The National Incident Management
System (NIMS) was created in 2003 to help
federal, state, and local emergency response organizations coordinate their actions. By
standardizing response time and type, NIMS seeks to reduce inefficient or redundant
actions while placing help in its area of maximum
benefit.
At the moment, there have been only three original
studies on the subject, each of which showed similar results; the NIMS system is a good
start to standardization, but still has flaws in its implementation. Specifically, the
federal aspect of NIMS means that in most cases, federal resources allocated to disaster
or emergency response will be held back for "major," or "significant" emergencies; the
implication -- explicitly stated in one of the studies -- is that the current focus on
terrorist-related activities will overshadow natural emergencies, such as hurricanes,
floods, and tornadoes.
Another problem is the decreased
functionality of local response teams. With specialized teams intended to respond at
various levels of threat, local teams might not be trained or ready to respond as
quickly as they might otherwise. Although NIMS is intended to provide fast and efficient
help, it might also create a dependency in local response, making reaction to disaster
slower instead of faster.
Finally, disaster can break down
communications, and without designated lines to the federal government, local response
teams might not know which areas to focus on. In the case of fast-response, local teams
always need to know who is responding and to which emergency, so as not to leave people
stranded or in danger.
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