HSS Recovery Coordination

Section Overview

By the end of the section, you should be able to:

Describe the premise and methods for collaboration in support of HSS Recovery.
Describe the organization of the HSS RSF and how it interacts with other RSFs, state and local government, and private sector stakeholders.
Identify, in general, who sets recovery priorities and what federal RSFs provide.

List of sections - Section 1: The HSS Recovery Support Function (checkmark), Section 2: HSS Recovery Coordination (arrow), Section 3: HSS Recovery Operations, Section 4: HSS Recovery in Practice

This course should take approximately 42 minutes to complete.

Introduction

The federal government's role in HSS recovery reflects the complexity of implementing the HSS RSF's broad mission scope. The complexity arises from several factors:

Health is where you live, work, learn, worship, and play.; Most communities do not enjoy optimal health prior to a disaster.; The stress of dealing with the aftermath of a disaster can exacerbate or create health concerns.; Emergencies and disasters present opportunities to enhance healthcare systems through recovery that supports a more optimal state of health.

Optimizing post-disaster health outcomes involves addressing acute conditions but also finding synergies to help overcome chronic health problems.

These factors make recovery efforts complex by requiring the HSS RSF to orient its efforts around supporting the social determinates of health.

Social Determinants of Health and Recovery

Social Determinants of Health are the environmental conditions in which people live, learn, work, play, worship, and age, which affect a wide range of health, functioning, quality-of-life outcomes, and risks.

These determinates include: healthy food access, living/working conditions, employment, housing, health care access and quality, etc.

Addressing these conditions in disaster recovery guides communities toward reducing inequities while increasing baseline community health.

Example: A community recovering from a disaster decides to integrate social service, school, and public recreation program improvements into its recovery plans to improve public welfare and service access.

Social Determinates of Health - Economic Stability, Education, Social and Community Context, Health and Healthcare, and Neighborhood and Built Environment

Communication and Coordination is Critical

Affecting the social determinants of health in disaster recovery requires close inter-sectoral collaboration between public and private stakeholders at the local, tribal, state, regional, and national levels.

Such collaborative efforts involve thousands of near-simultaneous, inter-related decisions being made as part of an overarching process. As such, communication and coordination is imperative.

Recovery leaders need to communicate and coordinate as much as possible before, during, and after an event to:

Maximize efficiencies
Minimize delays, disruptions, and duplication of effort

Four people sitting in a table group, in discussion

Federal - State/Tribal/Territorial Coordination

Process chart displaying Federal Resources to State/Tribe/Territory Recovery Priorities, then splitting into three different Local jurisdiction text boxes

Coordination between federal and state/tribal/territorial government has special significance in disaster recovery. This is because Federal RSFs must work with and through the state government - at their request.

State, tribal, territorial, and local governments are responsible for:

Determining recovery goals and priorities
Managing recovery efforts in their jurisdictions
Coordinating allocation of federal support

Federal RSFs integrate closely with their state/tribal equivalents to assist them in:

Assessment
Goal development
Implementation planning
Execution tasks

Federal - State/Tribal/Territorial Coordination (Continued)

The speed, quality, and impact of federal assistance can be significantly diminished by delays and impediments to effective integration. States and tribal authorities can avert many of these challenges by pre-establishing state/tribal/territorial-equivalent RSFs that support state/tribal/territorial agency integration to interface with the federal RSFs.

Process chart showing the flow from Governor’s Office to Senior Policy Group and State Disaster Recovery Coordinator, to State RSF Primary Departments, to Supporting Departments, to Parish and Local Governments; Aligned next to the chart is another process chart showing the flow from FCO to Federal Disaster Recovery Coordinator to Federal RSF Coordinating Agencies to Primary and Supporting Agencies; The two process charts grouped together distribute to Private Sector Stakeholders, Academia, Community and National Foundations, Non-Governmental Organizations, and State and National Associations

Organization of the Federal HSS RSF

The NDRF defines which federal agencies are in each RSF, and their levels of responsibility. The Federal Interagency Operations Plan (FIOP) for Recovery defines how they work together.

Each RSF is composed of:

One Coordinating Agency
Primary Agencies
Supporting Agencies (technical assistance)

The organizations assigned to these roles may have multiple lead and support responsibilities and be part of multiple RSFs.

Each agency brings a unique skill, capability, authority, or resource to the recovery effort.

Federal HSS RSF organizational chart showing Recovery Support Function (Coordinating Agency), Mission Area (Primary Agency and Primary Agency), and Sub-Task Execution Support (Supporting Agencies, Supporting Agency, and Supporting Agency)

Coordinating Agencies

Coordinating Agencies are responsible for supervising the strategic planning and execution of their assigned RSF's role in federal disaster recovery efforts. The HSS RSF's Coordinating Agency is the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).

Coordinating Agencies appoint a Field Coordinator (FC) for each incident to lead execution of the RSF's Core Mission Areas and coordinate efforts.

