management
Outcome:
• Identify most likely pro bono needs for a range of scenarios
Driver:
• FEMA improves forecasting model with business and NGO input and collaboration
Achievability: High
Outcome:
• Create online registry and reverse auction capability for meeting unanticipated needs for pro bono
goods and services
Driver:
• Congress provides funding for NEMA to implement as part of “Business EMAC” within state EOC/
BOC
Achievability: Development of process: High; Funding: Moderate
Logistics Processes
Outcome:
• Educate business employees and public on emergency preparations to lessen peak demand
Driver:
• Businesses provide employee education
• DHS continues improving website www.ready.gov
Achievability: High
Outcome:
• Improve credentialing process for private-sector responders and volunteers prior to and during
disasters
Driver:
• States working with local authorities create standards and protocols
• Congress provides funding through DHS
Achievability: Moderate
Outcome:
• Improve “last mile” logistics to improve vehicle offloading and distribution capabilities
Driver:
• States and major urban areas working with local authorities develop capabilities
Achievability: Moderate
Business Executives for National Security
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Appendix H – Legal & Regulatory Environment Outcomes and Drivers
Disaster Law: Liability
Outcome:
• Improve Good Samaritan protections with aim of ensuring predictability of liability
Driver:
• Congress and states develop common body of legislation or enact new law
Achievability: Low
Outcome:
• Clarify/standardize liability of professionals acting in good faith during disasters (e.g., patient
triage, alternative treatments, etc.)
Driver:
• Congress improves legislation on the books or enacts new law
Achievability: Low
Disaster Law: Regulation
Outcome:
• Clarify and promulgate procedures that allow quick implementation of discretionary authorities
during disasters
• Package and set triggers for implementation
- Antitrust
- Emergency implementation of environmental law
- Licensing
- Privacy
- Service delivery and termination
Driver:
• Federal agencies review laws and authorities under their purview and make necessary changes
Achievability: High
Stafford Act
Outcome:
• Revise the Stafford Act to enable the private sector to:
- Participate as full partners in the complete range of disaster response activities
- Be afforded non-monetary federal assistance when necessary
- Request assistance directly through the appropriate federal agency
Driver:
• Congress enacts revision
Achievability: Moderate
Congressional Hearings
Outcome:
• Identify recommendation from this report that can be implemented under existing authorities
Driver:
• Task Force uses its government affairs resources to encourage Congress to act
Achievability: High
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
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Appendix I – Priorities and Sequencing
Business Integration into the National Response Plan
Outcome:
• Integrate business more fully in the federal, state and local government operations continuums:
- Doctrine development
- Capabilities-based resource planning
- Operations planning
- Training and exercises
- Operations
- Lessons-learned assessments
Driver:
• Congress directs DHS to include substantive business participation in federal programs
• Congress makes federal funds available to states for business participation
Achievability: Integration into NRP: High; Funding: Low
Resource commitment
Outcome:
• Ensure adequate resources are devoted to implementing Task Force recommendations at the state,
regional and federal levels on a sustainable basis
Driver:
• Congress directs DHS to create guidelines and provide funding for states, urban areas, and regions
to build sustainable partnerships to implement Task Force recommendations
• Task Force to consider a standing advisory group to:
- Keep government and business focused in implementing the Task Force recommendations
- Inform a core group of state governors and enlist their support for implementing the Task Force
recommendations
- Advise states, urban areas and regions on implementation of the recommendations
- In cooperation with other like-minded groups (e.g., the Business Roundtable), develop a voluntary
national-level advisory group that can offer advice and instruction to states interested in building
a BOC structure
Achievability: Moderate
Business Executives for National Security
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Business Executives for National Security
For a quarter century, Business Executives for National Security has been the primary
channel through which American business leaders can contribute their special
experience and talent to help build a more secure nation.
Founded in 1982 by business executive and entrepreneur Stanley A. Weiss, BENS is
guided by the simple notion that America’s security is everybody’s business. Led by
President and CEO General Charles G. Boyd, U.S. Air Force (Ret.), BENS is a national,
nonpartisan organization of senior executives dedicated to enhancing our national
security using the successful models of the private sector.
As the United States confronts threats of terrorism at home and abroad, BENS is
more important than ever before. The innovative business-government partnerships
that BENS has fostered over the past two decades to help save the Defense
Department billions of dollars are now uniquely positioned to help meet the new
challenges of the 21st century.
BENS is expanding these public-private partnerships into all aspects of homeland
security – helping to guard against cyber attack, track terrorists’ financial assets,
secure the nation’s ports, and prepare state and local governments to deal with
catastrophic events or terrorist attacks.
Recognizing that the nation will never fully realize the efficient, agile military it
needs to win a global war on terrorism without an equally efficient and agile support
structure, BENS remains a tireless advocate for smarter spending at the Pentagon.
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
60
Getting Down to Business:
An Action Plan for Public-Private
Disaster Response Coordination
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
January 2007
BUSINESS EXECUTIVES FOR NATIONAL SECURITY
1717 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW • Suite 350 • Washington, DC 20006-4620
E-mail: [email protected] • Tel: 202-296-2125 • Fax: 202-296-2490
www.bens.org
doc_995798184.pdf
The American private sector must be systematically integrated into the nation’s response to disasters, natural and man-made alike. Government alone cannot manage major crises nor effectively integrate the private sector after a crisis occurs.
Getting Down to Business:
An Action Plan for Public-Private
Disaster Response Coordination
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
January 2007
BUSINESS EXECUTIVES FOR NATIONAL SECURITY
1717 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW • Suite 350 • Washington, DC 20006-4620
E-mail: [email protected] • Tel: 202-296-2125 • Fax: 202-296-2490
www.bens.org
Business Executives for National Security
1
Table of Contents
Preface .......................................................................................................................................... 2
Key Findings and Recommendations ............................................................................................. 4
Introduction: Background, Methods and Aims ............................................................................... 6
Chapter 1. Public-Private Collaboration ...................................................................................... 13
Chapter 2. Surge Capacity/Supply Chain Management .............................................................. 21
Chapter 3. Legal & Regulatory Environment ............................................................................... 31
Chapter 4. An Expert’s Guide to Priorities and Sequencing for the
Integration of the Private Sector into U.S. National
Disaster Response Planning and Execution ............................................................... 36
Appendices
A - Business Response Task Force Charter................................................................................... 41
B - Task Force Members, Advisors and Staff ................................................................................ 42
C - List of Survey Interviews ........................................................................................................ 44
D - Relevant Recommendations from Federal Government
After-action Reports and Other Sources ................................................................................ 46
E - Glossary of Acronyms in this Report ....................................................................................... 50
F - Public-Private Collaboration Outcomes and Drivers .............................................................. 54
G - Surge Capacity/Supply Chain Management Outcomes and Drivers ..................................... 55
H - Legal & Regulatory Environment Outcomes and Drivers ..................................................... 57
I - Priorities and Sequencing Outcomes and Drivers ................................................................. 58
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
2
Preface
The 2005 hurricane season and its prolonged crisis aftermath demonstrated beyond doubt that the
United States is not adequately prepared to deal with major catastrophes, whether natural or man-made.
Coming nearly four years after the 9/11 attacks, the inadequate local, state and federal government
responses to Hurricane Katrina put the entire nation on alert that America has many problems to
overcome before being truly ready to mount a reinforced and efficient disaster response.
Not least of these problems is the systematic failure of government to integrate the resources of
America’s vast private sector into its disaster response plans, up to and including response to an Incident
of National Significance.
1
As the February 26, 2006, White House report, The Federal Response to
Hurricane Katrina: Lessons Learned, stated:
The Federal government should recognize that the private/non-government sectors often perform
certain functions more efficiently and effectively than government because of the expertise and
experience in applying successful business models. These public-private partnerships should be
facilitated, recognized, funded [and]. . . the capability to draw on these resources should inform and
be part of Federal, State, and local logistics systems and response plans.
Invited by the senior leadership of both the United States Senate and U.S. House of Representatives to offer
advice, in June 2006 Business Executives for National Security (BENS) formed a Task Force to recommend
to the U.S. Government steps to systematically integrate the capabilities of the private sector—principally
those of the business community—into a comprehensive national disaster response mechanism.
BENS did so in response not only to the federal government’s recognition of a pressing need in the
aftermath of Katrina, but also in response to the overwhelming demand of its membership. During the
summer and autumn of 2005, many BENS members experienced first-hand the reality that the role of
business in response to national disasters has not been properly thought through. In preparing this report,
the Task Force has assiduously mined the wealth of experience of its members and other executives—
completing nearly 100 interviews—in developing its findings.
This report’s recommendations fall into three substantive categories: public-private collaboration; surge
capacity/supply chain management; and legal & regulatory environment. In addition, the report
specifies priorities and sequencing for implementing its recommendations.
During the late summer and fall of 2006, the report, in draft form, was circulated widely and briefed to
federal agencies and congressional offices and staff, the White House, senior leaders at the National
Governors Association, the National Emergency Management Association and the Association of State
Attorneys General, the U.S. Northern Command, professional associations, and corporate leaders
around the country. While the conclusions are those of the Task Force, the report benefits immeasurably
from comments and suggestions made by our colleagues in government and business.
We present these recommendations in the belief that the failure so far to properly integrate the private
sector into government disaster response capabilities, while serious and pervasive, can be remedied. To
do so, however, requires a new dedication to effective public-private partnership and, we believe, a
1
An Incident of National Significance is defined in the Federal National Response Plan (NRP) as an actual or potential high-impact
event requiring a coordinated and effective response by an appropriate combination of federal, state, local, tribal, nongovernmental,
and/or private sector entities in order to save lives, minimize damage and provide the basis for long-term community recovery and
mitigation activities.
Business Executives for National Security
3
new approach: simultaneous, integrated action from both the very top of our federal government
structure and from the state and local levels upward.
This report’s recommendations constitute the framework of an action plan to implement this new
approach. Its key proposition is that Emergency Operation Centers (EOCs), which already exist at all
levels of government to plan for, train and implement emergency responses to disaster, must include a
seat for the private sector. The private sector, in turn, must maintain parallel structures, referred to here
as “Business Operation Centers (BOCs)” that can plug-in to government operations and “scale up” with
them in a parallel and coordinated manner as government adapts to deal with disasters from small to
large. If this structural reform is adopted, it will greatly facilitate all of the other reforms recommended in
this report.
As simple and logical as this proposition sounds, formidable political, organizational and legal obstacles
now block simple and logical implementation. These obstacles can and must be overcome if we as a
nation are to seriously prepare for the next major calamity. Overriding all is the need for Congress to
recognize the value of establishing public-private partnerships in concord with state, regional and federal
entities and to provide funding through the Department of Homeland Security grant program to sustain
them.
The very sinews of American democracy have always resided in the integrity of our close-knit
communities, of which business has ever been and remains an integral part. We should not undervalue
the power of this bond in an age where our national security is being tested in new and daunting ways.
Business must be integrated into our disaster response plans not only because businesses have material
assets, money and technical expertise. American businesses are patriotic. They value their community
and their nation, and have and will willingly contribute their treasure and talent toward maintaining our
cherished way of life.
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
4
Key Findings and Recommendations
This BENS Task Force Report focuses on institutionalizing an effective and sustainable role for business in
disaster response at all levels of government. To that end, it offers recommendations in three substantive
categories:
1. Public-private collaboration, to plan, train, exercise, implement and evaluate joint actions
required to facilitate effective communication, decision-making and execution;
2. Surge capacity for private-sector goods and services, and the capabilities resident in private-
sector supply chains to manage the delivery of goods and services (whether pro bono or
contracted) to and within disaster areas; and
3. The legal & regulatory environment, which can help or dramatically hinder efficient delivery
of private-sector support during a disaster.
Public-Private Collaboration
Finding: The American private sector must be systematically integrated into the nation’s response to
disasters, natural and man-made alike. Government alone cannot manage major crises nor effec-
tively integrate the private sector after a crisis occurs. The Task Force believes that building public-
private collaborative partnerships, starting at the state level, is one of the most important steps that
can be taken now to prepare the nation for future contingencies. Unfortunately, with few exceptions,
durable, collaborative relationships do not today exist.
Consistent with this finding, the Task Force recommends:
A. Creating new ways to institutionalize public-private collaboration at the state and
major metropolitan area levels;
B. Facilitating greater public-private collaboration at the regional and federal levels; and
C. Building a “Business Emergency Management Assistance Compact (BEMAC)” structure.
Surge Capacity/Supply Chain Management
Finding: America’s existing commercial supply chains can provide a wider range of goods and ser-
vices on demand than any level of government can possibly match. During national disasters, these
supply chains have provided goods and services both with and without payment from an end user.
Government at all levels should incorporate such capabilities into disaster response planning. For the
most part, government has so far failed to do so.
Consistent with this finding, the Task Force recommends continued efforts re:
A. Improving government emergency-purchasing protocols;
B. Revising deficient donations management systems; and
C. Modernizing logistics processes across the board.
Business Executives for National Security
5
Legal & Regulatory Environment
Finding: Business requires a predictable legal regime to operate efficiently in an emergency situa-
tion, whether that business is engaged in charitable or profit-motivated activities. The current legal
and regulatory environment is conducive to neither predictability nor efficiency.
Consistent with this finding, the Task Force recommends that Congress:
A. Enact a nationwide body of “disaster law”;
B. Modify the Stafford Act
2
to include the private sector; and
C. Hold hearings to determine which Task Force recommendations can be implemented
under existing law and which require new legislation.
The Task Force urges government to move quickly to integrate business into its disaster response
planning on the federal, state and local levels, and within the operations continuums that link levels of
government together. Recognizing that the task is complex, and that political and fiscal limits make it
impossible to implement all recommendations at once, the Task Force has identified and prioritized
specific desired outcomes and policy drivers in Appendices F-I at the end of this report. This has been
done to facilitate the deliberations of political leaders, responsible government officials and private-
sector experts.
2
The Robert T. Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act (Stafford Act), 42 USC 5121-5206.
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
6
Introduction: Background, Methods and Aims
Americans learn only from catastrophe and not from experience.
—Theodore Roosevelt
For a quarter century, Business Executives for National Security (BENS) has served as the principal
channel through which senior executives can help build a more secure America. As a national, non-
partisan, non-profit organization, BENS has focused on adapting successful models and practices from the
private sector to strengthen the nation’s security.
Coming four years after the September 11, 2001, attacks, the hurricanes of 2005 dramatized the frailties of
our nation’s disaster response system. As the disasters unfolded, BENS was contacted by numerous
business executives seeking help in navigating the bureaucratic obstacles impeding them from providing
private-sector goods and services to those in need. BENS tried to help, but, lacking established
relationships with public-sector responders in the Gulf, successful outcomes were largely elusive.
As the official reports concerning the disasters of the previous summer began to emerge in early 2006,
much was said about improving government responses and even about reaching out to business to help.
But while these reports were long on rhetoric and generalities, they were disappointingly short on specific
plans of action.
So BENS decided to get down to business. In June 2006, BENS chartered a Task Force [see Appendix A]
comprised of senior U.S. business leaders closely tied to disaster response functions: telecommunications,
retail and wholesale supply chains, utilities, manufacturing, real estate, financial services, management
consulting and other key industries. The goal, said Task Force Chairman Duane Ackerman, was “to ensure
that as recovery occurs at the local level, [the efficient application of private-sector capabilities and
resources] are preserved as the disaster escalates and local, state and federal officials are all at the scene
together.”
The aim of the Task Force was to build up what U.S. Comptroller General David M. Walker, during his
March 2006 testimony before the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs,
called the “total force”—by which he meant the coordinated assets of federal, state and local authorities,
the military, non-profit organizations, and the private sector.
With the support of the BENS staff and professional assistance provided pro bono by Science Applications
International Corporation (SAIC), the Task Force members [see Appendix B] laid out an ambitious agenda
for how to approach the task of integrating the private sector into our nation’s disaster response system. In
order to publish a report that captured the broadest possible range of disaster-related experiences and
recommendations, the Task Force asked the BENS staff to design and conduct a comprehensive survey.
Over a 90-day period, interviews were conducted with
nearly 100 CEOs, corporate security and emergency
management officers, and subject-matter experts with
emergency-related knowledge and perspective [see
Appendix C]. This survey data formed a baseline record
of private-sector response to crises. The survey sampled
both small and large businesses in an array of industries
and included a number of former senior government
officials and disaster response experts.
