Projects

All Hazard Mitigation Plans

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New and Improved (All) Hazard Mitigation Planning

(All) Hazard Mitigation Plans (AHMPs) are FEMA-required documents that focus on “reducing loss of life and property by minimizing the impact of disasters”. Essentially, they are the definition of archaic federally mandated documents.

(A)HMP’s are required for all State, Local and Tribal governments who hope to access Pre-Disaster Mitigation Funding, now referred to as Building Resilience in Communities (BRIC) funding.

Why are (A)HMP’s important for USDN members?

Hazard Mitigation Plans are typically “owned” and developed by city and/or county emergency management departments. The issue is these documents look at historical hazards to try and determine where to invest dollars today. Presently they do not take into account climate change, equity, social & ecological justice, or sustainability. These plans provide USDN members with a fantastic opportunity to integrate sustainability, climate and equity initiatives and framing into a federally mandated document. This opens up funding opportunities for proactive climate action while also giving members support in prioritizing action in their most marginalized and disenfranchised communities. It also reduces duplication of vulnerability and risk assessments that are done in resilience and adaptation plans.

What does USDN offer to members?

USDN staff have worked with partners and members across the country to develop the New and Improved (All) Hazard Mitigation Planning program. This is a series of three documents that provide quick decision-making support, cut-and-paste text, and coaching to USDN members interested in making their (A)HMP’s more proactive while also bridging planning efforts between hazard mitigation, climate resilience, climate mitigation & adaptation, and social equity. This program has intentionally been designed to be adaptable and to cater to each US-based member's approach to their unique circumstances and the specific needs of the communities they serve.

In addition to the three documents provided here, USDN members also may sign up for assistance and support from USDN’s Direct Support and Innovation (DSI) team here.

Opportunity Pathways

USDN’s New and Improved AHMP guidance provides multiple pathways and a ‘choose your own adventure’ structure for making AHMPs more effective, proactive, and implementable.

The guidance provides members with four different pathways to choose from and different levels of “ambition” within each of those levels. The levels include:

Integration of climate change data and priorities
Use of a social equity framing and prioritization
BOTH climate change and social equity integration
Full Integration - Inclusion of climate change, social equity, and GHG mitigation strategies

New Hazard Mitigation Planning Guidance Document

The primary goal of these resources is to support you and your teams in meaningfully altering your community’s mandatory (All) Hazard Mitigation Plan. The structure below is intentionally set up to allow members to choose their own pace and align content to their climate, equity, and ecological objectives and capacity.

Part I: Framing

Background document that makes the case for this approach

Download Part I: Framing

Part II: Choosing Your Path

This guide is organized around four different “pathways” that local, state, and tribal governments may consider to update or enhance their AHMP. This is not a rigid structure. Your team is encouraged to pick, choose, and adapt depending on your circumstances and the specific needs of the communities you serve.

Download Part II: Choosing Your Path

Part III: Integration by Chapter

This section gives you access to boilerplate text and materials that you can insert and apply directly into your AHMP so that climate change and social equity are embedded into the work. The cut and paste text aligns with your chosen pathway and ambition level.

Download Part III: Integration by Chapter

Why would USDN Members want to work on (A)HMP’s?

(All) Hazard Mitigation Plans are a prerequisite for certain funding opportunities. The Disaster Mitigation Act of 2000 requires that all local, tribal, and state governments have an (A)HMP to be eligible for Building Resilience in Communities (BRIC) funding. If climate change, social equity, and ecological justice are incorporated into these plans, you will have more flexibility to align federal funding to sustainability and climate initiatives.
(All) Hazard Mitigation Plans require consistent updating.The Disaster Mitigation Act of 2000 requires that (A)HMPs be updated every five years. This is a huge ask for emergency management offices to take on and they tend to hire expensive consultants to provide cookie-cutter documents to “check the box”. If USDN members take these plans on and make them more robust and proactive, they open opportunities for deeper alignment and collaboration with your emergency management teams while also integrating other initiatives into federally mandated planning documents.
New and Improved HMPs operate at the intersection of hazard mitigation, climate resilience and adaptation and social equity. This body of work can support your team in bringing these three planning efforts – hazard mitigation, climate resilience and adaptation, and social equity – together into one document to connect and restructure objectives, actions, prioritization, and implementation.
Expanding (A)HMPs is needed now more than ever. The conventional scope of (A)HMPs does not include integration of the best science and climate trends that enable proactive action; nor do they acknowledge and consider the prejudiced and oppressive policies and practices that have been enacted and upheld at all levels of government, marginalizing people based on their race, ethnicity, culture, income level, education, ability, mental health status, and many other markers of identity or lived experiences. As a result, the synergy between planning and investment efforts concerning climate resilience and equity is often excluded from AHMPs, making it more difficult for governments to identify, prioritize, and fund proactive efforts.
(A)HMPs are critical planning and implementation documents. They set the standard pathway for state, tribal, and local governments to access federal funds to develop and deliver hazard-related investment, response, and recovery efforts for their jurisdiction. When done well, the identified actions can mitigate the destructive impacts of disasters, expedite recovery, and set the tone for how to build and sustain communities.

USDN's (A)HMP Framework in Action

The 2022-2027 Boulder Hazard Mitigation Plan was developed with USDN support and utilizes the framework shown above. This multi-jurisdictional plan has been approved by FEMA and offers a reference and example for applying this work in practice.

View the Boulder AHMP

Additional (A)HMP Funding & Finance Resources

There are supplemental documents available through USDN, that identifies opportunities for funding and financing strategies and actions that are proactive and human-centered:

USDN's AHMP Funding & Finance Guidance. Through this integration, siloed planning efforts will give way to cross-funding opportunities (such as leveraging FEMA’s BRIC funding, pre-disaster funding, NOAA, HUD, or EPA funding, and more) for proactive planning and investments.

Creative Commons

All USDN materials are under Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-Sharealike 4.0 license (CC BY NC SA).This means reusers can distribute, remix, adapt, and build upon the material in any medium or format for noncommercial purposes only, and only so long as attribution is given to USDN. If you remix, adapt, or build upon the material, you must license the modified material under identical terms. USDN is using this license to maintain the integrity of the work while also sharing it widely and making it possible for people to continue to build and iterate. It may not be shared commercially. You may find more information about this license here.