Emergence response operations are necessary in the society as they help in combating emergencies. Fire and rescue team, law enforcement officers and recovery divisions are responsible for the emergency response operations.
In California, emergency responses operations are carried using the Law Enforcement Guide for Emergency Operations which has been designed to assist the law enforcement personnel. Some of the major emergence operations that are relevant include technological disasters, civil and natural disasters. This guide has been set with watch commanders and field officers in mind. Law enforcement managers and deputy and line officers would also find the guide useful.
The guide incorporates standardized emergency management system statutory and the concept requirements as well as the law enforcement incident command system (Law Enforcement Guide for Emergency Operations, 2009).
The guide has to be followed by any one carrying out operations related to emergency response. The paper researches the California Office of Emergency Services on the recommendations provisions on emergency response by the law enforcement to identify the important issues raised and why they are important.
Communication and coordination between the different bodies involved in emergence response operations are essential elements required by the Law Enforcement Guide for Emergency Operations (Law Enforcement Guide for Emergency Operations, 2009).
The regulations provided by the SEMS demand that when the local government emergency operations center is activated a chain of communication and coordination need to “be established between the Incident Commander and the response Department’s Operations Center (DOC) to the EOC or directly between the Incident Commander and the Local Government EOC” (Law Enforcement Guide for Emergency Operations, 2009, p.11).
Additional requirements include the establishment of communication and coordination between state or local emergency response agency with the local OEC government. In this case, the emergency response agency must have the jurisdiction over and take responsibility for incidents that are likely to take place within the confines of the local government in question.
Prior to the undertaking of an emergency response by the ICS, it is important that they first communicate with the local government. In this case, the local government level is the one that covers counties, cities, and districts and they have the mandate of managing and coordinating all the emergency responses and any recovery response from within.
The reason why communication and coordination is required between these departments is because the field operations levels depend on the jurisdiction of the local governments. The policies, procedures used in dispatching jurisdiction and the communication capabilities are useful in determining the linking of the field level operations (Law Enforcement Guide for Emergency Operations, 2009). Jurisdictional responsibility is important as they determine the field level from which the operation takes place without any failure.
Without proper coordination and communication it would be impossible for ICS field response team to carry its operations in time. The Law Enforcement Guide for Emergency Operations (2009) indicates that such linkages are crucial because communication lines, jurisdictions and policies dictate the size of an emergency.
It is the recommendation of the SEMS regulations that all the emergency agencies with jurisdiction authority in a multi agency incident that they organize all the field responses based on the incidents command systems (ICS) (Law Enforcement Guide for Emergency Operations, 2009). SEMS regulations only find use in those incidents characterized by multiple jurisdictions.
This is the case even in a case whereby the regulations are treated as single disciplines. Case incident is used in reference to mean occurrences owing to either natural or manmade phenomena. Such phenomena may at times demand that prompt be taken in order to mitigate or prevent damage or loss of not just human life, but that of the natural resources as well.
However, there has been a dilemma on when to adopt ICS. This has over the years been the case where emergency response agencies have been reluctant and hesitant on what to apply. But, with time it has been advisable to use ICS in any incident or emergency no matter its size. The provisions have enabled single discipline use first on-scene emergency responder who follows the guidelines of ICS (Law Enforcement Guide for Emergency Operations, 2009).
The reason why the single disciplines were included in the ICS usage was because most of the single response incidents have the capacity of expanding to multi discipline incidents that may require extra resources. So, to avoid this gray area, it has been advisable to adopt the ICS principles. The ICS provides basics concept of functionality that ensures that the emergency is mitigated and the job done.
Because of the fire that was destructive in the 1970 in southern California, the Incident Command System (ICS) was developed (Law Enforcement Guide for Emergency Operations, 2009). The issue was the chain of command that was followed in by the law enforcement incident command system.
This delayed the emergency response operation as it took much time than necessary to respond the incident that proved to be disastrous. To counter this, a risk management system was designed to ensure effectiveness among the firefighting agencies. It also ensured that coordination and communication was achieved when combating multijurisdictional fires (Law Enforcement Guide for Emergency Operations, 2009).
ICS is flexible and can be applied in any function that requires response. The reason why ICS has been important issue is because of its ability to respond rapidly without any delays to emergencies. The system is able to respond to both single and multi discipline emergencies. Since then the California office of emergency services has been using the ICS as part of their Law Enforcement Guide for Emergency Operations.
In conclusion, the Law Enforcement Guide for Emergency Operations has been of great importance to the California emergency response department. By the development of the ICS it has been possible to respond to both single discipline and multi discipline emergencies.
The major issues are the coordination and communication of the links between the different bodies and the local departments. This is because the local emergency departments offer the policies and the jurisdiction procedures that can be applied the ICS on the area it has mandate. The jurisdiction of the local governments determines the field level from which the operation takes place.
Initially the SEMs regulations required ICS to be applicable in multiple emergency disciplines. However, because of the dilemma it caused, it was improvised to accommodate single discipline emergency respond. This was based on the functionality of ICS making it possible to act on emergencies. Lastly, it has been possible to increase the effectiveness and coordination of combating multi disciplinary emergencies.
Reference List
Law Enforcement Guide for Emergency Operations. (2009). Web.