Survey questions focused on respondents’ experiences
with Emergency Operations Centers (EOCs), with the
pre-positioning of goods and services (either for their
own continuity or to assist emergency responders), with
Business Executives for National Security
7
“We need to know how to connect
locally, so that we are not just
addressing the needs of our
employees and their families, but
the needs of the larger community.”
– Dr. Mark A. Sanna, Senior
Director, Global Security, Kraft
Foods, Inc.
3
“From Relief to Recovery: The 2005 U.S. Business Response to the Southeast Asia Tsunami
and Gulf Coast Hurricanes,” U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Business Civic Leadership Center,
March 2006.
physical access and security issues, and with the escalation of authority
from local to state to federal levels. Interviews included discussion about
broad or industry-specific legal and regulatory issues that may have
impeded the implementation of company continuity plans or the ability of a
firm to assist in its community’s recovery operations. Interviewers also
solicited specific suggestions on how to fix the problems identified.
As survey research proceeded, the Task Force organized itself into three
scoping groups to analyze lessons from recent national disasters and to
document examples of private-sector disaster response capabilities.
The Task Force survey was revealing. It reaffirmed several truths that Task
Force members recognized from their own experiences. First, disasters
happen regularly and businesses routinely plan for such contingencies.
Second, businesses in disaster-prone areas often have
extensive experience collaborating with public-sector first
responders. Third, after securing their own operations,
businesses invariably move to help ensure the continuity of the
community. As such, response from the private sector is
typically automatic, not only because businesses are citizens
of their own communities, but also because without continuity
of community no business can be done.
The evidence from the 2005 hurricane season testifies to all
these truths, particularly the final point. Private-sector
assistance during and following the major 2005 hurricanes—
Katrina, Rita and Wilma—totaled about $1.2 billion, 25 percent
of that in products and services, the remainder in cash contributions from
companies, employees and customers. At least 254 companies made cash or
in-kind contributions of $1 million or more.
3
In addition, the U.S. Departments
of Homeland Security (DHS) and Commerce (DOC), as well as state
governments, relied on the business community for reliable information about
the situation on the ground. Situation reports provided by business, based on
their first-hand knowledge of local infrastructure, geography and geology,
helped to shape government’s response.
In thinking about the Task Force’s aims, it soon became clear that the key was
determining how to scale effective local responses up to a true national
response capability. The nine main themes that emerged from the survey
helped Task Force members frame their recommendations.
Preparation: The first theme to emerge from the surveys was that
companies’ experience in preparing for crises is extensive and applicable to
government preparations.
All but the smallest business organizations have a continuity plan in place.
For some, that means compiling executive phone lists, buying satellite
phones with text-messaging functions, and making contingency
arrangements with vendors. Other firms have their own 24-hour emergency
operations centers, run live crisis-scenario drills with government agencies
“We don’t count on plans, we count
on training....[W]e have regular
meetings of our emergency people.
Live exercises, table-tops, including
local first responders and local
government officials.”
– Donna Shalala, President,
University of Miami
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
8
“You have to learn to expect the
unexpected. Not everything will be
found in your crisis management
manual. For example, nowhere in
our crisis management manual did
it demonstrate how to get a dead
600-pound sea lion out of your
parking lot.”
– Lance Ewing, VP Risk
Management, Harrah’s
Entertainment, Inc.
“[W]e had a ver y instructi ve
vantage point being the
headquarters and watching [the
response] grow, and watching the
capability and confusion at the same
time. I saw how it mushroomed:
how complicated it was, how many
players there were, how many
uninformed players there were, how
many inexperienced players there
were, how little they communicated,
and how often they changed. It’s
amazing anything got done.”
– Patrick J. Quinlan, M.D.,
Chief Executive Officer,
Ochsner Clinic Foundation
as participants, and develop emergency fall-back plans with their
competition so that business can be moved to a remote location in the
event of crisis. Nearly all companies stressed the importance of training
their employees and crisis management leaders.
Another important aspect of preparation is planning how to distribute goods
and services to the people who need them. Major retailers know to stock
up on extra supplies during hurricane season and position them just outside
the hurricane zone in order to be able to deliver them immediately after a
storm passes. Government needs to leverage that private-sector capacity
and plan for its use.
Many interviewees stressed that continuity plans need to be flexible and
imaginative. Business employees and government officials need to be
prepared to operate in unpredictable emergency situations. This involves
devising plans that are imaginative enough to deal with a host of different
circumstances (such as the failure of levees in New Orleans) and are
flexible enough to allow individuals to deal with completely unexpected
events.
Relationships: The second theme is that relationships must be established in
advance of a crisis.
Companies pursue pre-crisis relationships for their own continuity plans by
developing lines of communication among employees and senior executives;
with neighbors, suppliers and even competitors; and with government author-
ities at all levels. Said one interviewee, “you don’t want to be handing out
business cards...in the middle of an emergency.” Many company representa-
tives complained that, based on what they witnessed during the 2005
hurricanes, government appeared to have failed to make connections even
among its own agencies, not to mention with the private sector.
The question often posed was that if cutthroat business competitors manage
to cooperate in a crisis, why can’t government agencies?
Authority: The third theme is that there is a lack of clarity about who is in
charge once governmental authority escalates from the local to the state
and federal levels.
Federal, state, and local government personnel are all on the scene
following any Incident of National Significance, and confusion among them
is common and somewhat understandable. Problems with credentialing
and permitting, fights among agencies (even those under the same
department), and problems related to commandeered goods and equipment
are omnipresent. The surveys uncovered a number of stories where a
company’s trucks were commandeered by one agency while trying to
deliver emergency supplies under contract to another. There also were
cases where vehicles credentialed by one government authority were
denied entry to the disaster area by another government authority down the
road. There were many cases where two or more agencies, regardless of
government level, would butt heads over turf issues in the midst of a crisis.
Business Executives for National Security
9
“We’re competitors, not enemies. We
collaborate during emergencies.... We
had one competitor who gave us office
space, and we’d do the same for
them. Relationships were all in place
beforehand.”
– Gregg Jones, Chief
Administrative Officer,
Greenberg Traurig, LLP
“On the communication side: If the
land lines aren’t working—which
they are not if the power is down—
you will only have cell phones.
Whatever system you have, they have
two problems: one, the power to the
towers went down, and two, their
backup batteries only had a short
useful life.... So in any business that
is spread out...you’re basically out of
business. This season all of the senior
executives have three separate cell
phones on different systems, hoping
that at least one of the systems will
be up and operating in the areas
where we need it.”
– Gerald D. Kelfer, President &
CEO, Avatar Holdings Inc.
One organization told an interviewer that while the Federal Emergency
Management Agency (FEMA) was, figuratively, at one door to help, the
Customs and Immigration Service (CIS) was at the other, trying to remove
employees whose visas were invalidated because the organization was
closed for business (even though closure was due to the very same hurricane
that its fellow DHS agency was addressing via recovery efforts).
Communications: The fourth theme is that operational and accurate
communications are vital.
Crisis wreaks havoc with technology. From 9/11 to Wilma, we were told
that phones and computers do not work (either because of a lack of
electricity or because satellite, cellular and land lines have crashed).
People cannot physically move to back-up communications locations
because of evacuations or public-safety concerns. But the problem
transcends technology. During Katrina, even when a company could feed
into a government source or EOC, it was reported that the information
available was often confusing and inconsistent, particularly when multiple
government authorities were on hand.
Interviewees differed on what would constitute an ideal arrangement for
coordinating communications. Some preferred that one voice speak on
behalf of all government to the private sector; others preferred to gather
information from multiple sources and sort it out on their own. All concurred
on three points, however: that more organized communication between
government and business needs to occur; that government personnel must
be clear about what they need; and that officials placed in a
communications role must have the authority to make quick decisions.
Logistics: The fifth theme is that a need exists for improved methods to
deliver goods and services to the government or directly to needy
communities during crises.
Interviewees discussed at length government’s inability to accept and
distribute goods and services in an efficient manner following Katrina.
Everything from food and clothing to medical care came in, but without
control over the distribution system, ice melted, donated clothing piled up
and rotted, and medical personnel were turned away. One company had
600,000 tarps available to cover damaged roofs, but the federal
government was unable to draw on the supply chain to secure and
distribute them. Another company offered to donate three mobile
communications units, only to be told that their offer was refused and then
countered with a request to buy ten of the same. We were told by one
interviewee that a senior manager of a large transportation association
spent a full day trying—and failing—to locate a single authoritative point of
contact within FEMA to coordinate bus deployments. Numerous examples
were cited of the government’s inability to accept private-sector donations,
often because of a lack of pre-defined procedures or mechanisms for doing
so.
Interestingly, many companies we interviewed had not heard of DHS’
National Emergency Response Registry (NERR). The NERR, created during
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
10
“You go to war with the army you
have. The problem in Katrina was
that the FEMA army was ill-
equipped for the job, and the lesson
we took away from it was that we
have to marry the private sector and
the public sector before the disaster
occurs, otherwise those resources will
not flow and will not be made
available. Once the disaster occurs,
it’s too late to begin to develop
personal relationships, and to put
in place the systems that are
necessary that will facilitate the
people at the federal side and state
and local sides, working with the
private sector.”
– Peter F. Carpenter, President,
INSTEDD
“Have you heard the FEMA Bob
and FEMA Joe stories?...The way
people down here learned to deal
with FEMA was to just talk to
them more than once. FEMA Joe
will tell you one day that you can’t
do this, but if you go back the next
day and talk to FEMA Bob, he’ll
tell you that you can.”
– John McFarland, Marketing
Director, The Biloxi Sun Herald
the Hurricane Katrina response, was an Internet-based system to source
goods and services to the government during emergencies. Most
interviewees expressed support for the concept but wanted to know why
the NERR was kept a virtual secret from businesses, given that DHS sought
to implement such a system. That frustration also was reflected by some in
government.
Other companies discussed concerns about government contracting, with
many stories about procurement process problems. Surprisingly, complaints
never focused on payment issues (although some companies reported very
long delays in FEMA reimbursements). Rather, many companies were
perplexed by rules requiring federal government agencies—but not states
and localities—to refuse pro bono donations and demand for-fee contracts
instead. Still other complaints noted that work offered at one fee was
sometimes rejected in favor of the same work paid at a higher fee—which
some companies regarded as unconscionable. For example, one large
restaurant chain offered to distribute boxed lunches at a price of $4.50 per
lunch but ultimately rescinded the offer when FEMA refused to pay less
than $6 per lunch. Many of these problems stemmed from government
procedures that tied the hands of FEMA officials. However, it also was
reported that many government contracting officers seemed to be unaware
of the variety of contracting vehicles available to them during crises, and
either did not know how to streamline the contracting process or were not
empowered to do so.
Business response: The sixth theme is that like government authorities,
companies also play the role of first responders and thus need to be given
priority status.
The private sector plays a critical role in post-disaster community
reconstruction. Disasters often destroy many key components of a
community’s critical infrastructure, and business continuity for companies
in those industries (such as energy and telecommunications) is an essential
component of the community’s immediate recovery. Therefore, these
corporate first responders (identified as such by the authorities and prior to
a crisis) need to be given priority status with regard to credentialing and
access to facilities, affected areas, and information. Many interviewees
also proposed that banks and waste removal services should be added to
this list of corporate first responders, since two repeatedly-mentioned areas
of post-disaster civil unrest concerned cash and garbage pick-up.
Because the private sector plays an essential role in rebuilding the
community, it is important that government agencies generally refrain from
commandeering essential goods from corporate first responders. Many
interviewees specifically complained that government officials often
commandeered their backup fuel tanks. Fuel and power frequently were
cited as the most important resources needed early in a crisis. Without
those inputs, business cannot proceed—and many continuity plans fall
apart. Some interviewees also suggested that laws be enacted to require
gas stations to install emergency generators, ensuring that they can pump
their own fuel in emergency situations.
Business Executives for National Security
11
“If you start reading the 300-page
National Pandemic Flu Plan, they
categorize and prioritize different
categories in terms of what they
think is critical infrastructure—
garbage men are level 6, which is
almost at the bottom. You’d think
we’d be up there with critical
utilities because that’s basically
what we are, but we’re not. We’re
down there below everybody and
their brother.”
– Michael R. Lambert,
Corporate Director of Safety,
Republic Services, Inc.
“If you’ve got twenty employees in
your firm, and you are trying to give
them some cash so that they can take
care of their families—they might
not have a home, they might not have
a car, they might not have a place to
stay—you try and give them $500
each—that’s $10,000, and you’ve
got to fill out a...currency transaction
report—for an established
customer! That’s my pet peeve, and
you can’t get...Washington to even
think about: if it is a national
disaster, waive it for a week, waive
it for...two week
established customer.”
– Chevis Swetman, Chairman,
President & CEO, Peoples
Financial Corporation
FEMA: The seventh theme is that FEMA must make dramatic improvements
in the planning and coordination of its recovery efforts.
Nearly all respondents asserted that FEMA failed in its efforts following
Katrina. There were a few good stories shared, but all agreed on two points.
First, FEMA representatives were replaced far too often, which resulted in
FEMA policies being inconsistently applied and the establishment of
working relationships with FEMA on the local level becoming nearly
impossible. Second, the mechanisms for establishing two-way
communications with FEMA officials on the ground were unreliable from
the start and quickly overwhelmed.
The Good Samaritan: The eighth theme is that the vast majority of
companies—like the vast majority of citizens—will strive to “do the right
thing” during crises.
When asked about their Good Samaritan actions, most companies simply
said that they aimed to do the right thing and worried about the monetary
and regulatory implications later. When asked what aspect of previous
disaster recovery efforts they are proud of most, companies said that it was
being able to help their communities and their own employees.
One can discern from this feedback that organizational cultures that are not
risk-averse in their daily behaviors will not be inclined to be risk-adverse in
a crisis. The challenge is how to transfer this cultural insight from the
private sector to government bureaucracies.
Legal and Regulatory Barriers: The ninth theme is that regardless of
industry, size, or location, companies found significant regulatory barriers
that hindered their ability to execute their own continuity plans, to assist
within their communities, assist other communities, and work in concert
with government recovery efforts. Some of those impediments, such as
permitting and credentialing, have been mentioned above. Others involved
financial filings, gasoline mixes, health inspections, and much more. In fact,
the interviews uncovered far more than we could catalogue in this report.
In many cases, government authorities waived regulations that would prove
to be unnecessary or overly burdensome in the midst of crisis. In others, the
government did approve the waiver—but only after weeks of meetings in
Washington. Of course, there also were reports of laws and regulations not
being waived at all, leaving companies in fear of legal reprisal should they
act to “do the right thing” versus consulting their legal counsel first.
The three Task Force scoping groups set out to develop recommendations
that flowed from their own experience. Informed by these nine insights,
they focused on developing key questions for deliberation. They are:
Public-Private Collaboration
• How can business become better integrated structurally into the
disaster response effort?
• What mechanisms can improve how business and government
communicate and coordinate decision-making before, during and
after a crisis, at all levels of government?
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
12
Surge Capacity/Supply Chain Management
• How can government improve contingency contracting and pre-
qualification of vendors for goods and services that will likely be
needed?
• How can government and business facilitate and accelerate the
delivery of resources (assets and volunteers) that business offers on
a pro bono basis?
• How can business emergency-response resources be deployed and
managed by federal, state and local government agencies to
maximize speed and utility and minimize redundancy?
Legal & Regulatory Environment
• How can government improve Good Samaritan laws to better
protect businesses and their employees who volunteer to help?
• How can legislation, regulation and policy be better aligned at the
federal, state and local levels to encourage private-sector
preparedness and better mobilize the private sector in a
catastrophic event?
• Is revision of the Stafford Act desirable?
After assimilating the results of the Task Force survey, each scoping group
developed recommendations for the near term that optimize business
participation in disaster response. They also developed recommendations
for the systematic longer-term integration of the private sector into the
National Response Plan and its execution in a disaster.
These recommendations are presented in the following three
chapters. A fourth chapter—an “Expert’s Guide to Priorities and
Sequencing”—describes a path for systematic private-sector
integration consistent with the federal government’s revised
NRP; it is the Task Force’s summary statement of the actions
required to implement the recommendations in this report.
Business Executives for National Security
13
“Public-private partnerships are
truly the best way for America to
imagine solving its problems down the
road, [including both] the simplest
notion of a standard setting
responsibility, being that of the
federal government, and the real
generation of solutions to problems
being forthcoming from the private
sector–the link between the two is the
ultimate public-private partnership
that will be the answer to so many
of our challenges.”
