Cobbled Together In Crisis

Federal Executive Boards try to coordinate emergency response with patchwork of staffing and funding.

Since they were established in 1961, Federal Executive Boards have been laboratories of innovation. Scattered across the country, they've been free to tailor the solutions that keep federal offices in their cities and states running during crises, help direct federal responses to local emergencies, and even push for changes in the way government runs.

But in a post-Sept. 11 world, FEBs are "coming back to that original mission of continuity of government," says Raymond Morris, executive director of the Minnesota Federal Executive Board. As the government envisions a greater role for FEBs in mass emergencies like pandemics and wildfires like the ones that swept across Southern California in late October, the decentralized, ad hoc model that determines FEB's funding, staffing and jurisdiction might no longer be viable.

The boards were created by a presidential order to foster coordination among federal employees outside Washington, who now make up 88 percent of the government workforce. They distribute information, pool resources to provide training and dispute resolution, support employee innovation, and manage crisis situations. That last role has received greater attention as the government prepares for terrorist attacks, global pandemics and other threats to its operations.

FEBs are funded by voluntary contributions from agencies that have staff in the boards' jurisdiction; as a result, some receive guaranteed funding from a single agency, while others rely on multiple agencies whose contributions are not guaranteed from year to year. "They do not receive specific appropriated funds. Some have an executive director, some have no permanent staff at all. Each of the 28 FEBs seems to have its own funding and operating structure," said Sen. Daniel Akaka, D-Hawaii, at a Sept. 28 hearing of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs subcommittee that oversees federal workforce and management issues. The hearing was about the role the boards play in pandemic preparedness.

Though the Office of Personnel Management oversees FEBs, their staffs consist of employees detailed from offices in the area. That lack of consistent staffing, and the fact that there is no standard for determining the jurisdiction of FEBs based on the number of federal workers in a given area, can leave directors dangerously short-handed in a crisis.

"We cover 125,000 federal employees and 230 separate agencies, and I'm a one-person office because my secretary just resigned a couple of weeks ago," Kathrene L. Hansen, executive director of the Greater Los Angeles FEB, said on Oct. 24, as some of the Southern California wildfires, which burned more than 770 square miles and 1,780 houses, began to come under control. "The fact that I am staffed and resourced less than Buffalo, N.Y., is just insane. I have 18 federal buildings. He has one. It's just not equitable, and I'm really feeling that right now.

"This is also compounded by the fact that there is no FEB in San Diego," Hansen said. "They have 140,000 federal employees. San Diego is the largest concentration of federal employees outside Washington, and Los Angeles is the second largest. . . . In the absence of an FEB, OPM calls me."

With a jurisdiction that big, Hansen said, it is very difficult to build the relationships that are so important to successful emergency management and that can help communicate lessons learned to make future responses more effective. "Last time I communicated real actively with San Diego federal agencies was 2003 [during a series of wildfires there]," she said. "It was a uniquely San Diego problem."

This time around, Hansen found herself responsible for coordinating air quality alerts, informing displaced federal employees about emergency financial assistance and running already scheduled training programs. "Ironically, we are this week hosting a COOP [continuity of operations] managers' training class," she said. "I teased one of the managers that he's not learning COOP, he's doing COOP."

Hansen's situation is extreme, but Raymond Morris' experience in Minnesota demonstrates what FEBs can do when they're fully supported and given a definitive scope of operations.

"I'm one of the lucky FEBs that has a stable source of funding, and it's one of the reasons we have been so successful with emergency response and planning," says Morris. "It's the only one that's funded directly from Washington by [the Interior Department]."

In addition to having a stable funding source, Morris' FEB is located in the Minnesota capital of St. Paul, something he credits with bringing the organization closer to lawmakers and other agencies. "We've certainly capitalized and amplified that relationship over the past 10 years, and we've reaped the benefits," he says.

Morris has used the resources and geographic advantages at his disposal to build the FEB's relationship with relevant state agencies and officials through a number of forums, both formal and informal. Recently, the board ran two simulations of a pandemic that it designed and conducted in coordination with the Minnesota Department of Health and Homeland Security. The simulations included participants from federal, state and local agencies, and the business community.

On a more informal level, "We have the Metropolitan Emergency Managers Association that meets monthly," Morris says. "We start out over doughnuts and coffee and get to the aspects that are important to all levels of government and the Red Cross and a couple of other nonprofits."

Those exercises and meetings paid off in August after a bridge collapsed in Minneapolis, killing 13 people. "Everybody responded and did their part," Morris says. He told Akaka at the Sept. 28 hearing: "All of the major players knew each other by name and knew they could count on each other. No business cards were exchanged."

The challenge, then, is to make more FEBs run like the one in Minnesota. Kevin E. Mahoney, associate director of human capital leadership and merit system accountability at OPM, told the subcommittee that the office is working with the Federal Emergency Management Agency on a memorandum of understanding that will clarify and codify the role FEBs play in an emergency, and develop a strategic plan for the boards. It should be released this winter, he said. "Knowing exactly what the FEB can provide to local federal, state and local agencies will increase the FEB's reputation as a solid resource for emergency preparedness and human capital readiness for the federal workforce," Mahoney says.

He also said OPM is developing performance standards for evaluating FEB executive directors on two lines of business: human capital readiness, and emergency preparedness, security and employee safety. "We think it's important that as we ask agencies to fund the FEBs, to show them that the FEBs are able to accomplish what we want them to," Mahoney said.

Kim Ainsworth, executive director of the Greater Boston FEB, says she is optimistic about OPM's plans, especially those for changing how the boards are funded. "It's going to be consistent across the country, and every agency contributes on a national level," she says. "Much like Federal Protective Services, everybody contributes, whether they use it or not." She hopes a strategic plan also will get FEB directors other resources they need, such as security clearances to access certain emergency response plans.

Despite Morris' and Ainsworth's expectations, Akaka sounds a cautionary note. "I am concerned that inconsistent support from the federal government and the informal structure of the organizations reduce their potential effectiveness," he says. "OPM and FEMA need to finish the development of a strategic plan for FEBs as soon as possible."

Whatever understanding they reach, it will be too late for Hansen. She says a federal employee nonprofit, rather than a government agency, gave her FEB the most support during the October fires. "The Federal Employee Education and Assistance Fund has been really supportive," she says. "They've been saying, 'Can we help, can we come out there with a checkbook?' "