Weather Safety for Kids

September 22, 2000

DISASTER MANAGEMENT:
U.S. Policies Pertaining to Weather and Climate Extremes

Stanley A. Changnon and David R. Easterling*

Atmospheric extremes--which include floods, droughts, severe heat and
cold, and storms--have resulted in steady increases in economic costs
and lives lost in the United States since the Dust Bowl days of the
1930s. Shifts in the frequency and intensity of severe weather (events
lasting hours or days) and climate extremes (events persisting for
months or years) could exacerbate this growing problem. Most
assessments of recent increases in losses, such as from El Niño 1997
(1), point to society and human behavior as the
primary cause. Growth of population and wealth, as well as demographic
shifts to coastal areas and to expanding
metropolitan areas, have collectively increased the vulnerability of
the United States to losses from weather extremes
(2).Extremes now have an impact on all levels of government and on the
insurance industry (3). More than 90% of the
nation's natural disasters are a result of weather or climate extremes.
Two impacts of the cold Midwestern winters of
the late 1970s were the ouster of the mayor of Chicago and the
development of regional snow removal plans (4).
Losses associated with Hurricane Andrew in 1992 drove 11 insurance
companies into bankruptcy and resulted in
new laws overseeing the sale of insurance in Florida (5). Federal and
state payouts were $4 billion for the 1988
drought, $6.2 billion for the 1993 Midwestern flood, and $6.5 billion
for Hurricane Andrew. These increases are
necessitating a shift from a policy focusing on costly relief
assistance to one with more emphasis on mitigation and
personal responsibility for living in harm's way. Policies related to
extremes have followed two approaches, proactive
and reactive, and emphasis on each evolved as society changed, new
technologies developed, and government leadership shifted.

History of Policy on Extremes
Proactive policies attempting to anticipate and minimize losses from
weather and climate extremes developed about
1800. The goal of the nation's Weather Bureau, established in 1870, was
to protect life and property with a focus on
storm and flood warnings; however, skills in predicting developed
slowly until the mid-20th century (6). In the 1960s,
the federal government also endorsed research and development of
cloud-seeding technologies, but this policy faded
when clear proof of success failed to emerge (7).

Flooding, the nation's most damaging extreme, was the first to receive
policy attention (8). For the past 150, years
the federal government has built thousands of miles of levees and
hundreds of reservoirs in a massive "structurally" based policy.

Concern over the opposite extreme--droughts--also brought structural
solutions including hundreds of reservoirs and
irrigation projects in the drier west beginning late in the 19th
century. Record droughts of the 1930s and the presence
of the New Deal government created preventive policies that involved
land-use controls, conservation practices, and
more reservoirs, furthering the structural approach (9).

Policies relating to atmospheric extremes underwent major changes after
World War II. Costly proactive structural
policies to prevent losses during disasters were finally recognized as
unable to control all losses. A "nonstructural"
philosophy emerged in national policies: move people out of hazardous
areas, seek improvements in building codes
and encourage use of crop and flood insurance (10). Rapid improvements
in storm forecasting coupled with local
policies led to the development of thousands of community warning
systems after 1960. In addition to these proactive
measures, other policies have provided assistance to those with losses.
>From 1800 to 1950, relief was a local
government responsibility except when overwhelming losses occurred, and
then state and sometimes federal aid was provided.

A series of laws beginning with the Disaster Relief Act of 1950
expanded the scope of federal responsibility (11).
However, without objective policy criteria to define a disaster,
determining which events became "disasters" and how
much relief was awarded often became politically driven decisions. The
first presidential declaration of a disaster
occurred in 1953, and there have been more than 1000 since. Payouts
have rapidly escalated over time to a total of
$30 billion, with government aid to individuals and to local and state
government agencies. Temporary housing,
unemployment insurance, and small business loans have also been
provided at government expense.