– Admiral James M. Loy, USCG
(Ret.), Senior Counselor, The
Cohen Group
4
Critical infrastructure includes: 1) Agriculture, food (meat, poultry, egg products); 2) Public health
and healthcare; 3) Food (other than meat, poultry, egg products); 4) Drinking water and wastewater
treatment systems; 5) Energy, including the production, refining, storage, and distribu-tion of oil
and gas, and electric power (except for commercial nuclear power facilities); 6) Banking and finance; 7)
National monuments and icons; 8) Defense industrial base; 9) Information tech-nology; 10)
Telecommunications; 11) Chemical; 12) Transportation systems; 13) Emergency services; 14) Postal
and shipping; 15) Dams; 16) Government facilities; 17) Commercial facilities;
18) Nuclear reactors, materials, and waste.
5
The Disaster Response Supply Chain consists of commercial suppliers, distributors, and vendors
at the wholesale and retail level.
6
Non-governmental and charitable organizations are also critically important to disaster-response
efforts, but their role is beyond the scope of this Task Force.
Chapter 1. Public-Private Collaboration
Finding: The American private sector must be systematically integrated
into the nation’s response to disasters, natural and man-made alike. Gov-
ernment alone cannot manage major crises nor effectively integrate the
private sector after a crisis occurs. The Task Force believes that building
public-private collaborative partnerships, starting at the state level, is one
of the most important steps that can be taken now to prepare the nation
for future contingencies. Unfortunately, with few exceptions, durable, col-
laborative relationships do not today exist.
Consistent with this finding, the Task Force recommends:
A. Creating new ways to institutionalize public-private
collaboration at the state and major metropolitan area levels;
B. Facilitating greater public-private collaboration at the regional
and federal levels; and
C. Building a “Business Emergency Management Assistance
Compact (BEMAC)” structure.
Local, state or regional public-private partnerships are vital to filling gaps in
homeland security and disaster response that neither government nor
business can manage alone. These partnerships mobilize private-sector
cooperation—including the supply of material assets, volunteers,
information and expertise—that strengthens our nation’s capability to
prevent, prepare for, and respond to catastrophic events.
For responding to disasters, the private sector encompasses the for-profit
business community in all its aspects. Those aspects include critical
infrastructure,
4
the disaster response supply chain,
5
and other business
sectors (e.g., architecture and engineering firms, the hospitality industry,
mortuary services) that may be called on for support in a crisis or that are
necessary for the continuity of community in the aftermath of a disaster.
6
Ensuring continuity of community is essential for recovery from disaster in
all forms. Good will aside (and there were innumerable examples of
companies acting out of nothing more than corporate citizenship), although
most businesses plan for rebuilding and restoration of operations and for the
safety and security of employees, they also recognize the
interdependencies that exist in communities. A functioning community is
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
14
best defined by its natural commercial and social relationships, and can be
a locality, a state, an urban area within a state, or multiple states. If business
is to reconnect with its customer base, care for employees, restore
operations, and recover quickly from a catastrophic event, it has a clear
incentive to participate in the community response to disaster.
Whether activating established distribution networks or deploy-
ing aid quickly in the aftermath of a disaster, the private sector
can play a critical role in securing communities nationwide. The
private sector also needs—and can provide in return—disaster
information, coordination of access, protection and prioritization
of resources (e.g, fuel). A further benefit is that private sector
emergency resources can improve overall situational aware-
ness—if they are tied into the local, state and federal systems.
Established partnerships work because they enable business and
government leaders to work together not just once but on an
ongoing basis across many initiatives and all industry sectors.
Government and business know intuitively that they need to work together
during crisis, but how to do so does not come without effort on both sides.
Business-government collaborations require a level of trust and agility that
is easiest to build at the local, state and regional levels and possible at all
levels. It is important that local communities be as self-supporting as
possible in their crisis-response capacities, putting a high premium on the
efficiencies to be gained through cooperation; federal response capabilities
may be quickly overwhelmed if Washington were faced with several
simultaneous incidents.
At the same time, business must adopt new methods of cooperation to
support federal emergency response efforts. New structures are needed for
this purpose, and among these, regional public-private partnerships can be
critical in helping to sort through the multiple and overlapping requests from
federal, state and local government agencies that arise in a crisis. Regional
arrangements can allow business and government leaders to better
coordinate requests from multiple government agencies and to develop
coherent disaster response plans according to the needs and priorities of
their respective regions.
A. Institutionalizing Public-Private Collaboration at State and Major
Metropolitan Area levels
The purpose of state Emergency Operations Centers (EOCs) is to facilitate
coordination among essential government personnel during a crisis.
Through its emergency and disaster grants program, the federal government
has encouraged states to develop EOCs.
7
Many states and cities have
indeed developed such capabilities, as have major utility companies. The
Task Force recommends that those states, cities and other critical
infrastructure entities that have not should do so promptly.
7
Public Law 107-206, “2002 Supplemental Appropriations Act for Further Recovery From and
Response To Terrorist Attacks on the United States.” Phase 1 grants of $50,000 to each state are
used for an initial assessment of the hazards, vulnerabilities and resultant risk to existing EOCs. Phase
2 grants address the most immediate deficiencies and require a 50 percent non-federal cost share.
“[Y]ou have to recognize the
strengths of the various
areas...And those strengths are not
the same. [T]here is no reason to
expect government...to be as good
at military deployment as the
military is. The point is that
businesses are better able to execute
on certain things, the military is
better able to execute on some
things, and government is better
able to execute on some things. And
the question is how you link them
up and take advantage of those
various strengths. The failure was
access to tremendous resources that
were just under-utilized or never
accessed because there was no
communication and there was no
imperative to pull them in.”
–Thomas A. Oreck, President,
Oreck Corporation
Business Executives for National Security
15
Like government, most major (and many smaller) retailers and vendors in
the disaster supply chain have their own emergency operations centers.
These centers provide a location where employees in charge of emergency
management can communicate with the workforce and make important
business continuity decisions. Among the companies that do not have
EOCs, most still have emergency communications, protection, and
restoration plans. The extent of business continuity planning varies among
industry sectors and among individual businesses.
Because government has EOCs to coordinate emergency response, and
because the private sector has its own EOCs and emergency restoration
plans, it seems logical that government should use its EOCs to tap into the
vast organization of emergency resources and communication networks the
private sector can offer. Thus, the Task Force recommends that every state
and major metropolitan EOC offer a seat at the table—or broaden
representation if it already exists— for at least one business representative to
serve as liaison to the business community at large. This representation
should complement, not replace, presence in the EOC granted currently to
public utilities. Further, the Task Force recommends that a Business
Operations Center (BOC) be established to operate in conjunction with each
EOC, to provide a forum for collaboration, coordination, and decision making
between the public and private sectors.
Participation in the BOC should represent critical infrastructure and other
industries/companies vital to community viability and continuity in crisis
situations. Recognizing that it is not possible for all businesses to participate
at the “table” at once, the Task Force recommends that BOC membership be
generally rotating and structured in three tiers:
1) Critical infrastructure owners and operators as permanent members;
2) Other sectors or companies deemed critical to restoring the
continuity of community, represented as necessary (these
seats could be rotating or permanent, based on the number
of such businesses or the nature of the functions they
provide to the community); and,
3) Entities representing business at large within the
community (Chambers of Commerce, professional or trade
organizations, or civic clubs, e.g., Rotary), as rotating
participants that can reach back to their business
membership for help or information sharing.
The BOC concept creates an operational capability that
integrates private-sector resources into emergency response plans. It is
precisely this operational capability that is missing from the National
Response Plan as currently constructed—despite the frequent exhortations
in federal reports that the private sector be included. A BOC, connected
structurally to its corresponding EOC, will greatly enhance disaster-
response capability by providing a vehicle to include the private sector in
planning, preparation, training, exercises and execution.
8
“A new topic [in disaster response]
is ‘cross-industry response.’ The
telephone companies can only do so
much on their own, because
eventually they rely on the power
companies, who in turn rely on some
other industr y such as the
transportation industry. [W]e need
to consider what happens to the
other related industries such as the
financial industr y, [which is]
dependent on the transmission of
data among their various sites.
Working together on a cross-industry
basis is the only truly complete
solution.”
– Larry Babbio, Vice Chairman
and President, Verizon
Communications, Inc.
8
Although outside the Task Force’s purview, our assessment suggests that EOCs also should have
substantial non-governmental organization (NGO) representation. Many EOCs have a seat for the
American Red Cross and Voluntary Organizations Assisting in Disaster (VOADs), which include
NGOs and faith-based organizations; however, participation is not consistent across the country.
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
16
The Task Force believes that to ensure that the BOC concept spreads nation-
wide, the Congress should direct DHS to create guidelines and funding for
states and urban areas to build BOCs. Public-private communications sys-
tems and data interchanges may require direct appropriation. However,
sustaining funding through the DHS Grants & Training program should be
tied to the states and urban areas developing, training and exercising the EOC-
BOC collaboration.
The state of Georgia has developed and is exercising the BOC concept.
The Georgia BOC will be operated by a team of representatives from
corporations, trade associations and chambers of commerce. The BOC
will have about 30 organizational representatives who will be aligned
with the state’s Emergency Support Functions (ESFs), as defined in the
National Response Plan. BOC representatives must maintain an exten-
sive knowledge of a company’s operations and possess the authority to
quickly commit company resources. In addition, the BOC will have a
team of analysts with broad understanding of multiple commercial sec-
tors and the ability to rapidly define problems and propose solutions for
them. It is likely that one to two full-time employees with relevant emer-
gency management experience will be required to adequately manage
and sustain the BOC.
The Georgia BOC will initially operate virtually, using teleconferencing,
email and other web-based tools for communication, with the exception
that the BOC manager and analysts will co-locate at or near the Georgia
Emergency Operations Center (GEOC).
One also can look to similar examples in Florida, Massachusetts, Texas,
Utah, Los Angeles, New York City and the San Francisco Bay Area. All
are organized somewhat differently according to the particular require-
ments of the jurisdictions they serve, but the overriding theme in each is
the presence of the private sector in each phase of operation, from plan-
ning through execution.
Recommendation:
A. Integrate business into existing and prospective Emergency Operations
Centers (EOCs) of states and large urban areas through the
establishment of Business Operations Centers (BOCs).
1. Formalize a business presence in state and urban emergency
operations centers, to include emergency planning, training and
testing through periodic drills.
2. Include Critical Infrastructure sectors, if not already represented, and
those industry sectors not classified as critical but typically a part of
the disaster response supply chain (e.g., retail and wholesale), and
other critical businesses, such as the service and hospitality
industries. Businesses need cross-sector links to one another and the
credentials and clearances to operate with state and local EOCs
before, during and after a catastrophic event.
Business Executives for National Security
17
3. Congress should tie this requirement to receipt of federal homeland
security grants/funds.
4. Require testing, training and exercising of a formal business
presence in state and local emergency operations centers to ensure
proper functioning in a crisis.
5. Ensure that the BOC remains a permanent entity by codifying it in
the National Response Plan, sustained by the DHS-sponsored grants
program.
B. Facilitating Greater Public-Private Collaboration at Regional and Federal
Levels—Scaling-up to an Incident of National Significance
Unless their operations are compromised or incapacitated, state and local
governments are likely to have the first look at what goods and services are
needed during a crisis. They are responsible for transmitting this information
to public and private relief organizations.
If, however, a disaster rises to the level of an Incident of National
Significance,
9
the resources of the federal government are brought to bear.
The introduction of federal resources and authority presents the challenge of
“scaling-up” to accommodate a new set of players without loss of
efficiency.
Within the National Response Plan, the mechanism for this “scaling-up”
process is the Joint Field Office (JFO). Before we face another disaster, it
“Prior to the federal government
getting involved, most communities
have a local plan that has local
players that have relationships and
know what to do, especially around
critical infrastructure. Once that
process is overwhelmed, that’s where
the issue begins to get
complicated....That’s when...the
problem escalates in terms of degree
of complexity, and all the
relationships between the federal
government and the state, the federal
government and the private sector,
[and] the federal government and
the city become the issue at hand.”
– Duane Ackerman, President &
CEO, BellSouth Corporation
9
The National Response Plan recognizes the potential magnitude of threats from weapons of
mass destruction and severe natural disasters by adoption of a new term, the Incident of
National Significance. An Incident of National Significance is described as an incident with high
impact requiring an extensive and well-coordinated response by federal, state, local, tribal, and
nongovernmental authorities to save lives, minimize damage, and provide the basis for long-
term community and economic recovery.
Figure 1. Business Operations Center Concept
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
18
must be resolved how business will “plug in” to the plan as DHS
organizations and the U.S. Northern Command (NORTHCOM) come into
the mix through the JFO. To smoothly transition from local and state
operations to federal presence, business-government relationships and
roles within the JFO must be more than predetermined; they must be
practiced.
This recommendation sounds straightforward, but in truth, the task is both
challenging and complex. Government and the private sector must work
together to identify, in advance, governmental needs and the resources
available to match them. Roles on both sides must be clear, and each entity
must play to its strengths with as little mutual interference as possible. When
possible, government must provide information on required goods and
services, access to disaster sites, and security for relief workers in the area of
operations. The private sector must in turn be prepared to execute its supply
chain operations according to established procedures, with the least possible
regulatory interference and with reasonable protection from legal liabilities.
DHS recently established a liaison to the critical infrastructure
Emergency Support Functions (ESFs).
10
The JFO has a critical
infrastructure liaison position intended to interface with all
critical infrastructure companies—but one individual cannot
handle all of the activity generated in a crisis. That is why
DHS should establish a private-sector position linked to a
BOC-like concept in the JFO and establish an ongoing public-
private relationship in each of the ten FEMA regional offices.
In both cases, two conditions must be met for the liaison to be
effective: the business designee(s) must have sufficient
authority to commit the businesses they represent to take action; and the
government, especially in the JFO, must recognize that BOC input deserves
serious and high-level attention.
The Task Force believes that to build enduring public-private collaborations
at the regional and federal levels Congress needs to direct DHS to create
guidelines and provide funding for such entities.
Recommendation:
B. Facilitate greater public-private collaboration that will continue as
disaster response and recovery activities escalate to include federal
components under a Joint Field Office structure.
1. Establish long-term solutions that fully integrate the private sector
with regional entities and federal agencies, including creation of a
Business Operations Center (BOC) model at the JFO and/or FEMA
regional level. Recognize that a single event spanning multiple
regions or multiple events in different regions may require the
operation of more than one JFO/FEMA-BOC structures.
2. Establish a common set of private-sector expectations and “rules of
engagement” consistent with local, state and federal roles,
10
Emergency Support Function 15 – External Affairs has been modified (July 2006) to include
the private sector.
Business Executives for National Security
19
responsibilities and methods of operation. Broadcast these standards
widely and conduct necessary training and practical exercises, so
that they are thoroughly understood in advance of an actual disaster.
3. Weave the above recommendations into a strong fabric of business-
government collaboration on a nationwide basis:
a. Create regional partnerships with common elements and local
flexibility to provide the resources, structure and local
commitment needed to implement and exercise Task Force
recommendations on a sustainable basis.
b. Ensure BOC personnel understand and complete training under
the National Incident Management System (NIMS).
c. Provide outcomes-based federal funding to enable regional
partnerships to implement and exercise the above
recommendations and share best practices across the country.
C. A Business Emergency Management Assistance Compact
A successful example of a national mechanism for matching needs with
available resources is the state mutual-aid program known as the
Emergency Management Assistance Compact, or EMAC. EMAC currently
enables affected states to request government resources from non-affected
states, and it obliges non-affected states to comply if they are able.
The EMAC program could and should be expanded to include private-sector
resources. An expanded EMAC program could knit together a fabric of state-
based Business Operations Centers to create a scalable, flexible and robust
“[EMAC has] existed since
Hurricane Andrew. We test it every
year, we exercise, we have written policy
manuals, guided direction; it really can
serve as a model for that kind of
provision. It’s simple but robust, and
that’s ultimately what we’re talking
about when it comes to private-public
partnership.”
– Mike Sherberger, former
Director, Georgia Office of
Homeland Security/Georgia
Emergency Management Agency
Figure 2. BOC concept at the FEMA/JFO level
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
20
“network of networks.” Trained private-sector representatives would work
alongside emergency management leaders to coordinate government and
private-sector resources using interoperable processes and technical tools
(e.g., same communication systems, same data exchange systems, etc.). This
program would provide the mechanism for identifying in advance and rapidly
deploying billions of dollars of business resources on a nationwide basis.
The Task Force will nominate a team to work with the National Emer-
gency Management Association (NEMA) to explore application of the
Emergency Management Assistance Compact (EMAC) model to the task
of identifying, cataloguing and requesting private sector-resources for use
by government.
