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Defining the Whole Community

A popular term — defined as "everybody."

The definition of "whole community" as it relates to the National Disaster Recovery Framework is below. The "private sector" is included in the mix, but I'm thinking there should have been more mention of "business, industry, critical infrastructure owners and operators." I say this because of the critical nature of what they do for "the whole community." On the other end of the scale, "schools" and "utilities" could have been mentioned. 

Certainly, the definition is inclusive of those entities I point to above, but not everyone has their thinking cap on when engaging the "whole community."

"The National Disaster Recovery Framework defines the whole community as: The whole community includes individuals and communities, the private and nonprofit sectors, faith-based organizations, and all levels of government (local, regional/metropolitan, state, tribal, territorial, insular area, and Federal). Whole community is defined in the National Preparedness Goal as “a focus on enabling the participation in national preparedness activities of a wider range of players from the private and nonprofit sectors, including nongovernmental organizations and the general public, in conjunction with the participation of all levels of government in order to foster better coordination and working relationships.”

Eric Holdeman is a contributing writer for Emergency Management magazine and is the former director of the King County, Wash., Office of Emergency Management.