Personal Disaster Preparedness Levels In the National Guard: Analysis of Survey Data, Readiness Rates Compared to General Public, First Responders, and Federal Emergency Management Agency Goal

This report has been professionally converted for accurate flowing-text e-book format reproduction. The Federal Government's model of Tiered Response for disasters assumes that National Guardsmen, when given a no-notice call to respond to an incident, will actually respond. This assumption may be true if the Guardsmen's area was unaffected, but might not be if it was affected. Surveys reveal a moderate level of disaster preparedness for civilians and a slightly higher level of preparedness for emergency responders. Unfortunately, there is no published data on emergency preparedness levels of households of National Guardsmen. This monograph helps fill that gap in the literature. Specifically, it asks and then answers the question: how prepared are National Guardsmen and do they meet, as a collective, FEMA's minimum criteria for preparedness levels? The collected data indicates National Guardsmen in the surveyed population of their respective states are more prepared for disaster than the general public, have comparable rates of preparedness as compared nationally to first responders, but do not meet FEMA's minimum preparedness goals.

Contents: Introduction * Part One: Literature Review * Part Two: Methodology * Part Three: Analysis and Comparison of the National Guard Disaster Preparedness Survey (NGDPS) Data * Part Four: Conclusion

Multiple agencies, from school districts to businesses to the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), have studied and surveyed various populations to gather data on the emergency preparedness levels of their designated populations. Their reasons were typically the same: gain an understanding of the group to establish a baseline, compare against trends, or update future contingency plans. However, when reviewing the literature, a gap emerges; there is no data on emergency preparedness levels of National Guardsmen households. This gap is a significant hole in research since the Tiered Response model for Defense Support of Civil Authorities (DSCA) makes a considerable assumption. The assumption is National Guardsmen, when given a no-notice call for service to respond to an incident, will actually respond. This assumption may be true if the Guardsmen's area was unaffected, but may not hold true if they were. Surveys of first responders show a moderate level of preparedness and mixed levels of predicted absenteeism if a disaster affects their household personally. Yet, there is no parallel research for National Guardsmen. How prepared are National Guardsmen households for disaster?

The Federal Government plans for events that are small to large in scale exampled by chemical explosions, earthquakes, nuclear detonations, and pandemic flu that cover multi-county, multi-state, or even national geography. It is therefore reasonable to conclude that a future event will, in fact, impact the households of National Guardsmen who at the same time are mobilized to react to that same disaster. By extension, it is necessary to query the level of emergency preparedness of these households and compare this to individuals, first responders, and FEMA goals. This data will prove useful to the National Guard and to the Department of Homeland Security in modifying disaster response planning assumptions.