Recommendation:
C. Build a Business Emergency Management Assistance Compact
(BEMAC) Structure.
1. Expand existing FEMA and state models to better forecast the
resources and capabilities that are critical in the early stages of a
disaster.
2. Create state and regional resource registries of private-sector
resources, including resources government expects to purchase and
those that business expects to provide on a pro bono basis during
catastrophic events.
3. Create a mechanism similar to EMAC to connect business resources
in unaffected states to states in the disaster zone.
4. Create business support teams similar to EMAC “A-teams,” which
send emergency management officials from outside the disaster
zone to the affected state(s).
5. A BEMAC system should complement, not replace, existing mutual
aid processes like those in place in the public utilities sectors.
Business Executives for National Security
21
“If something is disrupted, [there
must be a] plan for reconstitution
that makes sense, rather than ‘first
come, first served’ or ‘we’re bigger
than you are.’ ”
– Bruce Townsend, Corporate VP,
Security, FedEx Corporation
Chapter 2. Surge Capacity/Supply Chain
Management
Finding: America’s existing commercial supply chains provide a wider
range of goods and services on demand than any level of government
can possibly match. During national disaster, these supply chains have
provided goods and services, both with and without payment from an
end user. Government at all levels should incorporate such capabilities
into disaster response planning. For the most part, government has so far
failed to do so.
Consistent with this finding, the Task Force recommends continued efforts re:
A. Improving government emergency-purchasing protocols;
B. Revising deficient donations management systems; and
C. Modernizing logistics processes across the board.
In the wake of recent national disasters, government agencies at all levels
have tried to prepare themselves for future contingencies by forecasting
needs and arranging to secure resources. Unfortunately, with the exception
of critical infrastructure, the role of the private sector remains unscripted
and untested—despite the fact that the private sector is the ultimate source
of the materiel and commercial services that will be needed.
The nation must do much more to develop the “emergency marketplace” in
advance of the next crisis. To do so, four overarching principles should apply:
• The private sector routinely operates efficient supply chains;
government should not be expending time, effort, and money to
build its own.
• The goal is to get product to the disaster zone quickly and at fair
market price.
• In the disaster zone, the private sector must be granted access and
know that adequate security will be provided.
• More planning needs to be put into “last mile logistics.”
A. Improving Emergency-Purchasing Protocols
Business prepares for disaster by developing relationships with public
officials in the community and knowing what emergency services are
locally available. It plans for protection of its business infrastructure and
merchandise, as well as for the safety of its employees. Many businesses
have methods of maintaining or re-establishing contact with employees so
that business continuity can be readily restored. When warning is available,
major supply chains, using point-of-sale data from previous disasters, begin
moving necessary products towards a disaster zone in advance of need.
They also develop contingency contracts or agreements to obtain goods and
services that are likely to be needed in case of emergency.
Like business, government can predict some (but not all) of its needs prior to
a crisis. And like business, government can and should plan ahead to have
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
22
those needs filled in the wake of a disaster. To do so, it must communicate its
projected resource requirements to its suppliers. Armed with such
information, commercial relationships between the private sector and
governments at all levels can be pre-negotiated for those goods and services;
examples include electrical power, communications capabilities,
engineering/construction, equipment maintenance, field services (e.g.,
lodging, food services and sanitation), security, medical services, mortuary
services, supply operations, and transportation.
Many localities and states have already entered into contracts with the
private sector to provide these crisis and post-crisis goods and services.
Likewise, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) has
contracts in place to provide the most common commodities (like water and
ice) that are needed following a disaster.
The disaster recovery agencies should establish blanket purchase
agreements with the suppliers of emergency materials, thus making the
contracting process quicker and more efficient. Regardless of the type of pre-
qualified government contracting vehicle, however, the contracting officers
must be trained, ready, and authorized to make quick decisions within the
bounds of those arrangements.
In November 2006, the General Services Administration (GSA) consolidated
its emergency response resources into a new Office of Emergency Response
and Recovery, providing a central location from which it can support first
responders, emergency workers and recovery teams. For both routine
purchasing and emergency contracting, some companies have elected to
become certified suppliers to the federal government through the GSA
Federal Supply Schedule. This mechanism avails the federal purchaser
access to thousands of pre-qualified vendors who hold “schedule” contracts
with GSA that establish purchasing mechan-isms and commercial pricing
similar to catalog buying. By virtue of pre-certification, GSA Schedule
vendors will likely be preferred by government purchasers and receive “first
bite.” To further consolidate buying opportunities, GSA introduced a Disaster
Relief and Emergency Preparedness Category to its popular online storefront,
GSA Advantage!
®
Of note, the FY 2007 National Defense Authorization Act
(PL 109-364, Sect. 833) allows states and localities to purchase from the GSA
Schedule to facilitate recovery from natural disasters (as declared by the
President), terrorism and certain types of attacks.
Beyond that GSA Schedule pool, there is an even larger vendor market that
must be accessible in a crisis. In the first week after a crisis, materials availa-
bility is paramount. Many capable vendors in a disaster area may not have
undergone a GSA certification, and those that have may no longer have the
capability to deliver on their pre-crisis agreements and contracts. This Task
Force recommends that in addition to the multiple contracting schedules,
government must improve its access to the national commercial marketplace
for additional support in a crisis. For example, FEMA should pre-qualify
vendors after studying the use of qualified bidders lists (QBL) in accordance
with the authority established in the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR).
The supply chain would benefit from a rigorous and adaptable qualifying and
pricing process identified and implemented in advance of the need.
“I find it sadly humorous that the
media was so surprised that some
great American companies... were
really good at the logistics of this.
What do you think these people do
for a living? They’re not $200 billion
companies because they’re stupid!”
– A restaurateur affected by
Hurricane Katrina
Business Executives for National Security
23
Also, the public sector should recognize and capitalize on the ubiquity of
large-scale retailers likely to be in or near the disaster zone. Such retailers
should be preferred when they are unmatched in terms of materials
availability and quick delivery, advantages that are not readily duplicated in
the public sector.
Contracting officers also must become better at using the emergency
contracting authorities available to them in the FAR. In May 2003, the Office
of Federal Procurement Policy (OFPP) published guidance on the use of
emergency procurement flexibilities to help ensure that agencies could
effectively meet the demands associated with fighting terrorism. The OFPP is
currently updating its guidance to also address flexibilities relevant to other
emergency situations. With the guidance in place, it is important for
contracting officers to be trained and tested, just the same as first responders,
in any emergency preparedness exercises conducted at local, state and
federal levels.
While pre-contracting for emergencies has been improved—especially at
the federal level, in the wake of Katrina—the Task Force believes that more
can be done to leverage the vast resources of the private sector in a crisis.
The mechanism most in need of development between government and the
private sector is a means to deliver commercial goods in a crisis in a timely
and cost-effective manner. As stated at the outset of this chapter, existing
commercial supply chains provide a wider array of goods and services than
the government can match. It is not evident that government has fully
leveraged these private-sector resources in its planning. This process must
allow for the effective use of vendors present in affected areas that have the
existing/surviving infrastructure to deliver within the “last mile.”
A consistent criticism of government buying in a crisis is that emergency
procurement rules are scattered throughout thousands of pages of federal
regulations and, thus, are obscure and hard to locate. Consequent to Katrina,
in July 2006 the government issued an interim rule concerning the Federal
Acquisition Regulation (FAR) that has the effect of providing a single refer-
ence to acquisition flexibilities that may be used to facilitate and expe-
dite acquisitions of supplies and services during emergency situations.
Specifically, this rule revises FAR Part 18 to provide a single reference to
the acquisition flexibilities already available to expedite acquisitions of
supplies and services during emergencies. For ease of use, the flexibilities
are divided into two main groups: “Available Acquisition Flexibilities,”
which may be used anytime and do not require an emergency declara-
tion; and “Emergency Acquisition Flexibilities,” which may be used only
after an emergency declaration or designation has been made by an
appropriate official. The second group is further divided into three sub-
groups: contingency operation; defense or recovery from certain attacks;
and incidents of national significance, emergency declaration, or major
disaster declarations.
This addition to the FAR adds no new rules and regulations.
“We had to fight for fuel with the
government and [other companies]
– even though we were all on the
same team. We’re all calling the
same five guys to get the same things.
It would be far better if there were
a pre-positioned supply chain.”
— Robert S. Boh, President and
CEO, Boh Bros. Construction
Co., LLC
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
24
Recommendation:
A. Improve forecasting for emergency goods and services, putting more
pre-contracts in place and pre-qualifying vendors.
1. Have FEMA, with the help of state emergency organizations, other
DHS offices and the private sector, improve forecasting models for
the most critical items needed during the initial response to the most
likely emergencies/crises:
a. The models should be data-driven from recent experience. Most
major retailers have vast point-of-sale databases that capture the
consumable items most in demand before, during and after a
crisis. These could be provided to modelers through industry trade
organizations.
b. Engage major retailers, or their association representatives, in the
construction of scenarios covering a variety of events and
magnitudes.
2. With the above list, FEMA should work with vendors to establish
pricing mechanisms that would set prices during the crisis period at
the market price in effect immediately preceding the emergency.
Electronic markets exist so that price lists for some commodities could
be updated routinely to address normal pre-emergency price
fluctuations. States and local municipalities would agree to use these
price lists in time of emergency (an example is the routinely updated
system of “Average Wholesale Price” used in the pharmaceutical
industry).
a. Establishing a schedule, whether derived from “Average
Wholesale Price” or another method, works well in stable times
and for certain product categories. AWP is a “warehouse” price
and is not applicable to retail pricing, however. As described in
the FAR, schedule pricing cannot change just because of a crisis;
rather, in order to increase pricing, the contract would need to
contemplate the increase.
b. For many “consumable” categories, like groceries, implementing
a schedule or price list is not feasible. Commodity prices can
fluctuate rapidly based on changing market conditions after a
crisis. Likewise, transportation costs also may change significantly
due to the rising cost of fuel, contributing to an overall rise in the
cost of commodities. As a result, schedule pricing could cause
product shortages in a true catastrophe or in a crisis of long
duration. Therefore, FEMA should work with vendors to establish a
business-oriented pricing mechanism allowing the government to
make rapid product selection decisions. The system should
involve pre-qualification of the prospective vendors and then take
into account the factors of 1) vendor’s stated price, 2) vendor’s
availability (when can it be delivered in the desired amount at the
desired location?), and 3) government’s assessment as to the
reliability of the vendor. With the proper pre-qualification of
vendors (e.g., use of a QBL), requests by government can be
Business Executives for National Security
25
transmitted and vendor responses received and processed
quickly.
3. Many major retailers and some states already have pricing policies
that take effect automatically in a declared disaster zone. States,
working through national organizations like the NGA, should take the
lead in developing pricing mechanisms to be implemented in disaster
situations and areas. Decisions to implement pricing policies can be
tied to a state or national declaration of emergency. Rules should
stipulate the duration of the pricing policy and procedures to modify
the duration if conditions change or do not materialize. The decision
to return to normal operation can be made by the states, in
conjunction with the private sector. (As a rule, price blocks should be
geographically based on where the crisis exists. Different areas
reconstitute more quickly than others and can be released from price
blocks more quickly). Such “anti-gouging” regulations should aspire
to national standards to both streamline and simplify their
implementation, but states—not the federal government—should take
the lead in their development.
4. GSA Schedule vendors may opt to take increased inventory positions
on certain Stock Keeping Units (SKUs)
11
prior to forecast events (e.g.,
hurricanes) or long shelf-life items for other kinds of emergencies.
FEMA and/or state EOCs would work with the private sector to assess
and monitor pre-emergency inventory buildup:
a. The private sector will pre-stage appropriate inventory levels
when possible before the event and will be moving inventories
rapidly after the event. Effective communication between the
private sector and government is essential to ensuring that the
right amount of product ends up in the right place.
b. It is imperative that government enable the private sector to
leverage the flexibility of its supply chain to meet crisis needs.
Creating large “stockpiles” of government purchased and
warehoused merchandise is neither effective nor advisable.
5. The government, through the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) or
other relevant authorities, should consult with private-sector groups
as needed to review the list of required items developed in
recommendation A.1 above to determine and grant conditional
waivers to any trade and regulatory restrictions. For example,
provisions of the Trade Agreement Act and Buy America Act may
restrict rapid responses to crisis. These waivers must be pre-defined
so that they can take effect automatically upon declaration of an
emergency.
6. To increase the pool of vendors, government should establish
mechanisms for pre-qualifying non-GSA vendors prior to a crisis and
for qualifying non-GSA vendors during a crisis:
11
SKU: An identifier used by merchants to permit the systematic tracking of products and
services offered to customers
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
26
a. For purposes of pre-qualifying vendors, the Federal Acquisition
Regulation provides authority for agencies such as FEMA to use
QBLs. FEMA should explore the use of QBLs or similar
mechanisms for pre-qualifying vendors.
b. For the purposes of qualifying vendors during a crisis, a
simplified certification process based on business information
maintained by commercial analysis firms (such as Dun &
Bradstreet) and a civil/criminal background check could be
employed. Qualification requirements should be tailored to
maximize the purchaser’s access during a crisis to vendors with
product availability and quick delivery windows. The emphasis
must nevertheless be on pre-qualification because it is
inherently difficult to qualify vendors during a crisis.
c. In extremis, FEMA and first responders should retain the
flexibility to purchase from any vendor at their discretion if
events preclude even simplified qualification processes.
7. Government should establish more effective vendor selection
mechanisms. Price may not be the first determinant in a crisis;
availability and delivery window may take precedence. It is
important, therefore, that the purchaser have access to the widest
range of goods and services possible. Therefore, if pre-certified or
otherwise qualified vendors cannot meet the requirements,
procedures should not preclude making other sources available to
the purchaser.
a. This system must, however, be open, transparent and self-
auditing in the interest of integrity and fairness.
b. At the same time, privacy protections must be incorporated into
the system to ensure that participating vendors cannot access
competitor information through this process.
8. Vendors should list their disaster-related inventory positions or build-
up on state (or regional) registries. The number of potential disaster-
related products is large, with a very dynamic fluctuation in what is
in-stock. So it is probably advisable to limit registry to just those items
expected to be in short supply. Additionally, this approach does not
address the “deconfliction” of competing requests for the same stock.
For example, a state or city may request all of a given product in
stock. In the end, businesses will decide how to distribute stock
within their own systems. With accurate registries, however,
government will have better insight into where resources are
available.
9. In addition to pre-registering items expected to be in short supply, states
and regions should implement “reverse auction” systems, in which the
public sector list its needs and invites private sector bids. FEMA is in the
process of developing this capability for its own use. GSA vendors
could respond to these orders, and those not filled by pre-qualified
Business Executives for National Security
27
vendors would be sent to the “open market” for others to fill. The price
would be the one established in recommendation 2 above.
B. Revising Deficient Donations Management Systems
In a disaster, experience shows that volunteerism and pro bono donations
on behalf of the private sector—businesses, non-governmental and
charitable organizations combined—are the norm. The challenge for
government and the private sector is to ensure that donated goods and
services from the latter support, rather than interfere with, efficient public
response and recovery. Many public-sector entities prefer not to deal with
private donations because they add to the complexity of and often duplicate
the public response mechanism.
Dismissing private-sector donations is not a realistic or necessarily
desirable goal, however. Moreover, the real impediment generally is a lack
of government capability to match its needs with what the private sector
has and is willing to donate. That shortcoming can and must be rectified if
for no other reason than to allow the government to better plan for using the
full range of resources that can be made available.
It is not this Task Force’s intent to prescribe how non-governmental (NGOs)
or charitable organizations should factor into a crisis response, except to
note that they will play a major role and must be integrated along with
business into the nation’s response mechanisms (as the American Red Cross
[ARC], as a special case, long has been).
As an example, an organization known as Aidmatrix (www.aidmatrix.org)
has been working since 2000 to build global relief networks connecting
people in need to surplus products and goods. It claims links with over
35,000 charitable organizations worldwide. FEMA is working with
Aidmatrix to leverage their resources to respond to future US domestic
disasters.
The key is to get in front of volunteerism from business and the NGO
community in advance of a crisis so that those groups become effective
partners and not unwanted guests.
Recommendation:
B. Improve planning, forecasting and use of assets and volunteers that
businesses, NGOs and charitable organizations make available on
a pro bono basis.
1. State operations centers should add representatives from a few
key NGO and charity groups to participate in planning,
exercising and operations. (Businesses would coordinate
donations through the Business Operations Center [BOC]
concept described in Chapter 1.)