Current Policy
The massive growth of federal assistance has had a negative effect on
nonstructural policies, which are based on
persuading people to do the right thing--build on suitable land (not in
floodplains or risky coastal areas), and to buy
crop or flood insurance (12). Adoption of nonstructural policies
largely failed--what incentive was there to do these
things when government relief payments invariably bailed out almost
everyone when a disaster occurred? However,
by the 1990s, "budget-breaking" federal relief payments brought policy
action by the Clinton Administration and
Congress to encourage and enforce nonstructural approaches (11).

Recent extremes have been of two general types: extremely costly
weather events such as Hurricane Andrew of
1992 and the great Midwestern flood of 1993, or a sequence of climate
events (four severe winters in 1976-1980,
the drought of 1987-1989, or the 1990-1996 period with 72 weather
catastrophes that each exceeded $100 million
in insured losses). How and when these extremes occurred, as well as
the impacts they created, have helped define
recent policy reactions. Mitigation as opposed to recovery payments
emerged as a policy theme. For example, major
floodplain damages and $10 billion in farm losses associated with the
flood of 1993 led to new laws that drastically
changed the federal flood insurance program and the crop insurance
program (13). As a result of $16 billion in
insured losses due to Hurricane Andrew, the insurance industry has
seriously considered seeking government
involvement to serve as a backup for excessive future losses that the
insurance industry cannot handle (14). Insurers
have been seeking to formalize a government role as the reinsurer of
last resort, and the federal government has been
considering how best to get involved (15). Building codes have been
enhanced in Florida and other states (16).

The Natural Hazard Reduction Program of the Clinton Administration
represented a major move to mitigate losses
and to reduce disaster costs, and to help accomplish this goal, the
government has joined with the property insurance
industry to improve disaster reduction (17). In an effort to address
problems caused by temperature extremes,
government policies have also focused on various issues such as helping
to fund energy costs for the poor,
establishing public shelters for protection during extremes, setting
energy price controls, and encouraging
conservation practices. An emerging excellent thrust is "energy
efficiency," which has the added benefit of minimizing
emissions of carbon dioxide to lessen the potential for global warming.

In a global context, U.S. policies for dealing with extremes have been
more complex and sophisticated than those in
most other nations. Most other nations rely on relief assistance, often
undergirded by U.S. funds, for dealing with
losses. The United States has also exported its policy of structural
approaches to assist many developing nations.
Canada passed comprehensive emergency preparedness legislation in 1988,
defining government actions in natural
disasters, and further established an emergency preparedness agency to
promote mitigation and coordination during
disasters. The United States and Japan have established a panel to deal
jointly with problems associated with high
winds, typhoons, and seismic disturbances.

Future Policy Directions
Endeavors to control damage and to provide assistance should continue
to be a part of government policy, but some
structural policies, like those that once required continuing
construction of electric power systems by utilities, have
ended, and others should change. Agricultural policies should continue
to encourage adaptation (wise land use, better
seed varieties, etc.); water policy should deemphasize construction and
resource control (reservoirs, diversions,
dams, etc.) and policies to protect society must emphasize warning
systems and mitigative actions (stronger buildings,
better insulation, and shelters).

Future assistance should not rely on political decisions about which
events deserve assistance and how much relief is
needed. Emerging policies emphasizing personal responsibility for
actions, as reflected in the crop and flood insurance
changes in 1997, will need more incentives. Such policies also will
need to be enforced by the insurance industry and
should involve a partnership of local, state, and federal entities and
the private sector (18). The Subcommittee on
Natural Disaster Reduction identified major issues that need scientific
attention to help reduce future losses, and these
include studies to better estimate losses, to more effectively adapt
new technologies that mitigate losses, to improve
prediction of weather hazards like hurricanes, to define the effect of
global change on hazards, to define impacts of
disasters on natural ecosystems, and to assess the vulnerability of
critical infrastructures (19).

Most loss of life during recent extremes has been attributed either to
location in inadequate facilities or questionable
personal actions after receiving a warning such as driving a vehicle
into a heavily flooded highway (13). Education is
needed to create greater awareness of dangers and individual
responsibility. Insurance coverage related to extremes
should become a requirement for those deciding to live in high-risk
areas.

