I'm having a hard time seperating the three questions - I think it is a requirement that a risk assessment understands current capability in order to provide an accurate picture of risk. So I think they need to remain together, maybe the problem is in what they try to accomplish and where it all fits in the overall relationship between the funds provided and how they are allocated etc... I feel a disconnect between the plan (which is hard to understand, and the investments, which don't really help a communities baseline needs but become a managment burden and source of stress in many cases). Our communities maintain that all events are "local" yet this document in the end proposes and pushes national decision making on preparing for local events. The result is plans which seemingly can't be implemented or developed, much less resourced. In the investment process today funds are filtered to the local level to fund local projects that support national program goals, yet many jursidcition will tell you they have local needs that are more pressing to them. In the end it doesn't seem we have been able to measure change in our risk since 9/11, nor have we proven the investments we made have resulted in better preparedness (these investments may have resulted in better local police and fire protection (look at the recent dropping violent crime rates in major cities)but that doesn't seem to equal the preparedness goals outlined in the current documents. A proposed soultion is a national capabilty assessment program that simply asks street level employees about the how their organization would handle a number of events, or prevent a number of events. This would not be a check box solution, really all you are trying to do is determine if plans are developed and resourced throughout a specific community, at different levels you could ask how the plans interact within communities. The questions you ask become the baseline capabilities, in the end it has nothing to do with fusion centers or ventilators, but how would your community handle XXX (XXX being number of events that could actually happen in their communities ( an F5 Tornado,an arson problem, a threat against the water plant, a protest, a chemical leak, suspicious actiivity at city hall, etc...) A randon sampling can provide a look at how we are doing, but in the end none of this will work without more creative programs that capture the public's imagination and make them realize they are the key to our Nation's Homeland Security, our community of responders is only the gatekeeper.

This idea is important because it offers simplier solutions that are focued at the local level. We have to have local solutions and local stability before anything else if we want to have preparedness.