Pre-Disaster Recovery Planning

Pre-Disaster Recovery Plans

Pre-disaster recovery planning is an emerging best-practice for towns, cities, and counties with a goal of building resilience to hazards, especially as some of these communities are facing the same hazards on a continual basis. There are no standard rules or templates for the development or implementation of pre-disaster recovery plans, and communities have developed their plans in different ways.

The most successful plans do share several common characteristics:

First, they take a holistic approach. While each community’s pre-disaster recovery plan will look different depending on their needs and priorities, it should consider the full range of potential recovery decisions and actions that will be needed in the event of a disaster. Topics addressed in the plan may include “business resumption and economic redevelopment, housing repair and reconstruction, infrastructure restoration and mitigation, short-term recovery actions that affect long-term redevelopment, sustainable land use, environmental restoration, and financial considerations as well as other long-term recovery issues identified by the community” (Post-Disaster Redevelopment, 2011). Depending on a community’s needs and priorities, land use planning tools in this guide, like post-disaster building moratoriums or overlay zones, may be enacted pre-disaster to help shape post-disaster recovery.

Second, pre-disaster recovery plans should be consistent with other community plans, including their comprehensive plan, hazard mitigation plan and/or climate plan. As noted by FEMA (2017), building on and integrating with other community plans avoids “re-inventing the wheel” in pre-disaster recovery plans or creating unnecessary planning conflicts during the recovery period.

Figure: The Cyclical Nature of Planning, Source: FEMA 2017

Third, many pre-disaster recovery plans build linkages to state and federal disaster recovery frameworks, like FEMA’s National Disaster Recovery Framework. Establishing these linkages in pre-disaster recovery plans allow communities to better coordinate with state and federal partners during response and recovery and better leverage the external resources that will become available to them.

Fourth, pre-disaster recovery planning requires broad-based participation by local leadership and government officials. While different offices might take the lead in developing a pre-disaster recovery plan, the process itself requires active participation by diverse participants like planners, emergency managers, key departmental staff, town/city managers, and community leaders. Further, a good pre-disaster recovery plan will make links to regional or county-level actors or resources who may provide additional capacity to a community post-disaster.

Fifth, pre-disaster recovery plans should involve significant community and stakeholder engagement and outreach. Engaging with communities and stakeholders allows recovery planners to understand the existing (and sometimes contradictory) regulatory conditions and differences between communities or populations in their jurisdiction. Leveraging current planning processes and mechanisms, such as hazard mitigation plan updates, resiliency plans and adaptation plans, are great opportunities to engage the public for pre-disaster recovery planning. The Maui County Planning Department, for instance, carried out an  extensive community engagement process that helped shape seven county-wide recommendations at the core of their reconstruction guidelines as well as addressing additional community-specific needs and considerations.

Finally, pre-disaster recovery plans should be flexible and scalable to meet a community’s uncertain needs across different types of disasters and recovery processes. Maui County’s reconstruction guidelines and protocols, for example, sets forth seven guidelines for recovery that do not have the same force of law as a rule or regulation but are a flexible means to “inform decision makers, set policy, and implement a planning paradigm in the face of uncertainty.” Its plan then describes 26 protocols, or instructions on how to implement the guidelines. The result is a streamlined set of recovery actions that are flexible to meet the wide range of hazards that Maui may face while detailed enough to hasten the reconstruction process.

While pre-disaster planning for post-disaster recovery is an emerging best practice, there are useful guides available to Colorado communities. FEMA’s Pre-Disaster Recovery Planning Guide for Local Governments and Pre-Disaster Recovery Planning for State Governments define key recovery concepts and lays out a whole-of-community based planning process that aligns with the National Disaster Recovery Framework. The Community Recovery Management Toolkit further provides guidance, case studies, tools and training for post-disaster recovery planning. The American Planning Association provides several important reports and briefing papers that describe the pre- and post-disaster recovery planning process, and highlight successful case studies from across the United States.

Maui County Disaster Reconstruction Guidelines and Protocols Simplified Flow-Chart, Source: Maui County Planning Department

COOPs and COGs: In many communities, COOPs and COGs are developed by Emergency Management staff; however, the planner has an important role to play. For example, planners can help establish continuity of operations procedures for the Planning Department to be included in the COOP.

The Colorado Department of Homeland Security and Emergency Management maintains several helpful resources for developing COOPs, including a COOP Plan Review checklist, a plan template, and links to FEMA training resources.