2. FEMA should, as part of the modeling effort described in
Recommendation A, improve forecasts for the most likely
charitable needs for a range of scenarios, to allow the various
NGOs to plan their own responses in advance of need.
“We had a number of people
donating things to New Orleans.
There’s no mechanism in place to
coordinate those things. You want to
have a real transparent process in
place, but you also want to utilize
the gifts that are being offered.”
– Dickie Brennan, Managing
Partner, Dickie Brennan &
Company
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
28
3. State (or regional) registries should be created for pro bono
resources not normally for sale, like warehouse space, buses, or
volunteers. Such registries should include both business and
NGO/charitable organization resources. They should be
combined with the for-sale registries described in A.8 above.
4. A reverse auction capability attached to the system described
above can also be applied to unanticipated needs for pro bono
goods and services. This area is ideal for management by a
council of key NGOs. However, it should be integrated and not
separate from the mechanisms established for governmental and
private-sector response.
5. State coordinators representing charitable and NGO
organizations should work within their respective national
infrastructure to fully utilize their organizations for tasks like
sorting and storage, rather than pushing these burdensome tasks
on to people in the affected area. They also should develop their
own operating plans at the state level. Questions of storage
facilities, logistics, housing, and so forth should be addressed in
advance.
6. DHS should develop nationwide education programs for the
private sector on how best to prepare its people for volunteer
efforts—like dispensing of medications—giving them required
training, inoculations, and other preparatory skills.
C. Logistics Processes
Throughout this report, the underlying stipulation has been that the private
sector operates efficient, resilient supply chains that cannot and should not
be duplicated by the government. However, there are ways that the private
sector, working with government, can improve the functioning of these
logistics processes in a crisis.
If, as recommended in Chapter 1, the full integration of the private sector into
EOC operations at all governmental levels is achieved, it will overcome the
major coordination obstacle: determining how government and business
gather information, communicate, analyze problems, propose solutions,
deconflict and make decisions. That is why the EOC/BOC partnership
described earlier is so central to the success of the action plan described in
this report. What remains is improving the “rules of the road” in effect during
crisis response, thus clearing the way for the private sector to operate its
supply chains effectively.
Businesses, working with government, can improve the effectiveness of
logistics processes during a disaster. Here are some considerations:
Preparedness. To ease the strain on the supply chain in advance of and
during a crisis, businesses need to educate their employees on emergency
preparedness and encourage them to stockpile certain goods. Government
also plays a role in educating the public-at-large on the need to prepare.
Such preparedness can lessen peak demand during the first 72 hours of a
“You have the most phenomenal
logistics network in the United
States that exists anywhere in this
world. Why in the world does the
gover nment insist on tr ying to
replicate that at a much higher cost
[knowing] they couldn’t anticipate
where the need is?”
– Ken Senser, Senior Vice
President, Global Security,
Aviaton and Travel, Wal-Mart
Stores, Inc.
Business Executives for National Security
29
crisis, which may be the time required to get the supply chain back into full
operation.
Business closure. In disasters that come with some pre-warning (e.g., a
hurricane), state emergency officials must weigh public safety against the
need to keep major supply-chain retailers open as long as possible to provide
customers with emergency services and supplies. Shutting down prematurely
impedes the ability of a retailer’s customers to prepare their own homes and
businesses for an impending crisis. It also affects retailers’ ability to protect
stock and employees if the notice to shut down is immediate. Here, as in
other areas involving prudential judgment, reasonable balances must be
struck.
Credentialing. A major effort also must be mounted to address the permitting
and credentialing process imposed by public authorities in the aftermath of a
crisis. In the Katrina disaster, nearly all businesses reported this
shortcoming as a major impediment to restoring business
continuity of community. The first issue is resolving the
restrictions on professionals licensed in one state from practicing
in another. The second is granting access into a disaster area for
Critical Infrastructure and Key Resources (CI/KR) owners and
businesses to inspect, repair and re-establish their services. The
government has made headway in the second area, but both
remain key prerequisites if the professional and private sectors
are to quickly resume operations.
Point-of-delivery. Conceptually simple but practically
demanding “last mile logistics,” otherwise known as point-of-delivery issues,
also must be resolved. Commercial supply chains do not possess company-
controlled offload and distribution capabilities aside from those associated
with their own fixed facilities. Such capabilities therefore must be provided by
recipients, and since the ability to do this is by no means easily assured in
most crises, it must be planned. Finally, business-owned or chartered transport
should not be used to warehouse emergency supplies because the efficiency
of the supply chain hinges on keeping these transportation assets in motion.
The Task Force believes that involving the private sector in the planning,
exercising and execution of local, state and regional emergency response
plans can identify and solve these current shortcomings in crisis-response
logistics processes. If the private sector is not integrated in the planning
process, we believe that government will make the same mistakes
repeatedly.
Recommendation:
C. Improve the management by federal, state and local governments of
business emergency response resources to maximize speed and utility
and minimize redundancy.
1. Test, validate and use the EOC, BOC and BEMAC models described
above to minimize physical and regulatory roadblocks and help
facilitate the operation of business supply chains.
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
30
a. The proliferation of EOCs and BOCs recommended here may
overburden the trained emergency response personnel available
to individual private-sector organizations. A virtual presence can
overcome the need to staff the BOCs 24/7. Also, periodically
rotating the businesses supplying personnel to the BOC can ease
the burden.
b. Plans must include a physical back-up in the event of
communications or other data-sharing disruptions.
2. In order to lessen peak demand during a crisis, employers should be
encouraged to develop programs that help their employees
stockpile personal emergency supplies. The additional benefit is that
it frees the employee to return to work sooner.
3. Improvements to the permitting and credentialing process must
continue. States, working with appropriate local authorities, must
create agreed standards and protocols. These procedures must be
communicated to and practiced with private-sector supply chain
operators.
4. For GSA-qualified companies, and others as the state crisis teams
see fit, develop a system of pre-certification of the transportation
fleet so that supply chains can be restarted as soon after the event as
possible and can flow as freely as is practical.
5. Transfer capability to the BOC for members of state departments of
transportation, law enforcement, and the private sector to
coordinate movement of business-owned vehicles with critical
supplies into impacted areas as efficiently as possible. This
capability already exists in many state EOCs, but it needs to be
applied consistently and properly on a statewide basis and should
be a function of the BOC.
6. The transportation command-and-control model adopted should be
consistent across states; current differences often obstruct seamless
end-to-end supply chain operation when multiple jurisdictions are
transited.
7. Local, state and regional authorities must take responsibility for “last
mile logistics,” which will then allow the private-sector supply
chains to play to their strengths in responsiveness and agility.
8. Businesses should take the lead in educating local, state and
regional entities on private-sector surge/supply chain management
best practices to ensure they are not forced to operate inefficiently
and, therefore, ultimately at greater cost to government.
Business Executives for National Security
31
“Business normally conducts [its]
activities in an environment which
is governed by civil authority and
provided access to resources through
the commercial marketplace. In a
disaster where civil authority is
overwhelmed and normal
commercial activity disrupted,
assistance at the federal level may
be necessary in order for private
sector entities to perform expected
disaster response functions.”
– Duane Ackerman, President
& CEO, BellSouth Corporation
Chapter 3. Legal & Regulatory Environment
Finding: Business requires a predictable legal regime to operate effi-
ciently in an emergency situation, whether that business is engaged in
charitable or profit-motivated activities. The current legal and regula-
tory environment is conducive to neither predictability nor efficiency.
Consistent with this finding, the Task Force recommends that Congress:
A. Enact a nationwide body of “disaster law”;
B. Modify the Stafford Act to include the private sector; and
C. Hold hearings to determine which Task Force
recommendations can be implemented under existing law and
which require new legislation.
Action by Congress and the Executive Branch is essential for putting into
place a legal and regulatory environment in which the private sector can
become a full partner in the national response to disasters. We can and
must ensure that federal, state and local emergency planners include the
private sector in the preparations, testing, training, and execution of their
responsibilities. We also must rethink the not-inconsequential issue of the
legal allocation of risk through the civil justice system, most importantly tort
law, as well as through regulation.
The Task Force understands that a comprehensive review of the legal and
regulatory environment surrounding emergency response will require
considerable time and effort, and we urge Congress to schedule hearings to
deal with longer-term issues. But we also urge government to concentrate
initially on specific short-term objectives so that an adequate private-sector
response is available for the next disaster—not one that may befall us years
from now.
One example of an important short-term action would be to implement the
critical EOC/BOC partnership concept discussed earlier. That action could
be done through a mandate to DHS under existing law, even as other long-
term legislative solutions are being considered.
Another important action would be to adopt immediate legislative fixes to
the Stafford Act (such as those included in “The Post-Katrina Emergency
Management Reform Act of 2006” [S. 3721], introduced by Senator Susan
Collins on July 25, 2006).
A. National Disaster Law
Major disasters are a national issue, and uniformity of law across states is
essential to the efficient leveraging of the nation’s business assets in dealing
with them. During the Katrina response effort, many out-of-state businesses
that tried to help had little or no familiarity with the laws of Louisiana,
which hurt their efforts and hurt the people of New Orleans. While we must
respect the purposes and value of federalism, we should nevertheless
explore whether we need a body of federal disaster law to preempt the
heterogeneous patchwork of state law in this particular context.
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
32
Two basic principles should guide us in thinking about such a body of law:
• Things should get easier, not harder, and better, not worse, during a
local/regional disaster or incident of national significance.
• Individuals and businesses acting in good faith should be able to
confidently provide assistance based on a predictable set of rules and
responsibilities governing their conduct.
Following the hurricanes of 2005, a great number of laws and regulations
necessarily were waived, suspended or modified—HIPAA (Health
Insurance Portability and Accountability Act) privacy provisions being a
case in point. This body of waiver authority should be kept “on the shelf”
for consideration in future disasters. However, to be effective when
invoked, government must communicate with the private sector in advance
of and during the crisis to set a level of expectations sufficiently high so that
the predictability standard is met.
Recommendation:
A. Congress should hold hearings and produce legislation for a
nationwide body of “Disaster Law.”
1. Considerations for such legislation are: 1) lack of predictability, 2)
differences between laws applicable to pre-disaster agreements and
those applicable to people and organizations who deliver goods
and services voluntarily after a disaster occurs, and 3) variations in
state law.
a. With respect to liability, Congress should improve protections
with the aim of ensuring predictability of liability for private-
sector entities and citizens providing Good Samaritan (no
reimbursement to the provider) goods and services, particularly
when those goods and services are specifically requested by the
government, e.g., FEMA or a state or local government:
1. Safe harbor provisions in existing law should be reviewed
and cataloged in a Stafford Act provision (see
Recommendation B below);
2. Good Samaritan activities deemed appropriate to federal
protection but not covered in current law should be
identified.
2. Congress should clarify and standardize to the extent possible the
liability of professionals acting in good faith during disasters.
a. Examine the need for government-backed secondary insurance,
or some other type of indemnification mechanism (perhaps
analogous to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation
[FDIC]), to mitigate some of the potential private-sector risk in
emergency response situations.
b. Investigate the effect of federal law, regulations and standards
for disaster response on the liability insurance coverage to
businesses.
Business Executives for National Security
33
c. Review federal laws, regulations and standards regarding
medical response to disasters to determine where revisions can
improve the effectiveness, safety and efficiency of medical care
delivery and the protection of medical facilities and
professionals in those circumstances. For example:
1. Triage: The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS)
could set triage standards to be used as the benchmark in
determining negligence by health care providers dealing with
mass casualties and by emergency medical responders to
disaster scenes. HHS currently provides only voluntary triage
standards and supporting tools. Moreover, many different
triage systems are in use nationwide, setting up the certainty
of problems when medical augmentation teams from outside a
disaster area support a local triage system different than the
one in which they are trained.
2. Lack of Adequate Vaccines and Medicines: Protection for
healthcare providers needs to be established in case a
scarcity of effective vaccines and other medicines early in a
crisis requires experimental and out-of-formulary treatments.
3. Transportation of Patients in Non-Standard Vehicles:
Protection needs to be established for medical facilities and
transportation providers who through necessity use
emergency vehicles not normally suitable to the purpose for
transporting injured or sick persons.
d. To the maximum extent possible, facilitate ordinary rules of risk
and liability allocation being applied to emergency situations.
e. Provide for a predictable, single (and probably federal)
jurisdiction for hearing disputes arising in the course of response
to an Incident of National Significance.
3. With regard to regulation, federal agencies with oversight/regulatory
authority over the private sector need to clarify and promulgate
procedures that allow the agencies to quickly implement
discretionary authorities for the relaxation of regulations in the event
of an emergency. These authorities need to be pre-packaged as much
as possible so that they can be triggered by an appropriate declaration
of emergency. Examples include:
a. Antitrust: DHS should take advantage of the “voluntary agreements”
section of the Defense Production Act, PL 81-774, which allows
competitors (with government notice and clearance) to allocate
certain resources.
b. Effects on the Environment: The entire body of environmental impact
laws and regulations can usefully be reviewed to determine if
standard waivers need to be developed to cover disaster situations.
c. Licensing: Develop uniform rules concerning interstate recognition
of business and professional licensing during times of emergency,
“Some agencies like the Department
of Education get very high marks,
but one problem was that the
agencies did not seem to speak with
one another. While we had FEMA
and others at one door helping us
to re-open, we had the immigration
service at another talking about
deporting our foreign students
because they weren’t in school.
These were regulations that could
have been suspended given the
situation.”
- Yvette M. Jones, Chief
Operating Officer and Senior
Vice President for External
Affairs, Tulane University
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
34
perhaps incorporating a trigger mechanism activated by the
Governor of the state where the emergency situation exists.
d. Privacy: Rules governing the release of personal data by competent
authority during a crisis should be reviewed and clarified. During
Katrina, much confusion and concern was generated because of
statutes (such as HIPAA) that appeared to prohibit the release of
personal data.
e. Service delivery: We must review and if necessary revise laws and
policies concerning how and when providers of goods and services
during a catastrophe can terminate service after a crisis has
passed—especially laws that would affect providers of free or
discounted goods. Companies providing services such as medical
care or housing after Katrina found that they could not terminate
services once a patient/tenant was in the system, even if that
patient/tenant abused or violated the terms of service.
f. Trade restrictions: Review the Trade Agreement Act (19 USC 2501,
et seq.) and the Buy America Act (41 USC 10a - 10d) to determine if
waiver authority is warranted to ensure these laws do not restrict
government’s purchasing from non-domestic sources in an
emergency.
g. Regulatory agencies should establish and test contact procedures
and empower federal regulators to respond quickly to private sector
requests for regulatory relief when a crisis has occurred.
B. Revise the Stafford Act
The Robert T. Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act
(Stafford Act), 42 USC 5121-5206, is a federal law designed to bring an
orderly and systematic means of federal natural disaster assistance to state
and local governments in carrying out their responsibilities to aid citizens.
The Stafford Act is a 1988 amended version of the Disaster Relief Act of
1974, Public Law 93-288. The amended act created the system in place
today by which a Presidential Disaster Declaration of an emergency
triggers financial and physical assistance through FEMA. The Act gives
FEMA the responsibility for coordinating government-wide relief efforts and
includes the contributions of 28 federal agencies and non-governmental
organizations, such as the American Red Cross. In October 2000, Congress
amended the law with passage of the Disaster Mitigation Act of 2000,
Public Law 106-390, which permitted contributions of federal resources to
private nonprofit entities under certain conditions.
The SAFE Port Act of 2006 (PL 109-347, Sect. 607) extends the Stafford Act
to include the private sector, but only to the extent that it precludes the
head of a federal agency from denying or impeding essential service
providers
12
access to the disaster site or impeding them from performing
restoration or repair services.
12
Essential Service Providers include entities that provide telecommunications, electrical power,
natural gas, water and sewer services or any other essential services as determined by the
President. They include municipal, nonprofit and private, for profit, entities in the act of
responding to an emergency or major disaster.
“People need cash. Law enforcement
needs to...partner up with the banks
so that as branches are opened
without power, you’re not putting
employees at risk. [T]hey (law
enforcement) think it’s a business
thing: ‘I’m not going to help you at
Bank United.’ [But]our service is
essential to the community, and if I
[open] a branch without any alarm,
without any cameras, and you’re
looking at $80,000 in your teller
drawer, and you’ve got a line of
people, you’re not going to feel too
good.”
– Ramiro Ortiz, Chief
Operating Officer, BankUnited
Financial Corp.
