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What Government Gains by Engaging the Public Panel | Transcript | Audio | Q&A audio Q&A Transcript
Monica Schoch-Spana:
We have a great deal of expertise represented in the first panel. I do want to make sure we have enough time for questions and answers, and involving you in the audience. So, what we're going to do is take questions. Please use the two microphones either to your right or your left. Any questions for Karen, Elaine, or Mary Pat? And, actually, it would be useful if people who are asking questions introduce themselves and the group they are with. Ana Marie Jones:
Good morning. My name is Ana Marie Jones. I'm the executive director of C.A.R.D., which is Collaborating Agencies Responding to Disasters based in Oakland, California. Our focus is the most marginalized communities: people with disabilities, and homeless, and low income, and immigrants, and people who definitely are not the most likely candidates for traditional citizen engagement. We found in the 16 years since Loma Prieta-the earthquake-that we needed to re-write the context of action for these groups. To try to scare poor people into thinking that earthquakes, floods, and terrorism are more pressing and more immediate than their immediate circumstance was absolutely useless, and we found great success with changing the message and the messenger and the medium of delivery. My question for you guys is: what do you have in place to encourage non-traditional participation? As we know, many people are just never going to show up at summit meetings like this and other things, so what is actively in place so that alternative programs such as C.A.R.D. would actually have a way of being known or heard? Elaine Chatigny:
I can just very quickly say that in Canada, when it comes to engaging with our First Nations communities of which we have a responsibility to do, we have strategies to engage with them, through the Assembly of First Nations, we have partnerships, we have all kinds of means. For example, we work with agencies of record for the development of social marketing campaigns or other kinds of communications activities with First Nations organizations and agencies. So, it's mandated, and we build it in as an integral component in our strategies that we have to absolutely build in those components or the strategies don't go very far. Karen Marsh:
Well, I certainly think from our perspective, there are a couple of things. One is to make sure that it's written into policy so that as it cascades down from the federal government to state and local governments that there is [consideration] for the groups you have identified. We very definitely have included that in the grant guidance, for example. The second piece, of course, is to promote best practices, and I think we need to do a better job of that. We've got a couple of things in the works that I think will help with that, but I think we need to share best practices across communities, and we need to publicize successful outreach and preventative measures rather than focus on the response element. We need to now shift the focus and put a lot more attention on what's being done "pre-incident" versus the response phase. Mary Pat McKinnon:
Just to quickly add to that-because my colleagues have covered all, I think, the major points... [O]ne thing that we've done-the citizen dialogues that we do-they're random recruitment. So, it's from the general population, so we've gone to extra lengths to design a process that is respectful [and] welcoming. We provide an honorarium of a 100 or 150 dollars a day or for two days. And we've actually been pretty successful getting a representative group there so that the lower income and socio-economic diversity is in the room, and once they're there, it's a safe, welcoming, respectful place to be. Ana Marie Jones:
Thank you. And, for anyone who is interested on this whole different context: UC Berkeley Center for Infectious Disease Preparedness actually has all these courses webcast, so if you're interested you can go to www.idready.org and it's all about the alternative process. Monica Schoch-Spana:
Thanks, Ana Marie. We'll take a question from this side of the aisle. Sheila Davis:
Hi. I'm Sheila Davis, and I'm with the National Medical Association's Cobb Institute. My question is for Karen Marsh. Is there reciprocity between the Citizens Councils and the Department of Homeland Security? Can you provide concrete examples of how the department is listening to what these citizens councils are saying and doing and- Karen Marsh:
Reciprocity. You mean just conversation? I mean just in terms of sharing of information? Is that what you mean? Sheila Davis:
Well, I mean-Well, that's one example, but sort of, to take the model that was of, you know, one way flow of information versus level one versus level five. Where would you say that the Citizens' Council falls in that continuum? Karen Marsh:
From the government perspective, as I said. I think that, I think that there are a lot of NGOs out there that have been interested in these issues for many, many years. I think it really is the government's willingness to work with NGOs that needs to shift. And I think that we're making headway in that area, but that really is what the council is all abouttrying to break down those barriers and have, at the local level, have government and first responders sit down with the rest of, with representatives of the rest of the community in formulating a strategy for the community. We have a fairly hierarchical structure. We have the federal government, our grants and our guidance. We work closely with our Citizen Corps state points-of-contact. And what we have done is, we asked all the governors to select the appropriate person at the state level. So, in some states it is with the state service commissioner, so it's the State Office on Volunteer Service. In other states, the representative sits in the office of Homeland Security or Emergency Management. So, the lead component at the state level varies, and it is then the state who reaches out to the local level, and some states have structured the councils more at the county level. Some have done it regionally. Of course, we also have tribal councils, and then at the community level. So, it does vary from state to state, but it is more of a hierarchical structure that the communication, the policy, sort of cascades down. We've got a couple of things in the works, as I've said also to Ana Marie's issue, to share the best practices. We're hoping to have an online best-practice-collection-tool so that local communities can post directly success stories-examples of what they've done for outreach, for volunteerism, for exercises involving citizens more collaboratively in community exercises. So we're hoping to have that up and running in a couple of months. There's also LLIS in America. It's Lessons Learned Information Sharing, and there are best practices that are posted on that website as well. So, I think there are some state representatives in the room. Suzanne, I don't know if you want to talk about your relationship with your local councils. Ann Patton also at the local level. But, we very definitely want to have this dialogue and continue to learn from-it is the local level. Point blank. It is the local level that is going to reach out to citizens, and so we are dependent on the efforts of the local community and need to hear from them. Monica Schoch-Spana:
And I would recommend that-if you'll note in panel two that Ann Patton who is affiliated with the Citizen Corps in Tulsa, Oklahoma, can take up some of these issues. If we can keep the questions very brief I do want to provide everyone a break, and we can go over to this. If you could tell us who you are. Margaret Fowke:
Hi. I'm Margaret Fowke, a [program analyst] with the National Weather Service here in Washington. My question is for Miss Marsh. I-Since working at the Weather Service prior to Katrina, we saw a lot of the benefit value of using weather data in planning as far as prevention and not [over] reacting. So we did work closely with the office of Surgeon General's Medical Reserve Corps and they were very helpful. Marna Horn (sp?) was extremely helpful. And also the local Red Cross chapters. I have to tell you, before Katrina there was a lot of ambivalence in the communities, local communities toward learning weather and interpreting hurricane data-that kind of thing. So after Katrina, of course, the response was different. Now the local Red Cross and Red Cross headquarters are considering adding weather lessons to the CPR classes so a participant would have to take two to three weather quizzes to get their CPR card. And after that, subsequently taking another more advanced class so that they could learn more in depth knowledge of interpreting hurricane data. So that is in the works and I would welcome, especially your CERT teams. They've been in my classes and help with some of the development of these classes. So anybody within your divisions or programs that could help-I would definitely love to get involved. And that goes for anyone else in the audience. If you have local groups, public health or otherwise, who would be willing to use some of these weather quizzes to help educate especially medical and public health audiences, especially in the prevention aspects of using weather data so that people don't react after a weather event. Thanks. [jumbled voices] Monica Schoch-Spana: Jill Morgenthaler:
Hi. I'm Jill Morgenthaler. I'm the Homeland Security Advisor to Illinois, and, basically two questions: Number one, why wasn't the Citizen Corps used during Katrina? And, number two, we have noticed that the budget for the Citizen Corps is about between fifteen and eighteen million dollars which is-while at the same time, the money that will go to local emergency response groups, centers, towns, areas, that don't have much money, cannot pay for equipment, or hire people without that money that has just been taken away, and that doesn't seem like-to me-the correct focus yet. We're not high enough level where we can start removing money away from local areas. [applause] Karen Marsh:
