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CHAPTER FIVE
Tools for Building Resilience
As described in Chapters 3 and 4, there have been important improvements in dam
safety in recent decades, largely because of improved regulatory oversight, increased owner
compliance with dam safety requirements and attention to maintenance and inspections,
and a better understanding of potential failure modes. Improvements in dam safety practice
were accelerated by changes in legislation after a number of catastrophic dam failures in
the 1970s. Since then, primarily in the wake of levee failures caused by Hurricane Katrina
in 2005, a number of agencies have been making efforts to improve levee safety. Perhaps
the most far-reaching has been the decision of the National Flood Insurance Program to
deaccredit levees that could not be certified within 2 years as providing at least 100-year
level of protection for structural or levee height reasons, and to require the purchase of flood
insurance by property owners behind those deaccredited levees. Previously, those property
owners had been exempt from mandatory purchase of flood insurance.
As discussed in Chapter 3, most safety improvement efforts focus on reducing the
likelihood of failure. In the case of large dams, federal agencies and private dam owners
routinely review dam safety, both through their own application of industry best practices
and in compliance with state and federal dam safety requirements. But those steps address
only one aspect of the risk equation: the likelihood of an adverse event, not its consequences.
The potential consequences of dam or levee failure in many locations have increased and will
continue to increase in part because of economic growth. Since the 1970s, many areas prone
to inundation in the case of dam or levee failure have become developed with residential
and commercial properties and associated critical infrastructure. In such circumstances,
increased consequences of dam or levee failure can outweigh whatever reductions in risk
may have resulted from improved regulatory compliance. Because the likelihood of failure
can never be reduced to zero, consequences of failure must be addressed. Chapter 4 describes
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DAM AND LEVEE SAFETY AND COMMMUNITY RESILIENCE
the committee vision for dealing with and learning from the consequences of failure through
focused and active community collaboration to enhance resilience.1
Throughout the preceding chapters, the committee has described the types of tools,
products, and guidance that could be developed at the federal level that would aid devel-
opment of more comprehensive and effective dam and levee safety programs. The present
chapter focuses on tools and methods that could support engagement of community mem-
bers and stakeholders in collaborative efforts to improve community resilience, and provides
information about community circumstances and priorities that can inform technical deci-
sion making. The assumption is that the primary proponents for selection and use of these
tools will be dam and levee safety professionals. However, the broader community is an
equal partner in the application of those tools and in enhancing community resilience. The
chapter concludes with discussion of what the committee considers essential to successful
incorporation of resilience-enhancing practices into dam and levee safety programs: evalu-
ation of current safety program activities. The committee suggests a model that could be
applied by safety programs and the broader community to assess processes that are in place
and processes expected to be in place at given increments of program maturity.
Concepts of community resilience cannot be incorporated into dam and levee safety
programs in one decision, action, or administrative fiat. Rather, improving resilience requires
persistent and coordinated commitment and action—mostly voluntary—by many in the
community. In all cases, methods and strategies for outreach and engagement are needed
to create long-term and continuously improving relationships between owners, regulators,
community members, and stakeholders more broadly. Successful integration of these con-
cepts is supported by the identification and selection of the appropriate tools. But cases are
community- and situation-specific, and so generic recommendation of the “best” tools is
neither possible nor helpful.
Dam and levee professionals have direct access to much of the expertise and experience
needed to develop, apply, or assess tools that can be used at the community level. Some of
the expertise and tools can be found in the federal government. In some instances, it may
be possible to modify or adapt an existing or developing tool to better meet community
needs. In other cases, new tools are needed. The development of tools is best accomplished
collaboratively across levels of government to take full advantage of the perspectives and
knowledge of local and state entities and key stakeholders.
Community is broadly defined in Chapter 2 to include dam and levee safety professionals, all other stakeholders, and
1
the ecological and cultural values of the region.
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CHALLENGES TO BUILDING COMMUNITY RESILIENCE
A future in which communities are substantially more resilient to the effects of dam
and levee failure is achievable, but only with much effort and change. The importance
of recognizing the value of infrastructure services and the risks associated with them has
been stated several times in this report. Dam and levee professionals must also recognize
the benefits of collaborative engagement to enhance resilience. Community member and
stakeholder needs must be met, including those associated with everyday services protected
by dams and levees.
