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Saturday, 27 December 2008 |
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by Jacki Lyden
They fight in neighborhoods they describe as being like "a mouthful
of broken teeth" — a burned-out building here, a collapsed home there.
Calling themselves "urban warriors," Detroit's firefighters face a
landscape that grows more treacherous as the city's vacancy rate climbs.
Detroit
is shrinking. Once a symbol of American might, its population has
dropped to less than half the 2 million it was 50 years ago. It's
estimated that Detroit has more than 70,000 abandoned homes. The city
says 1 in 4 homes will be unoccupied next year if the trend continues.
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Monday, 22 December 2008 |
Southern California earthquakes and wildfires may have shock value, but for killing folks you can’t beat an old-fashioned heat wave or the bitter cold—a fact that means you might be more likely to die during extreme weather in Iowa than in the California region famed for it’s disasters.
The less-than-obvious conclusion comes from an examination of more than three decades of death data from two national databases, according to an article in the Los Angeles Times (link). The results of that study, Spatial Patterns of Natural Hazards Mortality in the United States, found that more frequent disasters, such as extremes in heat or cold, flooding, and tornadoes, were responsible for more deaths that those that steal headlines. |
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Sunday, 21 December 2008 |
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By Mark Hosenball | NEWSWEEK
The Federal Emergency Management Agency, which was widely ridiculed for its pitiful response to Hurricane Katrina, may undergo big changes under President Obama.
Agency critics say the nation's disaster-relief efforts have been
hampered ever since FEMA was lumped into the Department of Homeland
Security—the slow-footed bureaucratic behemoth created by the Bush
administration after 9/11. Last week, officials from the International
Association of Emergency Managers, which represents local disaster
agencies, met with Obama aides and urged them to break FEMA free from
Homeland Security and restore its previous status as an independent
agency.
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Sunday, 21 December 2008 |
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The Department of Homeland Security has failed to secure the Internet and should no longer take the lead role in trying, say government and security experts who on Monday urged President-elect Barack Obama to create a new national office to police cyberspace.
Their report also calls for new laws to protect privacy and speed investigations of cybercrimes; strong identification of all people and devices connecting to networks belonging to power plants and other organizations critical to U.S. security; and secure software for everybody who connects to the Internet - not just the military and national security agencies. |
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Monday, 08 December 2008 |
More than three years ago, needy children of the Gulf Coast fell prey to the sudden, torrential force of Hurricane Katrina. Today, those children are the victims of the slow and excruciatingly ineffectual system that was suppose to help them recover.
A study of the medical records of 261 poor Baton Rouge children found them to be “among the most medically needy child population in the United States,” according to the report’s summary. “Legacy of Shame: The On-going Public Health Disaster of Children Struggling in Post-Katrina Louisiana” (http://www.childrenshealthfund.org/PDF/BR-WhitePaper_Final.pdf) chronicles the medical travails of children under the care of the Children’s Health Fund (CHF) Baton Rouge Project, a group that includes the poorest and most vulnerable families affected by the storm.
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Monday, 08 December 2008 |
The Natural Hazards Center wants to hear your ideas on session topics for the 2009 Annual Natural Hazards Research and Applications Workshop. The annual workshop is a dynamic forum that showcases diverse opinions and perspectives from the hazards and disasters community. The 2009 Workshop will be held July 14-17 at the Omni Interlocken Resort just outside of Boulder, Colorado.
At the Workshop, hazards researchers, practitioners, and students discuss the latest issues in hazards and disasters, society’s efforts to address them, and ways to improve those efforts. But these discussions don’t happen in a vacuum—that’s why we need your input. |
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Monday, 08 December 2008 |
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The possibility that former Federal Emergency Management Agency Director James Lee Witt might temporarily pick up the reins of the agency for the Obama administration drew mixed opinions last week.
A column by the Washington Post’s Al Kamen (link) speculated—based on unnamed sources—that Witt might step in to whip the troubled agency into shape and then bow out, leaving his business partner and theoretical deputy administrator Mark Merritt to run a FEMA unfettered by the Department of Homeland Security.
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Monday, 08 December 2008 |
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By GREGG CARLSTROM
December 07, 2008
Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff has some advice for his successor: Don’t tinker with the Homeland Security Department. At least not right away.
“I would stop reorganizing,” he said in an interview last week. “Every time there’s a reorganization, it sets you back a year. People don’t know where they’re going to go, what their future is, what their job description is going to be.”
Last week, President-elect Barack Obama named Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano as his choice to head the Homeland Security Department.
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