Emergency Management and Programs Branch Overview

Branch Background

Pursuant to the Emergency Management Act, Public Safety Canada has the legislative mandate to build a safe and resilient Canada by providing national leadership in emergency management (EM) in the development and implementation of policies, plans and a range of programs.

The Emergency Management and Programs Branch (EMPB) supports this mandate by working with other federal departments and agencies, provinces and territories, national and regional Indigenous organizations, as well as other stakeholders, to advance an integrated policy, programmatic, and coordinated approach across the four components of EM:

EMPB, with approximately 330 employees, is composed of four directorates: 1) Policy and Outreach; 2) Programs; 3) Government Operations Centre (GOC); and, 4) Federal EM Modernization Project.

In addition, the Branch is also responsible for the Department's regional offices located across Canada. With presence in 13 locations (one or more in each province and one in the Northwest Territories), these regional offices serve as the primary point of contact for the Department at the regional level and play an important role in building and maintaining partnerships for emergency management operations and in supporting communities through program delivery.

Key Files and Responsibilities

Emergency management is a core responsibility of the Government of Canada and a collective responsibility of all federal government institutions. The federal government has statutory responsibilities for coordinating EM activities among government institutions and in cooperation with the provinces, territories and other entities. As disasters in Canada continue to increase in frequency, severity and costs, the leadership role that Public Safety Canada plays in Canada's emergency management system is becoming increasingly important in order to ensure a whole-of-society approach to strengthening Canada's response and resilience.

In December 2021, the Prime Minister mandated the President of the King's Privy Council and Minister of Emergency Preparedness to exercise leadership and coordinate efforts to strengthen emergency management in Canada, ensuring a strategic, integrated and proactive approach across all hazards, including public health emergencies. The Minister works closely with provinces, territories, municipalities and Indigenous partners to take strong action to prepare for future emergencies, including extreme weather events caused by climate change, with a focus on proactive prevention/mitigation efforts and ensuring robust response and recovery capabilities.

Policy

The Policy and Outreach Directorate (POD) is responsible for enhancing the resiliency across Canada's EM system. This includes leading the policy and program development function for the range of EM responsibilities under the EMA: prevention/mitigation, preparedness, response and recovery through developing, coordinating and enacting interdisciplinary policies and programs to reduce disaster risk for Canadians.

Guided by the Emergency Management Framework for Canada (2011) and in collaboration with provinces and territories, in 2019, the Directorate led the publication of the Emergency Management Strategy for Canada: Toward a Resilient 2030. The strategy is a collaborative, whole-of-society roadmap to strengthening Canada's ability to assess risk, prevent and mitigate, prepare for, respond to, and recover from disasters. Furthermore, it identifies federal, provincial and territorial priorities that will strengthen Canada's resilience by 2030. The Interim FPT Action Plan 2021-22, created to advance defined outcomes within the EM Strategy, was published in March 2022. The 2023-2024 EMS Action Plan is in development towards a spring 2023 publication.

Aligned with the EM Strategy is the EM Transformation initiative, driven by the increasing frequency and severity of recent disaster events and human-induced threats which have shone a light on the gaps in Canada's EM system. This initiative seeks to undertake a series of phased system-wide actions through engagement and collaboration with provinces, territories, municipalities and Indigenous communities. Priority areas of action include: 1) strengthening governance, coordination and integration across all-hazards, recognizing EM is a whole-of-society priority; 2) bolstering national readiness and resilience for future emergencies while ensuring better access to interoperable capabilities; 3) improving and promoting a common understanding of disaster risks, and supporting strategic investments in risk reduction, pre-disaster resilience and resilient infrastructure. These priority areas of action are to be better enabled through strengthened integration and access to real-time data and leading-edge science and expertise to support decision-makers.

Other key initiatives underway include:

Exploring options for a low-cost national flood insurance and potential relocation program to better protect homeowners at high risk of flooding, and without adequate insurance protection. Public Safety, through POD, led a Task Force on Flood Insurance and Relocation that included FPT partners, industry stakeholders, and engagement with Indigenous communities, and has produced a public-facing, statement-of-fact report that was published August 2022.

The Disaster Financial Assistance Arrangement (DFAA) provides significant financial assistance to provinces and territories in the event of large-scale natural disasters when response and recovery costs exceed thresholds specific to each province and territory. Facing significant rising costs and impacts of disasters in recent years, PS undertook a review of the DFAA to ensure the program can remain an effective, comprehensive system available to PTs for disaster recovery and to support the safety and well-being of Canadians. The Review, which concluded in fall 2022, included 3 streams: 1) internal policy research, audit, and evaluation; 2) extensive engagement with PTs; and 3) an external Expert Advisory Panel that was stood up by the Minister in Spring 2022 to provide strategic recommendations on the program.

Connected to this work is the development of a Canada-wide Flood Risk Awareness Portal, which will provide Canadians with the best available flood risk mapping and modelling outputs, as well as resources and suggestions on how best to protect their homes and communities. This Portal will aim to increase the percentage of Canadians who are aware of their flood risk, as well as the percentage of Canadian homeowners who implement mitigation measures, contributing to increased flood resilience at the residential and community level and reduced financial impacts on Canadian homeowners in the event of a flood. This will meet a key Public Safety mandate letter commitment to provide centralized access to flood risk information to Canadians through an online Flood Risk Awareness Portal, including resources and suggestions on how best to protect homes and communities.

