Chapter Chapter 6
Section Transformation Within the Federal Government: Building Operational Capability
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A NATIONAL PREPAREDNESS SYSTEM
Transformation Within the Federal Government: Building Operational Capability
The creation of an effective National Preparedness System will require the Federal government to transform the way it does business. The most important objective of this Federal transformation must be to build and integrate operational capability. Each Federal department or agency with homeland security responsibilities needs operational capability—or the capacity to get things done—to translate executive management direction promptly into results on the ground. It includes the personnel to make and communicate decisions; organizational structures that are assigned, trained, and exercised for their missions; sufficient physical resources; and the command, control, and communication channels to make, monitor, and communicate decisions.
As described in the preceding narrative, the response to Hurricane Katrina required that the Federal government both support State and local efforts while conducting response operations in the field, in addition to making policy or implementing programs. With the exceptions of the Department of Defense and the Coast Guard—two organizations with considerable operational capabilities—the Federal government was at times slow and ineffective in responding to the massive operational demands of the catastrophe.
These shortfalls were not due to the absence of top level plans such as the National Response Plan and the National Incident Management System. Rather, the problem is that these plans lack clarity on key aspects and have operational gaps, as discussed in previous chapters, and have not been effectively integrated and translated into action. Prior training, exercising, and equipping proved inadequate to the task of effectively responding to Hurricane Katrina. There is a difference between a plan (saying “this is what we need to do”) and a trained, resourced set of defined missions (saying “this is what we are going to do, and this is how we are going to organize, train, exercise, and equip to do it”). For any plan to work, it must first be broken down into its component parts. Next, the plan’s requirements should be matched to the human and physical assets of each responsible department, agency, or organization.
The imperative, therefore, is to organize coherent, proactive management of responses to catastrophic events. Virtually all elements of the Federal government must be operational—to respond to catastrophic events with unified effort. There are three principal requirements to achieve this transformational goal:
Strengthening DHS institutions to manage the Federal response as well as enhancing DHS regional and field elements.
Reinforcing the Secretary of Homeland Security’s position as the President’s manager of the Federal response; and
Strengthening the response capabilities—management and field resources—of other Federal departments and agencies.
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