Business Executives for National Security
35
Several recent congressional actions have proposed changing the Stafford
Act yet again, but none of these efforts have been successful. The Task
Force believes that Congress should extend coverage of the Act beyond
state and local government to include the private sector, with particular
attention to the provision of security or protection of private-sector personnel
and assets operating in a disaster zone. Authorities should be automatic upon
presidential declaration of a national disaster, but protections offered should
be specific and limited to situations where it is impractical or impossible for
the private sector to provide for its own security.
Recommendation:
B. Congress should revise the Stafford Act to designate the private sector as
a critical component of a comprehensive disaster response mechanism.
1. Such provision in law can usefully support designated categories of
private-sector partners:
a. To participate as full partners in the planning, training, equip-
ping, certification, exercise and execution of disaster response;
b. To be afforded federal assistance when necessary to carry out
disaster responsibilities, e.g., providing escort and security so
that emergency repairs, etc., can be effected in a disaster zone;
c. To coordinate and request assistance directly through the
appropriate federal agency (such as designated Source
Selection Authorities [SSAs] and NRP-designated lead agencies)
without having to work through third-party (i.e., FEMA) officials.
C. Congressional Hearings
While remedies to the private sector’s full participation in the nation’s
disaster response capabilities are urgent, such remedies should not be
taken hastily. Adequate consideration and deliberation before deciding to
legislate is in order—once in place, law is hard to undo. The Task Force
therefore urges Congress to review carefully the body of existing law
pertaining to disaster response and the agencies of government responsible
for carrying out that law. The initial focus of its investigation should be to
determine which of the recommendations of this Task Force can be
implemented under existing statute, and which require new legislation.
A series of hearings, early in the 110
th
Congress, can build momentum for
systematically integrating the private sector and its resources into the
national response to disaster in the near term, even as longer-term new
legislation is being crafted.
Recommendation:
C. Congress, early in its 110
th
session, should hold hearings to determine
which remedies suggested by this Task Force can be implemented
under existing law and authority, and which may require new
legislation.
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
36
“You want to re-center from a
government-dominated, marginally
assisted system to a genuinely
collaborative partnership, because in
fact the private sector brings more
speed and more resources and more
capability than government has
internally.”
– Newt Gingrich, former
Speaker of the U.S. House of
Representatives
Chapter 4. An Expert’s Guide to Priorities and
Sequencing for the Integration of the Private Sector
into U.S. National Disaster Response Planning and
Execution
Government should move quickly to integrate business into its disaster
response planning, doctrine, exercises and operations and ensure that
adequate resources are devoted to implementing Task Force recommenda-
tions at the state and regional level on a sustainable basis.
The recently released National Infrastructure Protection Plan (NIPP)
acknowledges that Critical Infrastructure and Key Resources (CI/KR) are
essential to the nation’s security, public health and safety, economic viability,
and way of life. Natural or man-made disasters that weaken or destroy CI/KR
will significantly disrupt the functioning of government and business alike,
producing cascading effects far beyond the targeted infrastructure and
physical location of the incident. Direct attacks, natural disasters or technolo-
gical hazards could produce catastrophic losses and will require the
coordinated collaboration of the whole of society—public and private
sectors—to put the country back on its feet.
The Business Response Task Force recommendations proposed in this report
are directed toward creating mechanisms that would integrate the full
capabilities of the private sector as a critical component of a comprehensive
national disaster response. This chapter addresses the priorities and
sequencing necessary to put those steps into action.
Federal Plans and the Private Sector
The federal government, through DHS, has done a good job developing the
policy frameworks to be used in all aspects of protection and disaster
management. The National Response Plan (NRP), National Incident
Management System (NIMS) and the NIPP together provide for a
comprehensive approach to ensuring the viability of the national
community from a structural and policy perspective. What is still missing,
however, are the operational components and mechanisms that allow all
members of the community to participate as required to fulfill the objectives
of the risk management framework described in the NIPP.
DHS’ risk management framework addresses economic sectors in a vertical
fashion, but in real economies businesses operate within a community, not
an industrial sector. Communities are not only customers; they also make
decisions that affect businesses’ ability to function. Likewise, communities
cannot return to normal function without the private sector, which owns or
operates 85 percent of U.S. critical infrastructure. Figuring out how to
reconcile the top-down federal sectoral view with the bottom-up
community-centered perspective of business means that determining where
the private sector should plug into federal doctrine is a complex but vital
undertaking.
Business Executives for National Security
37
While that process plays out—as it must—we must do what we can on
other fronts, and the actual community level is the best place to start.
The Near Term
The Task Force recommends that the near-term focus be centered on imple-
menting the Business Operations Center (BOC) concept described in Chapter
1. The EOC/BOC partnership model provides the operating processes neces-
sary for private sector-involvement in the risk management framework,
focused initially on immediate response. The BOC provides a basis for public-
private collaboration that creates the necessary level of trust needed for full
integration of the private sector to succeed. This is most easily achieved at
the state and local levels because, in most cases, such relationships already
exist organically as part of normal social life—it’s “the community thing.”
Does that mean that we have to create 55 separate BOCs, one for each
state, federal jurisdiction and territory? Ideally, yes; but achieving this goal
will depend on the political and business leadership at the state level. The
same is true for BOCs in major urban areas. New York City and Los
Angeles County are creating their own versions, and others should follow.
There also is a question of resources. In the end, it is hard to see any other
way to proceed than to have some federal dollars, through some
combination of grants, credits or offsets, or by direct appropriation, support
the EOC/BOC concept.
A private-sector presence also should exist at the regional level. The June
2006 DHS Nationwide Plan Review Phase 2 Report suggests that a new
DHS-directed regional system is needed.
13
Were such a capability
developed, the inclusion of a BOC would be an important component.
Establishing BOCs in each of the ten current FEMA regions would at least be
a good start.
The creation of state and major metropolitan area BOCs should be put on
the fast track for— deployment, training and exercising before the end of
2007. Regional BOCs will follow on the success of deployment at the state/
major metropolitan area levels.
The Horizon
Doctrine development. The longer-term objective is to formalize private-
sector participation in the National Response Plan and other doctrine.
Ultimately, the private sector needs a permanent presence at the regional
and federal doctrinal development level. Task Force members are participa-
ting in the current revisions of the NRP and NIMS and will seek to codify
the public-private partnership collaborations recommended in this report.
Capabilities-based resource planning. To begin, the private sector needs to
have a large role in the current development/revision of the Universal Task
List (UTL) and Target Capabilities List (TCL). The UTL and TCL were
developed at the direction of Homeland Security Presidential
Directive(HSPD) 8: National Preparedness with the participation of federal,
13
U.S. Department of Homeland Security, Nationwide Plan Review: Phase 2 Report, June 16, 2006.
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
38
state and local government representatives and professional associations
representing government responders. The TCL provides the basis for
preparedness for all of the national planning scenarios and each of the major
missions of prevention, protection, response and recovery.
The TCL tiering summary chart assigns capabilities, outcomes, capability
resources, and roles to government, non-governmental organizations, the
private sector, and citizens. On cursory review, the Task Force believes the
private sector can make major contributions in the planning, management
and support of at least the 25 of the current 37 target capabilities in the TCL.
Further, we believe that the current tiering summary chart under-represents
the contributions the private sector can make to national preparedness,
thereby both raising the cost of public-sector investment in such capabili-
ties and reducing the effectiveness and efficiency of preparedness efforts.
The development and maintenance of TCL capabilities by federal, state and
local governments is supported by congressional appropriation. Where capa-
bilities are assigned to the private sector in the TCL, government could
likewise support the development and maintenance of such capabilities in
federal equipment, training, certification, credentialing and exercise programs.
Another area for private-sector inclusion is in the development and
implementation of changes to the National Incident Management System
(NIMS). The NIMS reflects the doctrine contained in HSPD 5: Management
of Domestic Incidents. Of the three NIMS components, only the Incident
Command System (ICS) is defined and, as yet, does not clearly indicate
where or how the private sector plays in its execution.
Likewise, as the other two components of NIMS are defined (the Multi-
agency Coordination System [MACS], which describes the relationships
among the operations centers at all levels, and the Public Information
System [PIS]), inviting early private-sector participation will ensure that its
views are reflected in the final products. Moreover, creating an enterprise
architecture for the NIMS will complete the development cycle by defining
public- and private-sector concepts of operations, organizational relation-
ships, activities, information needs, rules and supporting systems. DHS may
want to consider separate development of an enterprise architecture to
support the NRP.
Similarly, federal agencies should coordinate with those private-sector
entities governed by the National Infrastructure Protection Plan (NIPP) and
its sector-specific supporting plans to develop a process and schedule for
affected private-sector entities to come into compliance with those plans.
Operations planning. In the case of operations planning, DHS Secretary
Michael Chertoff has told Congress that the system is broken and cannot be
fixed without a major investment. A new National Planning System (NPS)
for coordinated federal, state, tribal, local and NGO/private-sector planning
has not yet been authorized or funded. This is a clear opportunity to get the
legislation right the first time relative to private-sector participation. In the
meantime, the private sector needs to make its voice heard on Capitol Hill
to give substance to a requirement for private-sector participation that is
currently defined only in the broadest terms.
Business Executives for National Security
39
In addition to establishing private-sector participation in planning at the
national level, the NPS should carve out room for business-to-business
efforts. Many areas of response and recovery are most effectively and
efficiently organized and implemented by the affected private sector, not as
a government-controlled activity. An excellent example is the mutual aid
pacts in place among the utility companies in the southeastern United
States. The planning system should be sensitive to and try to identify areas
of the economy that are best restored by the private sector itself in the
event of a disaster. In doing so, government should encourage and support
processes by which industry groups can organize and plan—and publish
those plans as part of the NPS.
Having the private sector commit resources and aggressively pursue
ongoing participation in thousands of local, state and federal contingency
planning efforts will never be fully achievable. But inclusion of the private
sector in the NPS can probably be accomplished at the federal and state
levels, in the largest urban areas—and at the regional level. The business
case for doing this planning is the basis for this report, and it is, to the Task
Force, compelling.
Training and exercises. As stated repeatedly in this report, repetitive,
detailed training and exercising of the plans developed for public-private
collaboration are essential for such operations to work efficiently in an
actual disaster. Some members of the Task Force feel that a major national
exercise that truly strains the system must occur in the near term if we are
to honestly confront the shortfalls and unknowns that exist in our current
plans. To encourage public-private collaboration, DHS grant funding to the
states and other entities must be contingent on demonstration of significant
participation by the private sector in disaster training and exercises.
Operations. Based on the successful outcome of private-sector and
government collaboration on implementing the recommendations in this
report, in an actual disaster the private sector would be able to carry out
the roles it had equipped itself for based on capabilities-based planning,
defined in doctrine, planned in contingency and crisis action plans, and
trained for in exercises.
Lessons-learned assessments. The operations continuum is not a circle but
a never-ending spiral. The impetus for change in doctrine and operations is
the assessment program. The private sector must play its role here as well.
As a consequence of scale, the most extensive and expensive commitment
required is at the local and state levels. Once again resources for this
activity must come from federal, state and private coffers.
Resourcing Private-Public Collaborative Relationships
Finding the resources to implement the recommendations in this report will
be difficult but doable if we proceed gradually from what now exists to the
achievement of the ideal. As reported here, many examples of state EOCs
exist. In a few, the BOC concept has been implemented. As the concept
scales up to the regional or federal level, new sources of funding will have
to be identified.
“Congress can and should encourage
DHS to provide grant funding to
implement the recommendations of this
report. Without strong Congressional
action, public-private collaboration in
crisis management and response will
remain an afterthought.”
– Former Sen. John Breaux (D-LA)
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
40
Along the operations continuum, doctrine development, capabilities-based
planning, and operations planning require an excess of brainpower over
cash. The major investment is talent and time, and the Task Force believes
that the private sector is willing to commit those resources if it is given its
seat at the table. The true costs occur during the training, exercising,
operations and assessment phases. The current grant program is geared
largely to funding one-off exercises.
The Task Force urges Congress to commission DHS to begin development
of an architectural framework linked to or as part of the NRP to ensure that
fully functional and staffed BOCs can be maintained in each state, urban
area and region.
Recommendation:
Ensure that adequate resources are devoted to implementing Task Force
recommendations at the state, regional and federal level on a sustainable
basis.
Appendices F through I at the end of this report identify and prioritize
specific desired outcomes and policy drivers keyed to the Task Force
recommendations.
Business Executives for National Security
41
Appendix A – Business Response Task Force Charter
June 2006
CHARTER
BENS Business Response Task Force: BENS has formed a Task Force to review and
recommend to the U.S. Government steps to systematically integrate the capabilities of
the private sector—principally that of the business community—as a critical component
of a comprehensive disaster response mechanism. Membership is comprised of senior
business leaders from U.S. industries closely tied to disaster response:
telecommunications, supply chain logistics, utilities, real estate management, and so
forth. Business leaders understand the need to ensure the continuity of their community
in order to maintain their own business continuity, but business-government
collaboration in major disasters is largely disorganized.
BENS: For nearly 25 years, Business Executives for National Security has served as the
primary channel through which senior executives can help build a more secure
America. BENS is a national, non-partisan, non-profit organization that harnesses
successful business models from the private sector to help strengthen the nation’s
security.
Scope: We propose to collect lessons learned during the responses to Katrina, 9/11, and
other incidents of national significance. We believe that the experiences, reactions, and
responses to catastrophic events apply equally to other kinds of national disasters and
are, therefore, appropriate exemplars for our review. The Task Force will focus on the
time between when the hurricanes were first predicted to make landfall in the U.S.
through the response phase of operation.
Process and final report: The Task Force will analyze lessons from these disasters to
recommend reforms enabling future improved public-private collaboration and
coordination. The Task Force will provide examples of response functions for which it
makes sense to rely on the private sector, and will offer policy recommendations to
optimize the contributions of business during national disasters. It will propose a
program leading to an architectural framework to integrate private sector participation
into disaster response at all levels—local, state, and regional—and under the execution
of the National Response Plan.
Timing: The Task Force intends to complete work within approximately 45 days from
the start date.
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
42
Christopher C. Melton
Managing Director
The White Oak Group, Inc.
Robert Nardelli
Chairman, President and CEO
The Home Depot, Inc.
David Ratcliffe
Chairman and CEO
Southern Company
William J. Rouhana, Jr.
Managing Member
WS Management, LLC
Roger Staubach
Chairman and CEO
Staubach Companies
Paul G. Stern
Chairman
Claris Capital, LLC
Tom Fricke
Vice President Asset Protection
The Home Depot, Inc.
Rahul Gupta
Director
PRTM
William I. Hancock
Fellow, Integrative Center for Homeland Security
The Bush School of Government and Public Service
Texas A&M University
Scott Hefter
Director, Government Sector Lead
PRTM
Mike Hickey
Vice President
Government Affairs, National Security Policy
Verizon Communications Inc.
Frank W. Jenkins
Senior Vice President
Science Applications International Corporation
Charles Lathram
VP Security and Business Control
BellSouth Corporation
Appendix B – Task Force Members, Advisors and Staff
Task Force
F. Duane Ackerman (Chairman)
President and CEO
BellSouth Corporation
The Honorable John Breaux (Co-chair)
Senior Counsel
Patton Boggs LLP
The Honorable Newt Gingrich (Co-chair)
The Gingrich Group
Lawrence Babbio
Vice Chairman and President
Verizon Communications, Inc.
General Charles G. Boyd, USAF (Ret.) (Ex Officio)
President & CEO
Business Executives for National Security
Guy F. Budinscak
Atlanta Managing Partner and
Regional Managing Partner, Strategic Clients
Deloitte & Touche LLP
The Honorable Sidney Harman
Executive Chairman
Harman International Industries
Advisors
Richard Andrews, Ph.D.
The National Center for Crisis and
Continuity Coordination
Anthony D. Begando
Chief Executive Officer
Tenon Consulting Solutions, Inc.
Peter Carpenter
Founder, Mission and Values Institute
Steve Carpenter
Director, Customer Service and Support
DataPath, Inc.
Dr. Scott S. Cowen, Ph.D.
President
Tulane University
Cherie Curry
Stock Plan and Communications Manager
Harman International Industries
General Ralph E. Eberhart, USAF (Ret.)
President and CEO
AFBA
Steven Cash
Principal/Counsel
PRTM
Business Executives for National Security
43
Ken Senser
Sr. Vice President - Global Security, Aviation & Travel
Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.