Through engagement with non-governmental organizations, POD is working to support capacity building, readiness and deployments in the provision of humanitarian support for Canadians, in response to COVID-19 and other large-scale emergencies and disasters in Canada, such as wildfires and floods. This includes working with the Canadian Red Cross and other NGOs through the Humanitarian Workforce Program. To support the development of longer term options in this area, The Policy and Outreach Directorate will be leading whole-of-society consultations on civilian response capability framework.

Other efforts include working with partners in monitoring the implementation of the Post-Traumatic Stress Injuries Action Plan for public safety officers; developing a National Risk Profile that will enhance our understanding of disaster risks and support the identification and analysis of the capabilities needed to build collective resilience to disasters; working with partners in developing a National Adaptation Strategy that will set out key actions in priority areas related to climate change adaptation; advancing national search and rescue (SAR) initiatives in Canada; and, in leading policy and program development with respect to interoperable emergency communications, such as continuing to strengthen the National Public Alerting System and building a Public Safety Broadband Network.

POD is also actively engaged with strategic international partners, including the Five-Eyes countries, and with international institutions to advance strategic priorities by leveraging knowledge and best practices. Canada is signatory of the Sendai Framework, a voluntary non-binding arrangement on Disasters Risk Reduction led by the United Nations Office of Disaster Risk Reduction (UNDRR). Public Safety has taken leadership role on delivering commitments under the Sendai Framework, leading for whole of government.

In addition, through outreach and engagement activities, EMPB fosters relationships with key partners, including other federal departments and agencies, provinces and territories, municipalities, Indigenous communities, academia, volunteer sector, private sector and civil societies, to raise awareness, promote a common approach, and strengthen the emergency management system.

Programs

The Programs Directorate, with the support of its 13 regional offices, delivers departmental programming related to Indigenous policing, crime prevention, guns and gang violence, countering radicalization to violence, search and rescue, and emergency management. In the last fiscal year (2021-22), the Directorate delivered approximately $944  million in program payments – for instance, $446 million under the DFAA and $133 million under the First Nations and Indigenous Policing Program, and $94M under the ‘Supporting the Canadian Red Cross' Urgent Relief Efforts Related to COVID-19, Floods and Wildfires' and ‘Humanitarian Workforce' programs.

In order to strengthen its capability to deliver a total of 31 programs, the Programs Directorate is reviewing and modernizing its program delivery model, as well as its organizational design, to optimize program delivery efficiency and emergency management functions.

Response Coordination and Preparedness

The Emergency Management Act (2007) gives the Minister of Public Safety responsibility for exercising leadership relating to emergency management in Canada by coordinating, among government institutions and in cooperation with the provinces and other entities, emergency management activities. The Government Operations Centre (GOC) supports national EM response by coordinating the federal response to events, and advances pre-event preparedness through EM planning, exercises and monitoring activities.

The GOC provides leadership for integrated federal emergency response to all-hazards events (potential or actual, natural or human-induced, accidental or intentional) of national interest. The GOC offers coordination and emergency management response and preparedness expertise to allow lead departments to focus on fulfilling their mandates. Despite being situated within EMPB, the GOC operates on behalf of the Government of Canada, and is an asset for the entire federal government. This includes support to the Minister of Emergency Preparedness in coordinating the federal response to provincial or territorial requests for assistance to address local or regional emergencies. Specifically, the GOC provides 24/7 monitoring and reporting, national-level situational awareness, warning products and integrated risk assessments, as well as national-level planning and whole-of-government response management.

Each year, in consultation with FPT and science based departments, the GOC completes a risk assessment and planning process in advance of the Floods and Wildfire seasons with the intent to increase federal preparedness to support provinces and territories. The final outcomes include a national risk assessment which is presented at Cabinet, and the Government of Canada Cyclical Event Response Plan. The GOC maintains a response team on 24/7 watch, including daily situational reporting. The GOC also coordinates the development of interdepartmental and/or multijurisdictional contingency plans to enable enhanced response coordination and reinforces preparedness through the coordination of the GOC National Exercise and Continuous Improvement team.

Government Operations Centre and Federal EM Modernization Project

The GOC and the Federal EM Modernization Project (FEMMP) have the Federal Emergency Response Plan (FERP) renewal efforts well underway and are working to update the FERP and policy framework to better define the structure for federal response and to support improved integration across federal response plans and instruments (such as Emergency Support Functions) and practices. GOC and FEMMP are also supporting efforts underway to relocate the GOC to a more modern facility.

Key EMPB Partners

Key partners include: the Canadian Red Cross; the Insurance Bureau of Canada; Canadian Association of Fire Chiefs; Paramedic Chiefs of Canada; Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police; National Indigenous Organizations; Federation of Canadian Municipalities; Salvation Army; St-John's Ambulance; Search and Rescue Teams, including Heavy Urban and Search and Rescue (HUSAR) Teams; United States Department of Homeland Security, United States Federal Emergency Management Agency and United Nations Disaster Risk Reduction (UNDRR).

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