Critical Incident Response Paper

The model of American governance is based on multiple levels authority that begin with local government, extend to state government, and finally expand to the federal government. Each level of government has different jurisdictions, responsibility, and spheres of influence. While they seemingly operate on different levels the servicers they are responsible for can often overlap creating an interdependence between them (Liesbet, 2003). This interdependence between the various tiers of government is especially critical when it comes to emergency management. A critical incident, such as natural disaster or terrorist event, requires a coordinated effort by local, state, and federal agencies to be effective. Additionally, governmental agencies rely on and need to work well with community, non-profit, and private entities to prepare and response to critical incidents (Sylves, R. (2015).

The ICS is a management system that was developed to support critical incident response by effectively organizing and structuring the major command functions of command, operations, planning, logistics, and finance and administration. It is important that ICS is implemented under a unified command to insure interjurisdictional coordination of the response. MOUs and mutual aid agreements should be negotiated prior to a critical incident to create the structure for a unified command. MOUs are intergovernmental and organizational agreements that establish the frame work for shared strategies, cross-training, and coordination. Mutual aid agreements are contracts between agencies and organizations to provide personnel, equipment, and provisions during specified and predesignated