In working toward the vision described in this report, dam and levee safety professionals
will need to change their professional culture. Some changes involve speeding up the current
evolution toward risk-informed management. Others involve accepting an expanded role
in safety management and related responsibilities, such as greater collaboration with the
broader community. Public and private dam and levee safety programs provide a founda-
tion for meeting those new responsibilities. At the same time, however, these programs face
challenges, and even obstacles, that go beyond what can be required by law or regulation of
a program. Similarly, challenges within communities as a whole make creating and partici-
pating in collaborative processes difficult, if not seemingly insurmountable. Recognizing
challenges is an important step toward recognizing the opportunities that resilience-focused
collaboration can offer. Tools to help overcome these challenges are discussed in this chapter.
Challenges for Dam and Levee Safety Professionals
Dam and levee professionals will need time to implement the changes suggested in this
report. Challenges and obstacles beyond immediate control include the following:
• Public-sector dam and levee safety regulatory agencies have inadequate resources,
making it difficult to keep up with current basic dam and levee safety duties. Con-
sequently, additional and changed responsibilities will, at first, mean greater burdens
in the face of limitations and cutbacks from state or federal legislative bodies. Leg-
islators and other public officials who set policy will need to recognize themselves as
part of the dam and levee safety community and understand—through collaborative
engagement—the effects of their legislation on resilience.
• Public and private dam and levee professionals responsible for safety may be simi-
larly overburdened. For example, according to the Association of State Dam Safety
Officials (ASDSO), about 10 times as many dam inspectors as are now employed
are needed to carry out regulatory mandates for inspections (ASDSO, 2011).
O wners and corporate boards may limit the availability of corporate resources,
including staff time.
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• Dam and levee safety professionals may be accustomed to an insular approach to
safety and risk reduction, for example, identifying and remedying structural defi-
ciencies and developing emergency action plans (EAPs). Their constituents often
favor strengthening dam and levee infrastructure by using state or federal funds
rather than local funding sources (Burby et al., 1991). Convincing their constituents
that accustomed funding sources may not be available in the future, and that new
approaches involving the broader community are required, is daunting.
• Government agencies and the private sector often are unable or unwilling to make
vital public safety information available to communities. In the interest of national
security, rules restrict access to some information that is necessary for a community
to understand its exposure to risks associated with dam and levee infrastructure fail-
ure (see Box 5.1). Some conclude that the disadvantages of withholding data from
the public are greater than the benefits of the presumed increase in infrastructure
security, and that the practice of withholding information could be eliminated (e.g.,
Pitt, 2008). The inability to share information is a major barrier to communica-
tion, resilience planning, and success of the safety mission. This problem is made
more difficult by the fact that dam and levee professionals, including those at the
federal level, often lack skills in risk communication and collaborative engagement.
W here there may be agreement that more risk communication is necessary, the
effective means of conveying what risk is are not well understood. Further, current
knowledge about risk communication does not permit conclusions about the best
approaches to use under specific circumstances (Kasperson, 2005). Research in
appropriate mechanisms and training in their use will be necessary.
Because community engagement is more efficiently developed from the bottom up,
dam and levee owners, operators, and regulators will be more productive if they focus
engagement efforts at the local level. Safety program professionals associated with locally
owned and operated infrastructure may find it easier to interact with the local community
because they already may consider themselves community members with multiple per-
sonal community linkages. Although they may not have the financial or other resources
of larger infrastructure management entities, they may already have reasons beyond the
professional for the continued safe functioning of infrastructure, and it may be easier for
them to tap community networks and discuss the ties between infrastructure safety and
community resilience. Their own professional and technical decisions may likely be more
easily influenced by community member and stakeholder resilience needs and priorities.
These professionals may be more easily convinced of the need for engagement, but may
need assistance identifying and establishing ties with existing networks, or, in some cases,
developing new networks. They may not have the skills or manpower for extensive outreach
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BOX 5.1
National Security Versus Safety and Resilience
One result of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks has been changes in policies and practices that
restrict the availability of emergency action plans (EAPs) and dam failure inundation maps to affected com-
munities and, in particular, to the general public (USACE, 2008; DOI, 2011). U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
(USACE) interim guidance states that all copies of inundation maps shall be marked for official use only
(USACE, 2008), indicating that the information can be disseminated only within the Department of Defense,
“between officials of Army components and Army contractors, consultants, and grantees, as necessary, in
the conduct of official business,” and to officials of the “Executive and Judicial Branches in performance of
a valid government function” (U.S. Department of the Army, 2000, p. 58). USACE provides the following
guidance (USACE, 2008, p. 1):
a. Part of the EAP. The primary use of inundation maps is to support the project Emergency Action
Plan (EAP). As part of the EAP, copies of the maps may be given to the emergency management
agency of communities or other jurisdictions that would be affected by a dam failure or other dam
safety incident. The individual or office providing the map to the local jurisdiction should ask that
the map be safeguarded and not distributed to the public [emphasis added]. We recognize
that these agencies operate under various state laws concerning the release of information and
may have to release copies under their laws and regulations.
