Emergency And Disaster Preparedness

Emergency and Disaster Preparedness

Introduction

There are countless public preparedness programs that have been and continue to be developed throughout the country and the world. While many of these programs are effective, many do not ascribe to any tried and tested social science best practices and as such are not necessarily as effective as the education campaign planners would have liked. The bulk of federal disaster relief efforts are managed by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (ready.gov). Ready.gov and other government agencies provide grants, low-interest loans and other types of assistance to people and communities struck by natural disasters. Those loans and grants help people rebuild disaster-torn homes and businesses and help local governments respond to disasters and rebuild damaged infrastructure, such as roads and bridges.

Discussion

Troubled Assets Relief Program (TARP) observers and experts argue that the government's role in disaster assistance has encouraged people to inhabit hazardous areas. Those critics say that the government has done so by building roads, bridges and other infrastructure that makes it easier for people to move to otherwise hard-to-settle land. When the inevitable natural disasters occur, critics say, the government enables people to stay and rebuild in the same risky areas by providing them with disaster relief.

What the government must do, many observers say, is put an end to policies that they say encourage people to build in risky areas by providing a never-ending stream of bailouts when things go wrong. It is the humane and right thing to do to help people and communities devastated by catastrophic acts of nature, writes the Atlanta Journal-Constitution in an editorial. But to entice people into areas where the danger of such events is greatest-that's simply courting disaster.

The bailout plan, called the Troubled Assets Relief Program (TARP), was amended by Congress and finally passed on October 3. The new version of the bill included over $100 billion in tax breaks, many of which were derided by critics as earmarks added to entice specific lawmakers to support the bill. Paulson's original proposal was only three pages long; the version that was passed by Congress exceeded 450 pages.

The passage of the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act (EESA), the legislation that authorized TARP, did little to boost the stock market, as investors engaged in a massive sell-off that, by October 10, had resulted in one of the steepest declines in Wall Street's history. Banks throughout the world had ...