Measuring Cross-Community Disaster Preparedness and Resiliency: Theoretical and Practical Application Development

这个项目的主要目标是扩大我们对社区在危机事件之前的准备和复原力的概念。这将通过探索我们在社区范围内衡量“准备”和随后的“复原力”的方式来实现，寻求制定一套可以标准化和衡量的特征和标准。通过建立衡量方法的框架，这项研究将寻求将灾害和应急管理领域中一个长期存在的理论结构付诸实施，即当对系统的需求超过社区的能力时，灾难就会发生。具体地说，该项目将通过为有意义的衡量建立基础，然后审查、完善和应用社区备灾指数(DPI)，从而更接近这一目标。一旦应用DPI，就可以制定社区灾害复原力指数(DRI)。这些测量的创建具有巨大的潜力，可用于多种研究和现场应用。这些指数将提供一个机会，在社区之间就其应急准备、反应能力和灾后恢复潜力进行有意义的交叉比较。总体灾害指数(DI)模型将产生几个重要组成部分，包括专门针对社区备灾情况的评分或指标系统(基于加权功能因素)，以及对社区能力和资源的系统评估(产生综合评分)。复原力指数部分将考虑到社区暴露在一组特定地点的危险中。预期的结果将引起广泛的研究人员、从业者和参与减灾、准备、响应和恢复的组织的兴趣。这些指数的制定将提供一个初步的理论框架，并确定研究界目前尚不存在的适当指标。在其他领域，直接投资模式的使用可能在以下方面产生重大影响：1)研究工具；2)社区备灾和恢复审计或评估；3)保险业和其他风险管理领域的风险定价工具；4)用于缓解和恢复活动的联邦资金分配工具；以及5)潜在地提高对任何特定社区备灾和复原力水平的关注的政治工具。

The primary goal of this project is to broaden our conceptualization of community preparedness and resiliency in advance of crisis events. This will be accomplished by exploring the manner in which we measure "preparedness" and subsequently "resilience," at a community scale, seeking to develop a set of characteristics and criteria that can be standardized and measured. By creating a framework for measurement methodology, the research will seek to operationalize a long-standing theoretical construct in the hazards and emergency management fields, namely; that a disaster occurs when demands on the system are greater than the community's capacity. Specifically, the project will move closer to that goal by developing a foundation for meaningful measurement, and then the examining, refining, and applying a Community Disaster Preparedness index (DPi). The DPi, once applied, allows the development of a Community Disaster Resilience index score (DRi). The creation of these measurements has tremendous potential for multiple research and field applications. The indices will provide an opportunity to make meaningful cross-comparisons among communities with regard to their emergency preparedness, response capabilities, and potential for recovery from disaster events. The overall disaster index (DI) model would generate several important components, including a scoring or indicator system (based on weighted functional factors) directed specifically to a community's preparedness, and a systematic assessment of a community's capabilities and resources (resulting in a composite score). The resiliency index component would account for a community's exposure to a set of locational-specific hazards. The expected results will be of interest to a wide spectrum of researchers, practitioners, and organizations involved with hazard mitigation, preparedness, response and recovery. The development of these indices will provide a first cut theoretical framework and the identification of appropriate indicators that do not currently exist in the research community. In other areas, the DI model could potentially have substantial impact with regard to its use as: 1) a research instrument; 2) a community preparedness and recovery audit or assessment; 3) a risk pricing instrument for the insurance industry and others in risk management; 4) an instrument for the allocation of federal funding, both for mitigation and recovery activities; and 5) a political instrument to potentially increase attention to the level of preparedness and resilience in any given community.