If extremes increase with time owing to changes in climate, society and
its systems will have to adapt. Regardless of a
change in climate, population growth and increasing vulnerability of
the nation's infrastructure mean that losses will
continue to increase, a clarion call for mitigative efforts. The
property insurance industry fears the potential for
massive, financially crippling losses, and "market-based" approaches
and new federal policies are likely (16). One
obvious need is for the design of systems and structures having greater
flexibility and to reduce infrastructure
vulnerability. This includes using diverse and better adapted crop
strains, more efficient irrigation, floating docks in
major harbors, stronger homes and structures, and new infrastructure,
particularly in aging urban areas. Highly
vulnerable infrastructures include communications, electricity and
natural gas supply systems, water supply and
sewage treatment systems, and transportation. Sustainability and wise
land use have been largely ignored in most
public policies dealing with natural hazards (20). Policies with
incentives for "doing the right thing" are necessary.

References and Notes

1.S. Changnon, Bull. Am. Meteorol. Soc. 80, 1819 (1999).
2.K. Kunkel, R. Pielke Jr., S. Changnon, Bull. Am. Meteorol. Soc.
80, 1077 (1999).
3.S. Changnon, Nat. Hazards 8, 290 (1999).
4.S. Changnon and D. Changnon, Illinois Third Consecutive Severe
Winter: 1978-1979 (Illinois State Water
Survey Report of Investigation 94, Champaign, IL, 1980).
5.R. Roth Sr., in Impacts and Responses of the Insurance Industry to
Recent Weather Extremes (Changnon
Climatologist, Mahomet, IL, 1996), pp. 101-132.
6.S. Changnon, in Prediction: Science, Decision Making, and the
Future of Nature (Island Press,
Washington, DC, 2000).
7.H. Lambright and S. Changnon, Sci. Technol. Hum. Values 14, 340
(1989).
8.S. Changnon, Water Int. 23, 263 (1999).
9.W. Riebsame, S. Changnon, T. Karl, Drought and Natural Resources
Management in United States
(Westview Press, Boulder, CO, 1991).
10.G. White, Changes in Urban Occupancy of Flood Plains in the United
States (Dept. of Geography
Research Paper 57, Univ. of Chicago, Chicago, 1958).
11.R. Sylves, Disasters and Coastal Zone States (Univ. of Delaware
Sea Grant Program, Newark, DE, 1998);
Committee on Assessing Costs of Natural Hazards, The Costs of
Natural Disasters: A Framework for
Assessment (National Academy of Sciences, Washington, DC, 1998).
12.J. Wright, in The Great Flood of 1993 (Westview Press, Boulder,
CO, 1996), pp. 245-275.
13.S. Changnon, in Floods (Routledge Press, London, 2000).
14.R. Pielke Jr., Hurricane Andrew in South Florida (National Center
for Atmospheric Research, Boulder,
CO, 1995).
15.W. Hooke, Nat. Hazard Rev. 1, 2 (2000).
16.H. Ryland, Nat. Hazard Rev. 1, 43 (2000).
17.H. Ryland, Stepping Toward a Safer Future (Institute for Business
and Home Safety, Boston, MA, 1998);
S. Changnon, E. Fosse, E. Lecomte, Clim. Change 42, 51 (1999).
18.H. Kunreuther, Paying the Price (J. Henry Press, Washington, DC,
1999), pp. 1-17; 209-228.
19.National Science and Technology Council's Committee on the
Environment and Natural
Resources/Subcommittee for Natural Disaster Reduction (SNDR)
available at
www.usgs.gov/themes/sndr/sndr09.html
20.R. Burby, Confronting Natural Hazards with Land-Use Planning for
Sustainable Communities (J.
Henry Press, Washington, DC, 1998); W. Hooke, Nat. Hazard Rev. 1,
4 (2000).

S. A. Changnon is in the Department of Geography, University of
Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Champaign, IL
61820. D. R. Easterling is at the National Climatic Data Center
(NCDC)/National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Admimistration (NOAA), Asheville, NC 28801.