October 21, 2013

The Center for Public Health Readiness & Communication (CPHRC) worked with the United Way of Greater Philadelphia and Southern New Jersey (UWGPSNJ) on a new white paper, titled Ensuring the Delivery of Human Services in Disasters: A White Paper for Southeastern Pennsylvania, that outlines existing capacity and challenges for human service agencies in southeastern Pennsylvania to meet the needs of at-risk communities in crisis situations, and proposes recommendations for future planning.

The paper came about after the UWGPSNJ commissioned the CPHRC to investigate existing emergency response capacity and challenges among nonprofit human service agencies (HSAs). Over the course of one year, the Drexel team surveyed more than 650 agencies in Southeastern Pennsylvania and conducted interviews with dozens of agency, government, and emergency management and response leaders responsible for delivering human services in the wake of a disaster.

The specific objectives of the white paper were to: (1) assess the current capacity of human service agencies in southeastern Pennsylvania to provide services in a major disaster; (2) identify challenges and successful strategies for providing those services; and (3) formulate specific recommendations for government planners and the non-profit sector to promote the integration of human service agencies into emergency preparedness and response activities in the region; and (4) facilitate the beginning of coordinated, collaborative planning.