LMS Part 1 - Vulnerability Assessment

INTRODUCTION AND OVERVIEW

In June 1997, the Florida Department of Community Affairs issued "The Local Mitigation Strategy: A Guidebook for Florida Cities and Counties." This "LMS Guidebook" is intended to support a new statewide program encouraging preparation of local strategies to lessen the human and economic costs of disasters. The Guidebook, together with its companion document "Workbook in Local Mitigation Strategy Development," describes both what a Local Mitigation Strategy should address, as well as how to undertake the planning process involved. Because one of the very important early steps in the planning process is to undertake a ‘vulnerability assessment," the Department has also issued this two-part Supplement to the Guidebook.

This Supplement will help local mitigation planners understand how to most effectively develop and use a vulnerability assessment as they prepare their Local Mitigation Strategy. Part One of the Supplement addresses the first steps in the process: how to complete the vulnerability assessment and take full advantage of the Department*s technical and financial assistance. Part Two explains how the findings of the assessment can be most effectively utilized to prepare the Local Mitigation Strategy itself.

Why conduct a vulnerability assessment?

The vulnerability assessment is a critical step in the development of a Local Mitigation Strategy. The assessment process helps local mitigation planning organizations define the hazards threatening their jurisdictions, how their communities are vulnerable to those hazards, and how often such hazardous events could occur. This type of information can enable local governments to better understand how they can develop programs to save lives, protect property and enhance the future economic stability of their communities. The vulnerability assessment enables local officials to identify the hazard mitigation initiatives needed, to assign a priority for implementation of each initiative, and to provide a factual basis justifying their implementation.

What is in a vulnerability assessment?

There are three basic components in the vulnerability assessment process:

• Hazard Identification: the identification and definition of the natural, technological and societal hazards confronting the community,
• Vulnerability Assessment: the determination of the population, property, and valuable environmental features of the community that are vulnerable to the identified hazards, and
• Comprehensive Risk Analysis: the estimation of the probability of occurrence of the hazard and the consequences of the event.

These three components can be most effectively conducted by local planning organizations through a methodical, step-by-step approach that begins with assigning responsibility for the upcoming work. Planners can then identify the hazards threatening the county and assess the vulnerability of the community and important public services to the impacts of those hazards. The vulnerability assessment process concludes with determining the actual risk to people and property that these hazards represent. The following sections of Part 1 of the Supplement explain each of these steps in more detail. After completing the steps outlined in this document, local mitigation planners can then use Part 2 of the Supplement to understand how the results of the of the vulnerability assessment can actually assist local government in the development of its Local Mitigation Strategy.

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