I'm most familiar with the Washington State example and then my own experiences in King County where we included the private sector in our planning and as signatories to the Region Disaster Response Plan (Security Magazine is going to be doing a story on that planning effort in the coming months).
To have the private sector at the table there has to be something in it for them. The one key element I've found that they want and that keeps them engaged is information. Especially information about ongoing emergencies and disasters. They don't want to try to manage their people and operations by following the event via commercial media outlets. They know that what the cameras might be focused on is not the most important thing to their operations. They also need to know what government is intending to do. Is the event getting better or worse? Should I send my people home now or wait? When is a road expected to be back open? Pretty basic information. We just need to have the channels of communications open.