In many communities, these types of plans are developed by Emergency Management staff; however, the planner has an important role to play in the development of each of these plans. For example, planners can help establish continuity of operations procedures for the Planning Department to be included in the COOP and there are many planning/land use issues that must be addressed in pre- or post-recovery plans.

Though the recovery plan could be developed after a disaster to guide recovery decisions, these three highlighted plans should ideally be prepared in advance of a disaster. Making the investment in pre-disaster plans that address post-disaster issues will pay dividends for the communities that take the time and initiative to do the planning. These plans should be regularly revisited, especially following an event that would require activation of such plans.

In 2014, officials in Douglas County, Colorado adopted the County’s first Disaster Recovery Plan. The plan establishes the County’s comprehensive framework for managing recovery efforts following a major disaster. The plan aims to “promote mitigation and foster resilient redevelopment and reconstruction” after disasters. As described by Commissioner David Weaver:

Having been through our own wildfires, floods, and other local emergencies, as well as having witnessed other counties navigate their own incidents, our staff had the foresight to recognize the importance of collaboration among our partners to assemble a recovery plan. (County adopts Disaster, 2015).

The plan describes how the County will use education, incentives, and regulation to reduce vulnerability to hazards and foster more resilient land use patterns and building practices, while also deferring to existing deliberative plans like the Douglas County Comprehensive Master Plan and Hazard Mitigation Plan. The County had also previously developed a Continuity of Operations Plan that is referenced throughout the Disaster Recovery Plan. This helps emphasize the importance of having both types of plans to facilitate successful disaster preparedness and recovery efforts.

Maui County, Hawaii developed disaster reconstruction guidelines and protocols to help streamline the repair of homes, businesses, structures, and private property post-disaster while also protecting sensitive environmental and cultural resources. Through pre-disaster recovery planning, the County is able to expedite their rebuilding after disasters without making “arbitrary and capricious decisions” and to incorporate mitigation and adaptation strategies to increase long-term community resilience.

Some of the nation’s most progressive pre-disaster recovery planning examples and resources came from the State of Florida’s Post-Disaster Redevelopment Planning (PDRP) Initiative (2010). The purpose of the Initiative, which lasted from 2007-2012, was to develop and test guidelines for a planning process to be applied in the pre-disaster environment to ensure the effective and timely implementation of post-disaster policies that result in more sustainable, resilient communities. While the resulting guidebook can certainly be helpful to Colorado communities, the subsequent plans and policies from the initial pilot PDRP communities provide real-world examples for local governments dealing with a variety of post-disaster scenarios. This includes the adoption of some advanced and fairly bold planning strategies designed to disinvest and steer redevelopment from known hazard areas to safer locations as opportunities arise through future disaster events. For instance, Hillsborough County, Florida established the concept of Priority Redevelopment Areas (PRAs) which essentially pre-identifies locations within the community to receive focused and prioritized attention for redevelopment to promote rapid recovery and facilitate the growth of disaster resilient centers of activity. The implementation of this concept would likely rely on the transfer of development rights (TDR) and similar tools as a means of shifting growth and development from one area of a community to another.

• Each of these plans can help a community more effectively and efficiently respond to disasters. These plans can inform decision-makers and reduce reactionary decisions (and thus, lead to less confusion) in the post-disaster environment.
• Pre-disaster recovery plans allow communities to discuss reconstruction policies and procedures in the less contentious and more deliberative pre-disaster environment.
• A pre-disaster recovery plan can strengthen a community’s applications for post-disaster funding, as it demonstrates a clear and carefully considered path to recovery. It also helps to ensure more rapid and effective access to state and federal recovery resources.
• Pre-disaster recovery planning helps to increase stakeholder and community involvement after a disaster by defining outreach resources and building key relationships.
• By engaging in pre-disaster recovery planning, a community can familiarize themselves with state and federal recovery resources and support structures.
• Adopting a COOP and COG puts a community in an excellent position to maintain essential leadership and services at the time of a disaster.

• Each of these plans requires considerable coordination with multiple government departments, and often partner organizations and community members as well. Once developed, the plans will need to be “exercised” (i.e., routinely tested and communicated) so that everyone understands their roles as defined in these plans.
• Keeping COOPs and COGs accurate and updated is imperative. Updates should be conducted consistently and thoroughly.
• As for pre-disaster recovery plans, at this time there is no dedicated federal funding source for communities seeking financial assistance in developing their recovery plan. Communities that are updating their hazard mitigation plans with PDM mitigation grant program support, however, may use the planning process to also include pre-disaster recovery planning.