FCs from the different RSFs coordinate closely to ensure unified effort. This integration is guided by the Recovery FIOP. The Federal Disaster Recovery Coordinator (FDRC) is responsible for facilitating this collaboration.

Federal HSS RSF organizational chart showing Recovery Support Function (Coordinating Agency) (highlighted), Mission Area (Primary Agency and Primary Agency), and Sub-Task Execution Support (Supporting Agencies, Supporting Agency, and Supporting Agency)

Primary Agencies

Primary Agencies provide RSF Field Coordinators, technical assistance with impact analyses, and implementation support for RSF Core Missions - each of which has a designated primary agency.

The HSS RSF Primary Agencies are:

Corp. for National and Community Service (CNCS)
Dept. of Agriculture (USDA)
Dept. of Homeland Security (DHS - multiple agencies)
Dept. of Housing and Urban Development (HUD)
Dept. of the Interior (DOI)
Dept. of Justice (DOJ)
Dept. of Labor (DOL)
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)

Supporting Agencies

Supporting Agencies provide technical assistance to the RSF Coordinating Agency and Primary Agencies to inform and support the development and implementation of RSF-specific missions.

The HSS RSF Supporting Agencies include:

American Red Cross (ARC)
Department of Commerce (DOC)
Department of Education (DOE)
Department of Transportation (DOT)
Department of the Treasury
Department of Veterans Affairs (VA)
Natl. Voluntary Orgs. Active in Disaster (NVOAD)
Small Business Administration (SBA)

RSF Agency Activation and Organization

There is a defined process for activating and deploying the federal HHS RSF. Remember: not all RSF members are activated for every disaster.

The Coordinating Agency (HHS) deploys a Field Coordinator to verify the situation and determine recovery needs
Primary and Supporting agencies are activated based on their ability to fulfill those needs
Activated agencies deploy resources, organize around their assigned mission areas, and link closely with state and local level peers.

Deployed Primary and Supporting Agency staff generally work out of the federal Joint Field Office.

A chart showing Joint Field Office in the middle, with six elements around - Economic, HSS (Example: State Recovery Sectors; Public Health & Health Care, Human Services, and Education), Housing, Inf. Systems (Example: Transportation & Infrastructure, and Public Safety & Flood Protection), NCR (Example: Environmental Management, and Coastal Restoration), CPCB

Combined Effort for Recovery

Once activated and organized, RSF members coordinate closely with relevant State, Tribal, or Territorial partners, as well as the private sector and affected communities.

This coordination expedites recovery by:

Establishing common objectives for integrated effort
Improving awareness of recovery issues and challenges (sharing information about known issues across agency relationship networks)
Reducing duplication of effort (information sharing of agency activities)
Helping authorities apply existing programs and resources toward addressing recovery needs

A chart showing coordination flow from State, Health and Social Services RSF (surrounded by Support Orgs, FEMA, Ed, EPA, CNCS, DHS, HUD, DOL, and Justice), and Community flow into Shared information, Coordinated activities, Shared strategy, Execution of steady-state programs for recovery, then separating into Key Activities, which include Information Sharing – Issues/Impact, Information Sharing – Agency Activities, Execution of Program Authorities for Recovery, and Establish Common Objectives; The Key Activities point to Support for Community-Driven Recovery

HSS RSF Interdependencies

The role of the HSS RSF is closely intertwined with those of the other RSFs. Each relies on the others to achieve their respective missions. Below are some examples of this interdependency in the context of HSS.

Community Planning and Capacity Building, Infrastructure, Economic, Housing, and Natural and Cultural Resources

Federal RSFs Support Locally-Led Recovery Efforts

Ultimately, the Federal RSFs focus on facilitating stakeholder collaboration and promoting intergovernmental and public-private partnerships.

RSF members additionally provide funding, expertise, and specialized resources for accomplishing local recovery priorities.

Disaster recovery is driven and executed by the communities affected by them. The Federal HSS RSF exists, specifically, to support these efforts as they pertain to to public health and social services.

Recovery is a marathon -- states, tribes, territories, and communities will be the inheritor of the outcomes of a recovery effort.

Section Summary

Following a disaster, state, tribal, territorial, and local governments are responsible for:

Determining recovery goals and priorities
Managing recovery efforts in their jurisdictions
Coordinating allocation of federal support

Federal RSFs only provide support to affected jurisdictions. They must coordinate assistance delivery through state and tribal authorities.

Communication and coordination between public and private stakeholders at local, tribal, state, regional, and national levels is critical.

RSFs are composed of Primary Agencies, Supporting Agencies, and a Coordinating Agency.

The Department of Health and Human Services is the Coordinating Agency for the HSS RSF

Once activated, RSF agencies deploy resources, organize around their assigned mission areas, and work closely with state-level peers to share information, establish common objectives, and coordinate recovery activities

HSS RSFs exist to align multi-agency resources with community-driven public health and social services recovery efforts