In Case Of Emergency, Read Blog

In the wake of Hurricane Ike, there will continue to be a need for volunteers to assist in the relief and recovery throughout the Texas and Louisiana coasts to assist the work of local groups as well as organizations like the Red Cross and the Salvation Army.

One idea to increase the pool of trained volunteers for disasters would be the creation of a national Civilian Reserve Corps. It’s an idea put forward by Walter Isaacson in the current issue of Time.  In his article, titled “Prepare For The Worst”, Isaacson, President and CEO of the Aspen Institute, says a Civilian Reserve Corps: 

“would be made up of engineers, doctors, judges, construction workers, teachers and others who could be deployed to restore stability in troubled areas. They could help get hospitals, schools, financial markets, utilities and courts up and running in post-invasion theaters like Iraq and Afghanistan. They could drill wells and build roads in fragile states such as Somalia. They could restore infrastructure after a tsunami in Asia – or a hurricane at home.”

A bill to establish such a corps has been introduced in the Congress by Senator Richard Lugar (R-IN).  Isaacson is a New Orleans native who has been very involved in post-Katrina rebuilding as Vice Chairman of the Louisiana Recovery Authority. His Time article was one of “21 Ways To Serve America” as part of the magazine’s cover story on national service. The magazine’s issue is tied to the Service Nation Summit held in Manhattan on Friday. Service Nation is a new national coalition whose goal is to:

“increase service opportunities, solve chronic social problems through service, and promote a culture of service in America. ServiceNation is a vision of a new America, an America where citizens unite to take responsibility for strengthening communities and building a better future, and where service is a core ideal of citizenship. The ultimate vision of ServiceNation is an America in which, by 2020, 100 million citizens will volunteer time in schools, workplaces, and faith-based and community institutions each and every year (up from 61 million today), and that increasing numbers of Americans annually will commit a year of their lives to national service.”

Service Nation was the sponsor of the September 11th forum on service at Columbia University which featured back to back appearances by presidential candidates John McCain and Barack Obama. Isaacson spoke at a panel discussion I attended the next day titled, “In Times of Great Need, The Role of Service in Responding to Disasters,” moderated by Amanda Ripley, author of The Unthinkable. 

One of the issues raised during the panel was the challenge of how to tap the enormous asset of citizens interested in helping after a disaster given the difficulty relief organizations have in integrating untrained (and unidemnified) civilians in the midst of an emergency situation ”There is nothing worse than having people who want to help in a disaster but cannot be used to help,” Isaacson said on the panel, “People want to help. They need to know how and where.” The Civilian Reserve Corps would be one way to address that problem. Another would be trying to increase the number of participants in training programs such as those run by the Red Cross or the Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) program in which I participate.