Innovative Emergency Management

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Innovative Emergency Management (IEM), established in 1985, describes itself as "one of the leading risk management companies in the US, providing services to private industry and government agencies, including the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and the US Department of Defense. ... Virtually all of our corporate efforts are focused on keeping people safe—at home, at work, and on the battlefield." [1]

Innovative Emergency Management is listed among the clients of The Livingston Group (see below).

In April 2004, IEM was identified as a corporate member of the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA). [2]

"Hurricane Pam" simulation
In July 2004, IEM "led a team of three firms"--URS Group, Inc. and Dewberry--"that created the simulation, working under contract for the Federal Emergency Management Agency." [3]

IEM New Orleans' Hurricane Disaster Plan

"In June 2004, FEMA privatized its hurricane disaster plan for New Orleans, contracting the work to the Baton Rouge, La., firm Innovative Emergency Management (IEM) whose motto is 'Managing Risk in a Complex World'," Joel Bleifuss and Brian Cook reported in the September 2, 2005, issue of In These Times.

"IEM announced the contract on its Web site on June 3, 2004, trumpeting that the company 'will lead the development of a catastrophic hurricane disaster plan for Southeast Louisiana and the City of New Orleans under a more than half a million dollar contract with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security/Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA)'," they wrote. "But in the days after Katrina hit, the press release was removed from the company’s online press release archives, as China Mieville noted on the blog Lenin’s Tomb."


"IEM Director of Homeland Security Wayne Thomas told the magazine Biz New Orleans, 'Given this area’s vulnerability, unique geographic location and elevation, and troubled escape routes, a plan that facilitates a rapid and effective hurricane response and recovery is critical. The IEM team’s approach to catastrophic planning meets the challenges associated with integrating multi-jurisdictional needs and capabilities into an effective plan for addressing catastrophic hurricane strikes, as well as man-made catastrophic events'," Bleifuss and Cook wrote.

"As Mieville opined, 'So, the IEM team’s approach isn’t to siphon off tax money, spout management shit, provide a demonstrably catastrophically inadequate plan, then f**k off like craven f**king caveworms and hide the evidence when the f**king corpses start piling up?'"

Lenin, of Lenin's Tomb, in response to the question "How did IEM get such a plum appointment?", answered September 3, 2005:

"Remember Newt Gingrich's (brief) successor Rep. Bob Livingston?
"The Livingston Group, the firm of former House Appropriations Committee Chairman Bob Livingston, R-La., also has clients that are marketing new technologies in Washington. Livingston represents Innovative Emergency Management, a Baton Rouge, La., company that specializes in chemical and biological emergency response. The firm has done work with state governments and the U.S. Army; with Livingston's help, company executives were able to pay visits recently to officials from the Defense and Health and Human Services departments.

IEM and FEMA did begin a draft of a plan. The plan was that, when a hurricane hit, everyone in the Crescent City would simply get the hell out in their cars. Apparently, the IEM/FEMA crew didn’t know that 127,000 people in the city didn’t have cars.

Over fifty-three days, IEM built Hurricane Pam, focusing on the small details of an exercise that would involve as many as 270 disaster responders. Greg Peters, an IEM contract worker, noted that the company fussed relentlessly over its guest list. “You know, they’d sit around asking questions like ‘Do we need someone from the phone company to be here?’” he said. “The answer was yes and so they’d move on: ‘How about the Department of Transportation?’ and so on.”

But the center of the plan was always this perfect storm, a few “words and tables,” as IEM’s president and chief executive, Madhu Beriwal, put it—words and tables calculated to stand up to assault, should someone want to quibble with the scenario. Brad Tiffey, IEM’s chief manager for the Hurricane Pam drill, worried endlessly about the storm’s precise path. “It’s funny how big of a difference five or ten miles can have on a hurricane’s effect,” he said. Ultimately Tiffey and his technical staff settled on a tried-and-true storm track, the one traveled by Hurricane Georges, the very real storm that had sparked the creation of Pam in the first place. The only difference was that this time the tempest did not veer to the east.

As with most IEM projects, the Hurricane Pam exercise was put together at the last minute, in a blind animal panic with no time for refinement, testing, or subtlety.

"Source: Peter H. Stone, "Selling Security," National Journal, 12/15/2001, Vol. 33 Issue 50-52, p3864, 3p"

Lenin also wrote that "Back in 2000, some congressional hearings by the House Armed Services Committee reveal that IEM apparently has a reputation for offering inadequate and contradictory plans."

Management

Clients: Federal Agencies

Clients: Commercial

  • Agrico Chemicals
  • APPRO Systems, Inc.
  • Arizona Public Service Company
  • Bechtel National, Inc.
  • Booz-Allen & Hamilton, Inc.
  • Comanche Peak Steam Electric Station, Texas
  • Dillard University
  • Dominion Virginia Power
  • E.I. DuPont de Nemours Corporation
  • James Lee Witt Associates, LLC
  • Kaiser Chemicals
  • Logistics Management Institute
  • Louisiana Power and Light Company
  • Harris Nuclear Plant, North Carolina
  • Occidental Chemical Corporation
  • Quaternary Resource Investigations, Inc.
  • Union Carbide
  • Taiwan Power Company
  • Westinghouse Electric Corporation
  • Westlake Chemical Group
  • Woman's Hospital, Louisiana

Clients: Municipal Agencies

  • Chester Water Authority, Pennsylvania
  • City of New Orleans
  • Lake Charles Harbor and Terminal District, Louisiana
  • New Orleans Regional Transit Authority

Clients: State

Contact Details

Innovative Emergency Management, Inc.
8555 United Plaza Blvd
Baton Rouge, LA
Tel: 225-952-8191
Fax: 225-952-8122
URL: http://www.ieminc.com/

Related SourceWatch Resources

External links

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