Robert WyCKoff EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Mass casualty, pre-meditated, and targeted violence incidents connected with extremism and hate are on the rise in the United States. In 2019, there were 41 mass killings in the country, which is more than ever recorded in a single year.[1] 2018 was the fourth-deadliest year on record for domestic extremist-related murders…
CHDS Theses: Executive Summaries
The Last Responders: Approaching the Disaster after the Disaster through Community-Led Long-Term Recovery Coalitions
Alana Tornello EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Recovery is the disaster after the disaster. The claim has been whispered around the proverbial campfires of emergency management (EM) for decades.[1] Scholars, practitioners, and survivors provide evidence to support this claim, particularly for long-term recovery (LTR)—the recovery period when “restoring, rebuilding, and reshaping the physical, social, economic, and natural environment”…
A Rising Tide Floats All Boats, but Drowns Infrastructure: The Impact of Sea Level Rise on America’s Maritime Infrastructure
Michael Sullivan EXECUTIVE SUMMARY America’s maritime ports play a critical role in supporting domestic and international trade. They facilitate the movement of goods across all economic sectors and contribute trillions of dollars to the gross domestic product. In 2018, U.S. ports directly contributed 2.2 million jobs and $5.4 trillion in economic activity, representing approximately 26…
Out, Out—The Role of Messaging in Countering Domestic Violent Extremism
KathRYn Roberts EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Countering the radical Islamist narrative remains a high priority of the United States in its ongoing efforts to counter domestic violent extremism. In 2014, the rapid emergence of the Islamic State (IS) brought the idea of narratives to the forefront of public discussion. As the first terrorist organization to leverage social…
Reading From The Same Map: Towards A New Situational Awareness Model For Emergency Management
Erik Rau EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Situational awareness (SA) is a critical issue for public safety disciplines, including emergency management, law enforcement, and the fire service. These fields operate substantially differently from each other, but share a common model for SA, based on John Boyd’s OODA loop. Boyd’s model, though applied widely, is heavily shaped by artefacts…
Political Demonstrations: A Terrorist’s Dream Opportunity
Patrick Mullane EXECUTIVE SUMMARY As the 2020 and 2024 U.S. presidential elections approach, an uptick in political protests is inevitable. Law enforcement agencies must fully prepare to police these political protests as well as secure them from any potential terrorist activity. Recent terrorist attacks, such as the vehicle ramming attacks in Charlottesville, Virginia, and on…
Improving Resilience among Law Enforcement Officers
Brian Miller EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Law enforcement officers in the United States are at the forefront of the homeland security enterprise, and their physical and mental well-being are key to our nation’s security. Officers are exposed to high levels of stress every day, and over time, that stress exacts a toll on them. In 2017, more…
Bridging the Gap: Providing Transportation Leaders with a Strategic and Risk-based Investment Methodology Through the Application of Network Theory.
Brittany Miller EXECUTIVE SUMMARY A nationally accepted and adopted methodology for state departments of transportation to assess the importance of roads, bridges, and other transportation assets doesn’t exist. Instead, transportation agencies must prioritize the projects to invest in, without having a complete picture of the makeup of their network and the risk posed from a…
Law Enforcement’s Role in Preventing Epidemics: Enforcing Communicable Disease Quarantine Policies
Donald Lowenthal EXECUTIVE SUMMARY The Philadelphia Police Department (PPD) currently has no policy providing guidance to its police officers on how to enact the quarantine enforcement component of the Isolation and Quarantine Plan (IQP) developed by the Philadelphia Department of Public Health (PDPH). Quarantine restricts the movement of healthy people who may have been exposed…
Insult to Injury: Disaster Displacement, Migrant Threat Perception, and Conflict in Host Communities
Michael Locke EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Environmental disasters are a concern of homeland security largely in terms of the planning, mitigation, and resilience aspects for the communities directly hit. A more complex problem is the longer-term disruption to the lives of people who are unable to remain in their home communities and relocate elsewhere in the country,…