Napolitano Emphasizes Shared Responsibility for Readiness and Resilience

Secretary Janet Napolitano today marked the conclusion of National Preparedness Month by delivering a speech emphasizing America’s shared responsibility for preparedness and stressing the important role that individuals play in building a national culture of readiness and resilience.

“When families are prepared—when communities stand together and stand tall—so does our nation,” said Secretary Napolitano. “United, we send a powerful message to those that seek to do us harm: we cannot be broken, we are America—strong and resilient.”

Secretary Napolitano delivered the speech at the American Red Cross Hall of Service in front of more than 300 volunteers and employees representing the Red Cross, DHS Citizen Corps, and local and regional emergency management agencies from around the National Capital Region—as well as employees of DHS and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA).

“America’s history is not written by the tragedies that have befallen us, but by how we responded to them,” said Secretary Napolitano. “Since our earliest days, every time we have been challenged or have seen tragedy, Americans have shown a sense of purpose and resilience.”

During her remarks, Secretary Napolitano recognized Citizen Corps and Red Cross volunteers who donate their time and energies to train others in critical readiness and emergency response skills while contributing to a culture of preparedness.

“We should measure our nation’s security not just by the borders we strengthen and the laws we enforce, but also by the strength and resilience of the communities we build,” said Secretary Napolitano.

Secretary Napolitano’s remarks on preparedness today build on previous speeches outlining her approach to counterterrorism, delivered in New York City in July, and border security, delivered in Texas in August—and reflect her commitment to ensuring readiness and resilience among all citizens.

DHS Secretary Napolitano To Give Major Preparedness Speech

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano will deliver a major speech on national preparedness today at 2:00pm ET. The speech will be streamed live at www.dhs.gov.

In the speeech Secretary Napolitano will thank all of our Citizen Corps volunteers, the Ready Campaign, national partners, and the thousands of others in the National Preparedness Month Coalition for all their hard work.
She’ll also challenge our country to see preparedness as a shared responsibility, and urge Americans to build a year-round culture of readiness and resilience in our communities.

DHS Link

Crisis Preparedness – What We Can Learn From Israel

Report suggests that America can learn much from Israeli example on public crisis preparedness.

It’s a widely accepted truism in American politics that an engaged citizenry is the best defense. Yet, when it comes to emergency preparedness, the American public remains incredibly unengaged in the process, largely lacking both the knowledge and the opportunity to participate proactively and constructively.

A report titled Public Role and Engagement In Counterterrorism Efforts: Implications of Israeli Practices for the U.S., prepared for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s Office of Science and Technology by the Homeland Security Institute (a federally-funded research and development center which serves as the Department’s think tank) examines both why that is the case, and how study of Israeli citizen involvement in crisis response might help US preparedness and “social resilience” improve.

The study was co-authored by Dr. Sibel McGee (the principal investigator), Catherine Bott, Vikram Gupta, Kimberly Jones and Alex Karr. Published as a PDF document it has not yet been released on the web.

“The successful management of emergency situations,” according to the report, “ requires not only competent emergency response personnel and prudent and effective emergency plans by the local/state/federal government, but also a public that is equipped and empowered with knowledge and information.”

The report cites Israel as a primary example of a nation with an effective track record in motivating and maintaining public mobilization in support of counterterrorism efforts. A reflection of that success, the report suggests, is that “the level of public understanding of the terrorist threat and readiness for terror-induced emergencies is such that Israeli public has an impressive ability to bounce back from frequent terrorist attacks.”

To accomplish this, according to the report, the Israeli government pursues a comprehensive and diverse program to bolster a strong public resilience and utilizes it as a deliberate counterterrorism tool.

Source

72 Hours…Is Your Family Prepared – Canada Launches Campaign

Why do 43% of Canadians say they have a a 72 hour kit when asked…?  It’s all about the message and how it’s delivered.

See the full press release here

I’ll have more to say about this next week in our press release announcing the Homeland Security Response Network launch. Read more