A Tale of Two Federal Emergency Management Agencies

Abstract

Prior to Hurricane Katrina, I wrote a short historical study of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). The narrative read like a tale of two agencies: a largely ignored and inept FEMA during the worst of times under Presidents Reagan and Bush, Sr. and a revitalized and reorganized FEMA during the best of times under President Clinton and up through the September 11th disaster. The aim of the study was to glean insight into the relationship between the internal organization of FEMA and its perceived performance. This paper shows that when FEMA is internally divided—its national security and domestic emergency missions are under separate directorates without much contact or communication with one another—and there exist heightened pressures for FEMA to divert resources and attention to its national security programs, the Agency’s overall performance in response and recovery efforts appears to suffer. With these findings I had hoped to make a conjecture about how the transfer of FEMA into the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) might adversely affect the Agency’s overall mission. As it happened, the negative attention paid FEMA in the months following its response to the 2004 Hurricanes seemed to bolster the hypothesis that a divided and militarized FEMA would not be able to respond to non-national security emergencies with the success exhibited by an integrated and demilitarized FEMA. The Agency’s recent response to the disaster in New Orleans has rendered the question considered in this paper both timely and important and, regrettably, has seemed to reinforce its conclusions.