A message from Christine Walsh, Emergency Management Committee Chairperson, 2009-2010:

First of all, I would like to “Thank you” for visiting the APWA Emergency Management Committee website. Our membership in 2009-2010 consists of representatives from a broad spectrum of professional expertise and jurisdictional sizes from California to New England. Each one of the Emergency Management members has devoted countless hours representing APWA to ensure and strengthen public works by participating in twelve federal coalitions, task forces and workgroups. Our members also provided testimony at the House Transportation and Infrastructure Subcommittee on Water Resources and Environment for the National Levee Safety Program. One of the specific areas that members will be working on this coming year includes updating our Nations Target Capabilities List by serving on working groups led by FEMA.

The committee members recognize there is still much work to be done in getting public works professionals recognized for our role as first responders, however this past year Public Works was nominated by the Federal Emergency Services Sector as an equal voting member. We believe it is important for all members to acknowledge their role as a first responder by coming to the table with other first responders to ensure our agencies can mitigate, prepare, respond and recover from incidents to the best of our ability. In light of that we highly encourage agencies to become compliant with NIMS. To find out more about NIMS’ requirements go to http://www.fema.gov./emergency/nims/nims_compliance.shtm.

One of the largest threats facing our Nation right now is the H1N1, which the committee provided APWA members with a “Continuity of Operations” click, listen and learn, a session at Congress, participation on local, state and federal agencies and the development of documents that are posted on the Resource Center.

This year our committee plans on the completion of a manual entitled Recovery Operations. Kudos to Brian Usher, who chaired this project, along with his committee members. Look for this publication in the bookstore early next spring.

If you would like to be involved in the work of the Emergency Management Committee, please contact me or any of the other committee members.

Thank you for visiting our web page and be sure to browse around before you go!

• Committee Roster
• Business Plan [PDF]
• Opportunities to Participate
• Meeting Summaries
• Training
• The Essential Role of Public Works in Emergency Management fact sheet [PDF]

• Department of Homeland Security
• DisasterHelp.gov
• FEMA
• FEMA Training
• Lessons Learned Information Sharing

Meeting the national security challenges of today's world requires collaboration and commitment from all levels of government, the private sector and citizens. With that in mind, the National Homeland Security Consortium has outlined a vision for how the nation should address homeland security in the modern era in a new white paper, Protecting Americans in the 21st Century: Imperatives for the Homeland.

In particular, the paper urges an equal partnership between state, local and private entities and the federal government in setting national homeland security goals, policies and procedures.

APWA comments on the NHSC white paper

Participate in discussions regarding this and other topics through:	Additional Resources:
	Resource Center APWA Position Statements