On the first point, with Katrina. Citizen Corps was very heavily involved in the Katrina response. So I'm not sure what your question there was. As I mentioned, the Harris County Citizen Corps ran the entire Astrodome operation, the shelter operation in Houston. We also had about 15,000 Citizen Corps volunteers all around the country receiving evacuees in Massachusetts, in Arizona, California, all around the country. Probably in about 47 states. That helped with- Jill Morgenthaler:
The citizens received it, or the state, or the city? Karen Marsh:
Citizen Corps was involved in bringing volunteers, for example, at the Armory here in DC when the buses came for the evacuees who were displaced. It was Citizen Corps and Citizen Corps volunteers who supported the shelter operations for the evacuees all around the country. So very definitely the local Citizen Corps Councils were involved in the sort of mass disbursement of the evacuees and to help the evacuees to sort of reacclimate in their new locations. We did not, however, do a nationwide call out of volunteers to go to the affected site, so if that's your question, that was a-that was a-because in-for those of you-In 2004 we in fact-Citizen Corps originally was in FEMA, but it was moved to a different part of the department. But of course I used to work at FEMA and have close ties with FEMA, and in 2004 we actually sent about 3,000 Citizen Corps volunteers from all around the country down to Florida and the Gulf Coast to help with the 2004 hurricanes, principally in the area of community relations. In 2005 we did not do that national call out although volunteers who participated in 2004 actually became FEMA DAEs-Disaster Assistance Employees-and did go down through the FEMA DAE system. So, in fact they became more substantially involved and became federal reservists through that initial exposure. But again, in 2005 we did have a lot of citizens who participated within their state and local jurisdiction to support Katrina evacuees. The second point, on the funding. I couldn't agree with you more. I am-I have been perpetually disappointed that we have not received greater funding for this. One of the statistics that we say is that if you look-if you take a very narrow definition, an admittedly narrow definition of emergency responders meaning sworn law enforcement officers, firefighters, and EMT paramedics, collectively that represents less than 1% of the population, and the Citizen Corps constituency is the rest of the 99% of the rest of the country. And we need to elevate the education, training, and involvement of the 99%. And our funding has been checkered at best. We have our-our peak was 40 million as a line item appropriation two years ago. In fact in the House bill, appropriations bill we were zeroed out coming into 07 so I'm not sure where that's going to fall as the 07 appropriations process continues. But to mitigate that in terms of the line item appropriations, we have included and integrated citizen preparedness and participation throughout the homeland security funding streams. So the state Homeland Security money: the UASI-the Urban Area Security Initiative-money, the law enforcement terrorism prevention program, the MMRS-the Metropolitan Medical Response Service-there's reference to Citizen Corps, Citizen Corps programs, Citizen Corps activities, in all of the funding streams, and we have in fact started to see greater use of those moneys for this issue. So, a lot of jurisdictions are now shifting from buying equipment and focusing exclusively on first responders to now take a broader perspective and a broader scope and involve-and use some of their federal funding for the citizen component. There are some examples. Sacramento, California for example used $300,000 of their UASI funds to stand up a medical reserve corps. So we at the federal level provide a great deal of latitude to state and local governments in terms of the use of the funds. There are simply categories of eligible use of funds and it is for the state and local jurisdictions to make the tough decisions in terms of how to spend their money. But we've worked very hard to make it an eligible use. Monica Schoch-Spana:
Thank you very much, Karen, and also for your questions. I'm hearing some good news which is the national governments in Canada and the United States are moving to embrace citizen engagement. We have Elaine from Canada's public health agency saying they're trying to put it into their DNA as an institution. We have Karen Marsh's depiction of the commitment within Citizen Corps. The bad news I'm hearing is that citizen engagement continues to be a low visibility policy objective, and that is commensurate with the funding levels that we currently see. So good news and bad news. But we've got a committed summit group here, so we can do things, I hope, about the bad news. Let's go ahead and break. Proceedings of the May 23, 2006 Summit: Disease, Disaster, & Democracy
Transcription by CastingWords |