Brian Spickard
Director, Business Assurance
Southern Company
Lacy Suiter
Director of Executive Education Programs
Center for Homeland Defense and Security
Naval Postgraduate School
Scott Louis Weber
Patton Boggs LLP
Danielle D. Camner
Director of Policy
Michael Doubleday
Sr. Vice President, Policy
Anne Ferris
Regional Director, California
Walter Gramm
Executive Director
New Jersey Business Force
David Guthrie
Director
Mid-America Business Force
Don Hays
Chief Operating Officer
Travis Hill
Intern
Lynne Kidder
Vice President
National Business Force
Appendix B – Task Force Members, Advisors and Staff (cont’d)
Thomas Lee
Director, Business Development
Monogram Systems
Admiral James M. Loy, USCG (Ret.)
Senior Counselor
The Cohen Group
William G. Raisch
Director
International Center for Enterprise Preparedness (InterCEP)
New York University
Michael Sherberger
Former Director, Georgia Office of Homeland Security/
Georgia Emergency Management Agency
Staff
Business Executives for National Security
Lauren Armistead
Deputy Director, Homeland Security
Advisory Council
Ken Beeks
Vice President, Policy
Ern Blackwelder
Sr. Vice President, National Business
Force
Jason Blake
Intern
Laura Bondesen
Intern
Colin Bucher
Policy Analyst
Joe Byrne
Director, Homeland Security Advisory
Council
Conrad H. Busch, Jr.
Director, Metro Atlanta
William F. Lawson, III
Director, Kansas City
Clinton E. Long
Director for Publications/Web
Melita Leoussis
Intern
Linda Moseley
Executive Asst. to the President &
CEO
Peter Ohtaki
Director
Bay Area Business Force
Paul Taibl
Vice President, Policy
Kiersten Todt Coon
Vice President, Policy
John H. H. Turner, III
Director/Program Manager
Georgia Business Force
Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC)
Lindsey E. Arnold
Program Manager
M. Wendy Reid
Senior Analyst
Pat A. “Doc” Pentland
Program Manager
James C. Sherlock
Program Development Manager
Julie C. Simpson
Policy Analyst
Donald C. Snedeker
Senior Analyst
Kenneth B. Van Dillen
Project Lead
Editor
Adam Garfinkle Paul Taibl
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
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Exponent, Inc.
FedEx Corporation
Food Lion, LLC
Food Marketing Institute
Gene Matthews
General Electric Company
Greenberg Traurig, LLP
Harman International Industries, Incorporated
Harrah’s Entertainment, Inc.
The Home Depot, Inc.
INSTEDD
Intel Corporation
International Business Machines Corporation
iWave, Inc.
J.B. Hunt Transport Services, Inc.
Johnson & Johnson
JPMorgan Chase & Co.
Keefe, Bruyette & Woods, Inc.
Kraft Foods Inc.
Lacy Suiter
Laitram L.L.C.
Lockheed Martin Corp.
The Macerich Company
Marriott International, Inc.
McKesson Corporation
Miami Herald
Michael Sherberger
Monogram Systems
NC4 (The National Center for Crisis
and Continuity Coordination)
Appendix C – List of Survey Interviews
Admiral Jim Loy, USCG (Ret.)
ALZA Corporation
Armed Forces Benefits Association
AutoNation, Inc.
Avatar Holdings Inc.
BankUnited Financial Corp.
Baptist Health South Florida
BellSouth Corporation
The Biloxi Sun Herald
Boh Bros. Construction Co., LLC
Burger King Holdings, Inc.
CACI International Inc
Cargill, Incorporated
Chevron Corporation
Cisco Systems Inc.
Citigroup Inc.
City National Bank
Coca-Cola Enterprises Inc.
Colonial Pipeline Company
ConAgra Foods, Inc.
Cushman & Wakefield Inc.
Darden Restaurants, Inc.
DataPath, Inc.
Deloitte & Touche LLP
Deutsche Bank AG
Dickie Brennan & Company
D.J.’s National Food Service
The Dow Chemical Company
Dr. Kathleen E. Toomey, M.D., M.P.H.
Durr Heavy Construction, LLC
Business Executives for National Security
45
St. Barnabas Health Care System
Steven Cash
Tenon Group Plc
The Staubach Company
Toll Brothers, Inc.
Tulane University
United States Northern Command
University of Miami
Verizon Communications Inc.
Wachovia Corporation
Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.
The Westfield Group
The White Oak Group, Inc.
William I. Hancock
WS Management, LLC
Appendix C – List of Survey Interviews (cont’d)
Ochsner Clinic Foundation
Oreck Corporation
Patton Boggs LLP
Peoples Financial Corporation
Pfizer Inc.
Raymond James Financial, Inc.
Republic Services, Inc.
Richard Andrews
Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd.
Ryder System, Inc.
Sandler O’Neill & Partners, L.P.
Science Applications International
Corporation (SAIC)
The Honorable John Breaux
Southern California Edison
Southern Company
The Honorable Newt Gingrich
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
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Appendix D – Relevant Recommendations from Federal Government
After-action Reports and Other Sources
Numerous reports have reviewed the response to Hurricane Katrina. Many of these reviews, including
those conducted by Congress and the White House, favor improving emergency preparedness,
response, and recovery via improved partnerships with the private sector.
1. The White House report entitled The Federal Response to Hurricane Katrina: Lessons
Learned enumerated specific recommendations to be implemented by collaboration with the private
sector. The White House report recommended that private-sector organizations “actively participate in
all phases of a Federal Disaster response.” The House of Representatives’ report, A Failure of
Initiative, provided anecdotal evidence of failures in collaboration. The report of the Senate
Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, A Nation Still Unprepared,
“examined in detail the actions of officials of local, state and federal government departments and
agencies.”
Public-Private Collaboration
The House report stated that critical elements of the National Response Plan (NRP) were unsuccessfully
executed during Hurricane Katrina. Gaps in the National Communications System, a component of the
NRP, resulted in miscommunication and slow response in delivering relief supplies. The report illustrated
how communications inoperability led to issues with command and control and situational awareness.
Another recommendation, according to the Senate A Nation Still Unprepared report, is “to enhance
regional operations to provide better coordination between federal agencies and the states and establish
regional strike teams.” Among their other duties, the regional offices should “enhance cooperation with
NGOs and the private sector, and provide personnel and assets, in the form of Strike Teams, to be the
federal government’s first line of response to the disaster.”
The White House report recommended actively engaging the private sector in reviewing the NRP and
the NIMS and finalizing the Interim National Infrastructure Protection Plan. Both Congress and the
White House suggested that slow delivery of relief commodities can be remedied via more robust
relationships with the private sector. The report recommended that DHS mandate “pre-competed”
private-sector contracts for arranging advanced communications capabilities.
Surge Capacity for Goods and Services
The House Katrina report also detailed problems with medical response, including inadequate
communications equipment, confusion relating to hospital evacuations, and problems with
credentialing. The report referenced failures in advanced contracting, which led to hasty acquisitions
and vulnerability to fraud. One company tasked with supplying temporary housing experienced
contracting issues when the requirements for the work order changed midway through their response.
The White House report specified that HHS arrange “pre-configured” teams of health care
professionals, including volunteer health professionals from the private sector. DHS should partner with
the private sector to develop a scalable, flexible, and transparent logistics system for the procurement
and delivery of goods and services. DHS should pre-identify private-sector resources to provide
disaster support. Also, states are encouraged to enter into contractual arrangements with private-sector
companies for procurement and delivery of goods prior to a disaster.
Business Executives for National Security
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Legal and Regulatory Framework
The House report cited exemplary companies with existing emergency preparedness plans. The White
House suggested that DHS overhaul regional disaster plans by collaborating with the private sector and
by setting standards for private-sector preparedness against which regional plans can be measured.
The White House recommended that DHS lead an interagency effort to remove federal and legal
liability obstacles to utilization and coordination of private-sector resources during a disaster. Private-
sector actors also are encouraged to plan their “giving streams” at the local level.
2. The DHS “Lessons Learned Information Sharing” report on public-private partnerships for
emergency preparedness explains the need for coordination between public safety agencies and private
sector entities. Public-private relationships must be established prior to emergencies. Familiarity of the
two sectors with each other’s capabilities and response procedures is paramount. The private sector
plays a vital role in emergency situations; it employs most of the nation’s workforce, owns 85 percent of
critical infrastructure, and produces essential goods and services. The public sector often
underestimates the private sector’s involvement in emergency preparedness, while the private sector
often overestimates the capabilities of the public sector. Collaboration by public groups with the private
sector is imperative to ensure emergency preparedness and safety.
Public-Private Collaboration
Many public- and private-sector groups have established partnerships to improve emergency prepared-
ness, prevention, mitigation, response, and recovery efforts. This allows the public- and private-sector entities
to share risk, vulnerability, and threat information; coordinate response and recovery operations; develop
all-hazards plans to pool resources and information; and share educational and training opportunities.
However, many communities have failed to establish such partnerships, either because they are viewed
as costly and time-consuming or because the public-private relationships lack the necessary trust and
understanding to exchange sensitive information and allocate valuable time and resources.
The section on developing partnerships outlines possible steps toward establishing long-lasting
relationships with public-or private-sector groups. The steps include:
1. Clearly define purpose and objectives
2. Identify partners
3. Develop incentives to try to persuade potential partners to join.
4. Secure commitment, usually by developing personal relationships with individuals at the senior
level and with individuals responsible for mitigation, response, and recovery operations.
5. Initiate dialogue to discuss capabilities, resources, and opportunities for mutual assistance.
6. Build the partnership by establishing objectives that reflect the interests of all members, identifying
leaders, forming a plan or task force around each objective, and planning regular activities to
ensure long-lasting relationships.
Surge Capacity for Goods and Services
Large-scale incidents can quickly deplete response resources, leading to a surge in demand for goods
and services. Sharing resources is often prevented by questions surrounding liability, cost, and
availability of resources. In order to overcome these obstacles, public-private partnerships must identify
available member resources and then develop procedures to manage and share them.
According to the report, resource sharing plans should accomplish the following:
• Define how partners borrow and/or expend resources during emergencies.
• Include agreements on inventorying, requesting, allocating, using, and returning resources.
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
48
• Include qualifications that must be met in order for resource sharing to occur. Such qualifications
can include:
- prior depletion of public sector resources
- expected impact of the incident on the private sector group’s area of concern
• Hold public-private training exercises that include resource sharing plans so partners can practice
requesting, locating, using, and returning resources.
• Include agreements on liability and reimbursement.
• Establish a single resource inventory for the responding agency.
• Establish resource request procedures.
• Develop rules for resource allocation, usage, and return.
Legal and Regulatory Framework
An important obstacle to public-private partnerships is the hesitancy to share sensitive or proprietary
information. At the federal level, DHS has undertaken various initiatives to provide secure ways to share
information. Many local communities have not taken such initiatives, and fears persist concerning
improper dissemination and/or the cost of secure sharing. Private groups also occasionally lack clearances
to view necessary information. In order to build partners’ trust in each other’s ability to protect sensitive
information, the report suggests formalized information sharing networks with security features that protect
and limit the dissemination of and access to sensitive information. The report also suggests assigning a
single public safety agency to disseminate all threat notifications to guarantee accuracy and reliability.
The report lauded a number of Presidential Directives and national strategies that have encouraged public-
private partnerships. Most such initiatives focus on establishing relationships between public and private
groups on a national level and facilitating information sharing among industries and federal agencies. On a
local level, however, public safety agencies and private sector groups in many communities do not
collaborate effectively. DHS has established initiatives to help foster local partnerships, and other
developmental programs exist in some areas through non-profit associations. Additionally, many industries
face local pressure or are legally obligated to enact safety and preparedness measures that require
coordination with the public sector. The report also encourages communities lacking such programs or
initiatives to dedicate time and resources to establishing public-private partnerships.
3. Government Accountability Office (GAO) testimony, “Hurricane Katrina: Planning for and
Management of Federal Disaster and Recovery Contracts,” April 10, 2006, contains many cogent
observations about what went right and what went wrong.
Public-Private Collaboration
Government contracts have long been a mainstay in public-private enterprise, but they now face new
challenges. In the face of unexpected contingency scenarios, an adequate response is of paramount
importance, but efficiency and avoiding waste cannot be overlooked. Contracts were inked hastily and
oversight was lacking, as there was an insufficient number of trained personnel to conduct oversight, as
well as unclear definitions and delegations of responsibility. The agencies scrutinized by this report–
FEMA, GSA, and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers–have high-risk acquisition practices that equate to a
“vulnerability to fraud, waste, and abuse.” The efficiency owed to taxpayer dollars can be better
facilitated with advanced planning and pre-arranged contracts.
Surge Capacity for Goods and Services
A lack of communication between agencies at the federal level and between levels of government, as
well as a failure to anticipate needs, led to the inefficient acquisition and allocation of goods and services.
Specifically, the need for temporary housing was underestimated, and for other goods and services that
Business Executives for National Security
49
were anticipated, the mechanisms by which to acquire them, legal and logistical, were neither fully
understood nor well lubricated. Furthermore, the GAO report notes tensions in upholding Stafford Act
preferences to engage contracts with businesses in the affected area (e.g., contracting with Gulf region
business in recovering from Hurricane Katrina). The difficulty of taking the initiative to engage local
businesses instead of falling back on national contractors, coupled with the fact that there was vast
confusion among GSA and FEMA officials about the actual Stafford Act preferences and how to apply
them, resulted in local businesses often being overlooked in taking advantage of government contracting
opportunities. GSA officials state that they plan to review the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) to
clarify Stafford Act guidance.
Legal and Regulatory Framework
Along with Stafford Act implications and oversight complications, other legal and regulatory issues were
factors in the response to Hurricane Katrina. The Army Corps of Engineers noted a hindrance to pre-
arranged contracts in that funding must be secured for a particular mission before formal preparation
can ensue. Regarding communication and continuity, especially in contract oversight, turnover and
transition can pose problems, and the Corps disclosed its policy to rotate personnel every 29 days to
minimize costs due to regulations under the Fair Labor Standards Act. To combat these problems, FEMA
stated that it is implementing a process to better distribute work and information among rotating
personnel, and GSA is investigating alternative options for smoother contract oversight.
4. The Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) Report, “Neglected Defense: Mobilizing the Private
Sector to Support Homeland Security” by Stephen Flynn and Daniel B. Prieto, March 13, 2006, offers
ten clear recommendations.
Public Private Collaboration
- Change policy paradigm from telling companies to protect themselves to offering leadership in
securing critical infrastructure.
• Current attitude is that the there are enough market incentives for the private market to provide
levels of security commensurate with the threat of catastrophic incidents–but this is untrue. The
government must take an active role understand how the private sector operates and then use this
understanding to encourage the private sector to provide more security.
- Create a national list of priorities, as mandated by law, as appropriate for government to do, and as
requested by various industries.
• Mandated by Homeland Security Act of 2002, but will likely not reach completion by end of 2006.
Therefore Congress should commission a rapid-turnaround study to be conducted by the NAS with
input from the private sector to compile a list of national priorities
• Then these priorities should be used as a guide for allocation of resources and as a measure of
effectiveness and progress toward bolstering national security.
- Strengthen DHS management and personnel experience, specifically by sponsoring and facilitating a
personnel exchange with private sector.
• DHS is currently plagued by high turnover, low morale, making it difficult to realize long-term
initiatives – it needs experienced managers
• Such an exchange program can be modeled after those employed at the Federal Reserve
- Improve information sharing with private sector, and government must be held accountable for doing it.
• Private sector should be fully integrated, but there are reservations: businesses fear if they share
information with the government it will be mishandled and could place them at a competitive
disadvantage, and the government worries about leaking classified information to the private sector.
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
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Appendix E – Glossary of Acronyms in this Report
AAF – Available Acquisition Flexibilities – form of acquisition flexibilities available in the Federal
Acquisition Regulation (FAR) to facilitate and expedite acquisitions of supplies and services during all
types of emergencies. “Available Acquisition Flexibilities’’ identifies the flexibilities that may be used
anytime and do not require an emergency declaration.
ABA – American Bar Association – a voluntary bar association of lawyers and law students, which is not
specific to any jurisdiction in the United States. The ABA’s most important activities are the setting of
academic standards for law schools and the formulation of model legal codes.
ARC – American Red Cross – a humanitarian organization that provides emergency assistance, disaster
relief and education inside the United States, as part of the International Federation of Red Cross and
Red Crescent Societies.
AWP – Average Wholesale Price
BENS – Business Executives for National Security – a national, non-partisan, non-profit organization
that harnesses successful business models from the private sector to help strengthen the nation’s
security.
