In late February, CDC released the highly anticipated notice of funding opportunity (NOFO) for the 2024-2028 Public Health Emergency Preparedness (PHEP) grant. The general concept of the grant wasn’t a big surprise, as they had been promoting a move to their Response Readiness Framework (RRF). The timing of the new five-year grant cycle seems ideal to implement lessons learned from COVID-19, yet they are falling short.
I’ve reflected in the past on the preparedness capability elements of Planning, Organizing, Equipment/Systems, Training, and Exercises (POETE). I also often add Assessing to the front of that (APOETE). These preparedness elements are essentially the buckets of activity through which we categorize our preparedness activities.
In reviewing the ten program priorities of the RRF, I’m initially encouraged by the first priority: Prioritize a risk-based approach to all-hazards planning. Activity-wise, what this translates to in the NOFO is conducting a risk assessment. Solid start. Yet nowhere else is planning overtly mentioned. Within the NOFO some of the other priorities reflect on ensuring certain things are addressed in plans, such as health equity, but there is otherwise no direct push for planning. Buried within the NOFO (page 62) is a list of plans that must be shared with project officers upon request (under the larger heading of Administrative and Federal Requirements) but the development of any of these plans does not correlate to any priorities, strategies, or activities within the document.
As for the rest of APOETE, there is good direction on Organizing, Equipment and Systems, Training, and Exercises. While that’s all great, planning is the true foundation of preparedness and it is so obviously left out of this NOFO. Along with my general opinion that most emergency plans (across all sectors) are garbage, that vast majority of findings from numerous COVID-19 after-action reports I’ve written (which included two states and several county and local governments) noted the significant need for improved emergency plans. Further, the other preparedness elements (OETE) should all relate back to our plans. If we aren’t developing, improving, and updating plans, then the other activities will generally lack focus, direction, and relevance.
Understanding that this is the first year of a five-year grant cycle, some changes and clarification will occur as the cycle progresses, but as planning is a foundational activity, it should be immediately and directly tied to the results of the assessment this year’s grant calls for. Otherwise, the findings of the assessments are generally meaningless if we aren’t taking action and developing plans to address them. This is leaving us with a significant gap in preparedness. Someone at CDC didn’t think this through and it leaves me with a great deal of concern, especially in the aftermath of the COVID-19 response.
What are your thoughts on this?
© 2024 Tim Riecker, CEDP
The Contrarian Emergency Manager 
Greetings. All excellent points, as usual.
Also contrarian, having witnessed countless agencies across many jurisdictional levels inexplicably wholly abandon their established and tested plans, trainings, etc. when COVID-19 arose—foremost CDC, I am nothing less than cynical that this will only repeat. What’s the point of emergency planning if the plans are only ignored (rather than adapted, scaled or modified) when disaster strikes?
There’s many credibility issues that now exist in our EM world as result of actions/inactions and abundant leadership failures during the pandemic. I’m hopeful we, as a profession, can see to correct this with candor and avoid a repeat. Thank you.
axs
Agreed… it was an egregious example of something that I think happens far too often – too few even reference the plans that so much effort goes into developing. I’ve even had some emergency managers tell me that they only care about having a plan done so they can check a box, they will never reference them. I never understood that attitude. I’m less concerned about the activities we do more often, as it’s more likely that enough people know what should be done (but even then, a process may have changed and they still revert to the ‘old way’). But certainly for the things we don’t do often, those plans, if well written, should be our guide! I, too, hope that we can improve.