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Disaster Recovery Operations

Citizen Science
essay
Citizen Science Helps Communities Participate in, Understand, and Trust Science
Jan 4, 2022
Good citizen science brings a community together and helps it prepare for, respond to, and recover from disasters. A RAND guide takes non-expert investigators from the early stages of defining their questions and setting their goals, through building their teams, to planning for action.
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Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19)
blog
RAND Commentary Highlights of 2021
Dec 21, 2021
Vaccine rollouts, an attack on the U.S. Capitol, massive ransomware attacks, the withdrawal from Afghanistan, record numbers of job openings and people quitting, and more. RAND researchers weighed in on all these topics and more.
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Emergency Preparedness
commentary
Hurricane Ida Is Part of a Cycle of Disasters—Mitigating Their Impact Means Building Back Better
Jay Balagna, Aaron Clark-Ginsberg @aclarkginsberg
Sep 13, 2021
CNN
Building back better means focusing on recovery that not only restores damage from a disaster but also reduces future risk. To meet that goal today, we need to look at the ways our disaster preparedness and response systems actually create risk themselves, by reinforcing things like wealth inequality, systemic discrimination, or access to crucial services.
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Disaster Recovery Operations
commentary
Four Strategies to Reduce Disaster Risk in Fragile and Conflict-Affected Contexts
Aaron Clark-Ginsberg @aclarkginsberg, Ronak B. Patel, Bernard McCaul
Jul 9, 2021
PreventionWeb
Addressing the circumstances for the more than two billion people living in fragile and conflict-affected contexts is crucial for delivering on the United Nations commitment for disaster risk reduction. Four strategies can help reduce risk and improve resilience for these communities.
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Critical Infrastructure Protection
commentary
New Thinking to Translate Infrastructure Dollars into Resilience
Benjamin Lee Preston @bl_preston, Michelle E. Miro, Andrew Lauland
Jun 2, 2021
The RAND Blog
Infrastructure investments the United States makes today to recover from the pandemic can help boost resilience for the future. We will need to think beyond what we've done in the past to ensure that these investments can continue to protect the nation from shifting threats in the future.
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Information Operations
blog
COVID-19 Disinformation, Biden's Address, Leaving Afghanistan: RAND Weekly Recap
Apr 30, 2021
This weekly recap focuses on Russian and Chinese campaigns to spread malign and subversive information on COVID-19, President Biden's address to Congress, the planned U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, and more.
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Disaster Recovery Operations
q&a
Disaster Recovery in Puerto Rico: Q&A with Marielena Lara
Apr 26, 2021
When Hurricane Maria hit Puerto Rico in September 2017, it peeled roofs from houses, turned roads into rivers, and left millions of people without electricity or safe drinking water. Marielena Lara, a senior physician policy researcher at RAND, was grateful to be part of the recovery planning.
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Community-Based Participatory Research
commentary
Local Communities Need a Voice in How to 'Build Back Better'
Max Izenberg, Aaron Clark-Ginsberg @aclarkginsberg
Jan 12, 2021
The RAND Blog
Long before it was popularized and made its way into political slogans and economic recovery battle cries, the phrase “building back better” was a central tenet of disaster recovery and community resilience. How should community voices be incorporated into “building back better” processes?
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Disaster Recovery Operations
commentary
Previous Disasters Provide Important Lessons for Central America's Recovery from Hurricanes
Shelly Culbertson @SC_Culbertson, Ismael Arciniegas Rueda, David G. Groves
Jan 11, 2021
The National Interest
As the global community works to assist Central America in recovering from the disastrous 2020 hurricane season, other recent recovery efforts offer helpful lessons, both for the governments of the region as well as outsiders providing resources and support.
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Machine Learning
commentary
Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning Are Important Tools to Improve Cost Estimation for Natural Disasters in Electric Utilities
Ismael Arciniegas Rueda, Parousia Rockstroh
Dec 4, 2020
Energy Central
Natural disasters in the United States cause billions of dollars of damage to electric infrastructure every year. Applying artificial intelligence and machine learning in a disaster-recovery context for electrical utilities might significantly improve cost estimating capability and responsiveness.
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Gender Equity in the Workplace
blog
Working Women, the Intelligence Community, Syrian Refugees: RAND Weekly Recap
Dec 4, 2020
This weekly recap focuses on supporting America's working women, challenges facing the next Director of National Intelligence, how Syria's forever war is creating forever refugees, and more.
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Natural Hazards
commentary
Disaster Reporting and Its Impacts on Policy and Inequities
Aaron Clark-Ginsberg @aclarkginsberg, Shearon Roberts
Nov 16, 2020
Poynter
Disaster news tropes may capture audience attention, but they ultimately frustrate progress in mitigating the short- and long-term effects of disasters on communities. It's more important than ever that news stories about disasters frame the effects of environmental phenomena in meaningful ways.
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Disaster Recovery Operations
commentary
What's Missing From Community Disaster Response? The Whole Community
Gary Cecchine @GaryCecchine, Aaron Clark-Ginsberg @aclarkginsberg
Nov 9, 2020
The National Interest
Across the United States, significant gaps exist in disaster response needs and capabilities. Community volunteers have stepped up to fill those gaps where possible. They may need more support and resources.
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Civic Education
blog
Truth Decay, Opioid Settlement Funds, Veterans Health Care: RAND Weekly Recap
Oct 23, 2020
This weekly recap focuses on fighting back against Truth Decay, how to spend opioid settlement funds, China's lack of friends, and more.
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Liability Risk Management
commentary
Creating the Right Incentives for State and Local Governments to Reduce Disaster Costs
Jason Thomas Barnosky, Noreen Clancy, Lloyd Dixon
Oct 14, 2020
The Hill
In the United States, federal, state, and local governments share responsibility for paying for losses from disasters. As the frequency and severity of disasters has increased, so have the losses. It's worth considering whether the current risk-sharing approach is appropriate.
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Disaster Recovery Operations
commentary
HSOAC Hosts Seminar Series on Improving Equity in Disaster Policy
Max Izenberg
Oct 7, 2020
The RAND Blog
Natural and biological hazards, and critically the human response to these hazards, have the potential not only to exacerbate existing population inequities but also to create them. To better understand the equity implications of disaster policies, the Homeland Security Operational Analysis Center invited several experts to share their knowledge.
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