Johnson: Local Recovery Management Framework International Journal of Mass Emergencies and Disasters August 2014, Vol. 32, No. 2, pp. 242–274. Developing a Local Recovery Management Framework: Report on the Post-Disaster Strategies and Approaches Taken by Three Local Governments in the U.S. Following Major Disasters Laurie A. Johnson Laurie Johnson Consulting | Research Email:
[email protected] Comparative case studies of post-disaster recovery are limited, and even fewer have explored organizational approaches to disaster recovery, especially local governments. This paper describes research on the post-disaster strategies and approaches taken by three local governments in the U.S. following major disasters: Los Angeles, California (following the 1994 Northridge earthquake); Grand Forks, North Dakota (following the 1997 Red River flood); and New Orleans, Louisiana (following 2005 Hurricane Katrina). The management practices, recovery timelines, and resulting outcomes were examined for each city. This research proposes a local recovery management framework that can extend the Incident Command System (ICS)-based emergency management structure into recovery, helping to standardize recovery management practices and improve local government effectiveness in recovery. Such a model has diagnostic application to determine gaps in local government capabilities to manage post-disaster recovery and identify needed support and resources—both financial and technical; it can also serve as a framework for recovery exercises and training. Keywords: Local government, Public management, Disaster recovery, Recovery management, Recovery planning. Introduction When Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast in 2005, there were a limited number of professionals in the U.S. who had faced the difficult task of managing local government recovery following a major, urban disaster.