BOC – Business Operations Center
CFR – Council on Foreign Relations – an American foreign policy think tank based in New York City. It
describes itself as being “dedicated to increasing America’s understanding of the world and contributing
ideas to U.S. foreign policy.”
CI/KR – Critical Infrastructure/Key Resources – According to the Homeland Security Act of 2002,
“critical infrastructure” refers to “systems and assets, whether physical or virtual, so vital to the United
States that the incapacity or destruction of such systems and assets would have a debilitating impact on
security, national economic security, national public health or safety, or any combination of those
matters.” The term “key resources” means “publicly or privately controlled resources essential to the
minimal operations of the economy and government.”
DHS – Department of Homeland Security – a Cabinet department of the Federal Government of the
United States with the responsibility of protecting the territory of the United States from terrorist attack
and responding to natural disasters. The department was created from 22 existing federal agencies in
response to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.
EAF – Emergency Acquisition Flexibilities – a form of acquisition flexibilities available in the Federal
Acquisition Regulation (FAR) to facilitate and expedite acquisitions of supplies and services during all
types of emergencies. “Emergency Acquisition Flexibilities” identifies the flexibilities that may be used
only after an emergency declaration or designation has been made by the appropriate official.
EMAC – Emergency Management Assistance Compact – an interstate agreement that streamlines the
assistance one governor can lend another after a natural disaster or terrorist attack by providing a
framework for flexible response. EMAC was first introduced to the states in 1993, and the program is
administered by the National Emergency Managers Association (NEMA).
EOC – Emergency Operations Center – the central command and control facility responsible for
carrying out emergency preparedness and emergency management or disaster management functions
at a strategic level in an emergency situation, and for ensuring the continuity of operation of the
company or political subdivision. The EOC is responsible for the strategic, or “big picture” of the
disaster and does not normally directly control field assets but makes strategic decisions and leaves
tactical decisions to lower commands.
Business Executives for National Security
51
ESF – Emergency Support Function – a mechanism that consolidates multiple agencies that perform
similar or like functions into a single, cohesive unit to allow for the better management of emergency
response functions.
FAR – Federal Acquisition Regulation – the Federal Acquisition Regulations System is established for the
codification and publication of uniform policies and procedures for acquisition by all executive
agencies. The Federal Acquisition Regulations System consists of the Federal Acquisition Regulation
(FAR), which is the primary document, and agency acquisition regulations that implement or supplement
the FAR.
FDIC – Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation – the FDIC preserves and promotes public confidence in
the U.S. financial system by insuring deposits in banks and thrift institutions for at least $100,000; by
identifying, monitoring and addressing risks to the deposit insurance funds; and by limiting the effect on
the economy and the financial system when a bank or thrift institution fails.
FEMA – Federal Emergency Management Agency – an agency of the Department of Homeland
Security (DHS) within the Emergency Preparedness and Response Directorate. FEMA’s purpose is to
coordinate the response to a disaster that has occurred in the United States and overwhelms the
resources of local and municipal authorities.
FTC – Federal Trade Commission – an independent agency of the United States government,
established in 1914 by the Federal Trade Commission Act. Its principal mission is the promotion of
consumer protection and the elimination and prevention of anticompetitive business practices.
GAO – Government Accountability Office – the non-partisan audit, evaluation, and investigative arm of
Congress, and an agency in the Legislative Branch of the United States Government. According to
GAO’s current mission statement, the agency exists to support the Congress in meeting its Constitutional
responsibilities and to help improve the performance and ensure the accountability of the federal
government for the American people.
GEOC – Georgia Emergency Operations Center – the central command and control facility responsible
for carrying out the principles of emergency preparedness and emergency management or disaster
management functions for the state of Georgia.
GSA – General Services Administration – an independent agency of the United States government,
established in 1949 to help manage and support the basic functioning of federal agencies. The GSA
supplies products and communications for U.S. government offices, provides transportation and office
space to federal employees, and develops government-wide cost-minimizing policies, among other
management tasks.
HHS – Health and Human Services – a Cabinet department of the United States government with the
goal of protecting the health of all Americans and providing essential human services.
HIPAA – Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act – law requiring HHS to establish national
standards for electronic health care transactions and national identifiers for providers, health plans, and
employers. It also addresses the security and privacy of health data.
ICS – Incident Command System – a management system used within the United States, parts of
Canada, the United Kingdom and other countries to organize emergency response, designed to offer a
scalable response to incidents of any magnitude. As part of FEMA’s National Response Plan (NRP), the
system has become part of the National Incident Management System (NIMS). The system is designed
to grow and shrink along with the incident, allowing more resources to be smoothly added into the
system when required or released when no longer needed.
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
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INIPP – Interim National Infrastructure Protection Plan – the Base Plan that provides the framework and
sets the direction for implementing a coordinated, national effort in the event of an incident. It provides a
roadmap for identifying CI/KR assets, assessing vulnerabilities, prioritizing assets, and implementing
protection measures in each infrastructure sector.
JFO – Joint Field Office – a temporary federal multiagency coordination center established locally to
facilitate field-level domestic incident management activities related to prevention, preparedness,
response, and recovery when activated by the Secretary.
MACS – Multiagency Coordination System – the combination of personnel, facilities, equipment,
procedures, and communications integrated into a common system. When activated, the MACS has the
responsibility for coordination of assisting agency resources and support in a multi-agency or multi-
jurisdictional environment.
NEMA – National Emergency Management Association – a non-partisan, non-profit 501(c)(3) association
dedicated to enhancing public safety by improving the nation’s ability to prepare for, respond to and
recover from all emergencies, disasters, and threats to America’s security. The state directors of
emergency management are the core membership of NEMA.
NERR – National Emergency Response Registry – permanent Internet-based system to source goods and
services to the government in emergencies
NGO – Non-governmental organization – a non-profit group or association that acts outside of
institutionalized political structures and pursues matters of interest to its members by lobbying,
persuasion, or direct action.
NIMS – National Incident Management System – a system that integrates effective practices in
emergency preparedness and response into a comprehensive national framework for incident
management. The NIMS is meant to enable responders at all levels to work together more effectively to
manage domestic incidents no matter what the cause, size or complexity.
NIPP – National Infrastructure Protection Plan – a document called for by Homeland Security
Presidential Directive 7 which aims to unify Critical Infrastructure and Key Resource (CI/KR) protection
efforts across the country.
NORTHCOM – U.S. Northern Command – a Unified Combatant Command of the United States Military
created in 2002 in the aftermath of the September 11th attacks. Its mission is to protect the United States
homeland and support local, state, and federal authorities, and it is responsible for U.S. military
operations in the United States.
NPS – National Planning System
NRP – National Response Plan – a comprehensive all-hazards approach to enhance the ability of the
United States to manage domestic incidents. The plan incorporates best practices and procedures from
incident management disciplines—homeland security, emergency management, law enforcement,
firefighting, public works, public health, responder and recovery worker health and safety, emergency
medical services, and the private sector—and integrates them into a unified structure. It forms the basis
of how the federal government coordinates with state, local, and tribal governments and the private
sector during incidents.
OFPP – Office of Federal Procurement Policy – policy office within the Office of Management and
Budget that plays a central role in shaping the policies and practices federal agencies use to acquire the
goods and services they need to carry out their responsibilities. OFPP was established by Congress in
1974 to provide overall direction for government-wide procurement policies, regulations and procedures
and to promote economy, efficiency, and effectiveness in acquisition processes.
Business Executives for National Security
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QBL – Qualified Bidders List
SAIC – Science Applications International Corporation – Although SAIC is a large technology firm with
numerous federal, state, and private sector clients, its traditional expertise has been supporting the
United States Department of Defense and the Intelligence Community, including the National Security
Agency.
SKU – Stock Keeping Unit – an identifier that is used by merchants to permit the systematic tracking of
products and services offered to customers. SKUs are not always associated with actual physical items,
but more appropriately billable entities.
SSA – Sector Specific Agency – Federal department or agency responsible for the overall coordination
of planning, preparedness, and protection-related activities within each of the 17 CI/KR sectors.
TCL – Target Capabilities List – list of capabilities developed by the Department of Homeland Security
that are required to prevent, protect against, respond to, and recover from incidents of national
significance.
UTL – Universal Task List – a list of every unique task that was identified from the suite of Common
Scenarios developed under the leadership of the Homeland Security Council. The fifteen scenarios
address a range of probable threats from terrorists, natural disasters and other emergencies.
VOAD – Voluntary Organizations Assisting in Disaster – a coalition of various volunteer organizations
with formal disaster response plans. These organizations share information about their capabilities,
resources, and special areas of expertise in order to foster cooperation and reduce duplication of effort.
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
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Appendix F – Public-Private Collaboration Outcomes and Drivers
State & Local Collaboration
Outcome:
• Build a “Business Operations Center” (BOC) capability in states and urban areas
- Include critical infrastructure, disaster supply chain businesses and other critical businesses
Driver:
• Congress directs DHS to create guidelines and funding for states and urban areas to build BOCs
• Congress considers funding public-private communications systems and data links with direct
appropriation; funding BOC sustaining costs through the federal grant program
• Congress directs DHS to tie receipt of funds to training and exercising
Achievability: High
Regional and Federal Collaboration
Outcome:
• Create an escalation process for public-private collaboration when increased federal participation
is necessary
Driver:
• Congress directs DHS to create guidelines and funding for regional and federal BOCs (FEMA,
JFO, other)
Achievability: High
Outcome:
• Integrate the BOC concept into the National Response Plan (NRP)
Driver:
• DHS to invite private-sector participation in developing and integrating the BOC concept into the
NRP
Achievability: Moderate
“Business EMAC”
Outcome:
• Work with National Emergency Management Association (NEMA) to explore application of
Emergency Management Assistance Compact (EMAC) model to private-sector resources
Driver:
• Task Force to nominate team to:
- Validate “Business EMAC (BEMAC)” concept with NEMA
- Seek support from the National Governors Association
• Congress provides funds through DHS to states for implementation
Achievability: High
Business Executives for National Security
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Appendix G – Surge Capacity/Supply Chain Management Outcomes
and Drivers
Emergency Purchasing
Outcome:
• Improve forecasting for emergency goods and services
Driver:
• FEMA improves forecasting model with other DHS offices and private-sector input and
collaboration
Achievability: High
Outcome:
• Have pre-contracts in place and vendors pre-qualified
Driver:
• FEMA improves contracting and qualification mechanisms
Achievability: High
Outcome:
• Establish prices at the vendors’ then-current market prices
Driver:
• FEMA and vendors establish pricing mechanisms
Achievability: Moderate
Outcome:
• Develop pricing mechanisms to be implemented in disaster situations
Driver:
• States take lead, working through affiliate associations to approach a national standard
Achievability: Moderate
Outcome:
• Establish mechanism for pre-qualifying before a crisis and for qualifying non-GSA or otherwise
qualified vendors during a crisis
Driver:
• Governments create streamlined mechanisms for emergency certification
Achievability: High
Outcome:
• Establish more effective vendor selection mechanisms
- Must have transparency of transactions
- Be self-auditing
Driver:
• Governments develop mechanisms that include other vendor sources if pre-certified or otherwise
qualified vendors cannot meet availability and delivery requirements.
Achievability: Moderate
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
56
Outcome:
• Further develop online “reverse auction” system for meeting ad hoc needs
Driver:
• Congress provides funding for NEMA to implement as part of “Business EMAC”
Achievability: Development of system: High; Funding: Moderate
Donations Management
Outcome:
• Identify most likely pro bono needs for a range of scenarios
Driver:
• FEMA improves forecasting model with business and NGO input and collaboration
Achievability: High
Outcome:
• Create online registry and reverse auction capability for meeting unanticipated needs for pro bono
goods and services
Driver:
• Congress provides funding for NEMA to implement as part of “Business EMAC” within state EOC/
BOC
Achievability: Development of process: High; Funding: Moderate
Logistics Processes
Outcome:
• Educate business employees and public on emergency preparations to lessen peak demand
Driver:
• Businesses provide employee education
• DHS continues improving website www.ready.gov
Achievability: High
Outcome:
• Improve credentialing process for private-sector responders and volunteers prior to and during
disasters
Driver:
• States working with local authorities create standards and protocols
• Congress provides funding through DHS
Achievability: Moderate
Outcome:
• Improve “last mile” logistics to improve vehicle offloading and distribution capabilities
Driver:
• States and major urban areas working with local authorities develop capabilities
Achievability: Moderate
Business Executives for National Security
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Appendix H – Legal & Regulatory Environment Outcomes and Drivers
Disaster Law: Liability
Outcome:
• Improve Good Samaritan protections with aim of ensuring predictability of liability
Driver:
• Congress and states develop common body of legislation or enact new law
Achievability: Low
Outcome:
• Clarify/standardize liability of professionals acting in good faith during disasters (e.g., patient
triage, alternative treatments, etc.)
Driver:
• Congress improves legislation on the books or enacts new law
Achievability: Low
Disaster Law: Regulation
Outcome:
• Clarify and promulgate procedures that allow quick implementation of discretionary authorities
during disasters
• Package and set triggers for implementation
- Antitrust
- Emergency implementation of environmental law
- Licensing
- Privacy
- Service delivery and termination
Driver:
• Federal agencies review laws and authorities under their purview and make necessary changes
Achievability: High
Stafford Act
Outcome:
• Revise the Stafford Act to enable the private sector to:
- Participate as full partners in the complete range of disaster response activities
- Be afforded non-monetary federal assistance when necessary
- Request assistance directly through the appropriate federal agency
Driver:
• Congress enacts revision
Achievability: Moderate
Congressional Hearings
Outcome:
• Identify recommendation from this report that can be implemented under existing authorities
Driver:
• Task Force uses its government affairs resources to encourage Congress to act
Achievability: High
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
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Appendix I – Priorities and Sequencing
Business Integration into the National Response Plan
Outcome:
• Integrate business more fully in the federal, state and local government operations continuums:
- Doctrine development
- Capabilities-based resource planning
- Operations planning
- Training and exercises
- Operations
- Lessons-learned assessments
Driver:
• Congress directs DHS to include substantive business participation in federal programs
• Congress makes federal funds available to states for business participation
Achievability: Integration into NRP: High; Funding: Low
Resource commitment
Outcome:
• Ensure adequate resources are devoted to implementing Task Force recommendations at the state,
regional and federal levels on a sustainable basis
Driver:
• Congress directs DHS to create guidelines and provide funding for states, urban areas, and regions
to build sustainable partnerships to implement Task Force recommendations
• Task Force to consider a standing advisory group to:
- Keep government and business focused in implementing the Task Force recommendations
- Inform a core group of state governors and enlist their support for implementing the Task Force
recommendations
- Advise states, urban areas and regions on implementation of the recommendations
- In cooperation with other like-minded groups (e.g., the Business Roundtable), develop a voluntary
national-level advisory group that can offer advice and instruction to states interested in building
a BOC structure
Achievability: Moderate
Business Executives for National Security
59
Business Executives for National Security
For a quarter century, Business Executives for National Security has been the primary
channel through which American business leaders can contribute their special
experience and talent to help build a more secure nation.
Founded in 1982 by business executive and entrepreneur Stanley A. Weiss, BENS is
guided by the simple notion that America’s security is everybody’s business. Led by
President and CEO General Charles G. Boyd, U.S. Air Force (Ret.), BENS is a national,
nonpartisan organization of senior executives dedicated to enhancing our national
security using the successful models of the private sector.
As the United States confronts threats of terrorism at home and abroad, BENS is
more important than ever before. The innovative business-government partnerships
that BENS has fostered over the past two decades to help save the Defense
Department billions of dollars are now uniquely positioned to help meet the new
challenges of the 21st century.
BENS is expanding these public-private partnerships into all aspects of homeland
security – helping to guard against cyber attack, track terrorists’ financial assets,
secure the nation’s ports, and prepare state and local governments to deal with
catastrophic events or terrorist attacks.
Recognizing that the nation will never fully realize the efficient, agile military it
needs to win a global war on terrorism without an equally efficient and agile support
structure, BENS remains a tireless advocate for smarter spending at the Pentagon.
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
60
Getting Down to Business:
An Action Plan for Public-Private
Disaster Response Coordination
The Report of the Business Response Task Force
January 2007
BUSINESS EXECUTIVES FOR NATIONAL SECURITY
1717 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW • Suite 350 • Washington, DC 20006-4620
E-mail: [email protected] • Tel: 202-296-2125 • Fax: 202-296-2490
www.bens.org
doc_995798184.pdf