b. Public Meetings on Dam Safety. The inundation maps may be used in public meeting concern-
ing dam safety. The maps may be displayed at the meeting and discussed. Copies of the full
inundation maps for a dam shall not be distributed at the meeting without written approval from
[Headquarters, USACE]. When a public meeting is advertised to cover a specific locality, the
portion of the inundation map required for that locality may be extracted and used as handouts
at the public meeting.
Such policies, however, can limit access to vital risk information and undermine efforts to meet public
safety mandates, build resilient communities, and meet other community needs (e.g., Pitt, 2008). For example,
in 2011, USACE wanted the Columbia County, Georgia Emergency Management Agency (GEMA) to remove
emergency flood information from public access, according to a local news report (Beasley, 2011). Report-
edly, the GEMA director responded, “it is my responsibility to talk to people about what hazards exist [and]
what the risks are. . . . It makes sense, it’s part of emergency planning to see what is the worst case that could
happen and then let those people know so they know what to do” (Beasley, 2011). According to the news
report, the 2005 map indicates that 7,000 people could be affected by worst-case scenario projections.
Given the rapid growth in the county since 2005, the number is probably higher today. The GEMA director
acknowledges that she does not expect a failure of the USACE dam, but is not willing to ignore the risk.
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DAM AND LEVEE SAFETY AND COMMMUNITY RESILIENCE
and will need assistance determining how best to use the resources they have to make the
necessary incremental changes.
Interactions become more complex, however, when infrastructure ownership and man-
agement are not local, or when the infrastructure includes miles of levees that run through
multiple communities. In such cases, there may be a greater need to demonstrate the ben-
efits of community engagement, and to plan the incremental steps necessary to engage the
local communities, communities further afield (e.g., downstream), and with stakeholders
more broadly. This type of encouragement could come from state and federal regulators
and agencies.
Overcoming these and other obstacles is possible. Government and professional or-
ganizations (such as the Federal Emergency Management Agency, ASDSO, and the U.S.
Society on Dams) can help the dam safety profession establish, refine, and expand its role
through training, model programs, and the development of new tools. The notion of “levee
safety,” however, is relatively new. The lessons of Hurricane Katrina and other flooding and
levee failure experiences have raised awareness of risks associated with levees. The levee
community will need to continue to develop and define what constitutes a levee safety
program and to develop standards of practice, training, model programs, and new tools for
use by its professionals. Because dams and levees are generally part of a larger watershed
system, many dam and levee operators—and the communities they serve—could benefit
from collaboration in managing the overall drainage system and resources and reducing the
likelihood and magnitude of individual and cascading failure events.
Community Challenges
Motivation for the community—particularly those vulnerable to flooding—to engage
in resilience-focused collaboration is often not translated into substantive action. Elements
of the public may not be aware that they live downstream of a dam and in the inunda-
tion shadow. Communities behind levees may believe the levees make them “safe” or pro-
tect them from flooding. Communities may be uninformed or misinformed because of
a lack of information, or because the information they have is inaccurate or incomplete.
Equally problematic is that community members may not fully comprehend the informa-
tion provided.
Challenges to resilience-focused collaboration faced by the broader community may
include
• an unwillingness to engage with dam and levee owners and operators,
• a lack of appreciation of the value of infrastructure (services provided, costs, and risks),
• active resistance to adoption of resilience measures by community special interests
(e.g., real estate and tourism promotion),
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Tools for Building Resilience
• a lack of reciprocal recognition of dam and levee owners’ needs and responsibilities
versus community goals and perceptions,
• an unwillingness of communities to consider hazardous areas in their comprehen-
sive planning efforts (e.g., Burby, 2006),
• the need for state and local governments (and lack of resources) to carry the finan-
cial burden of development constructed in harm’s way (Burby, 2006).
CHOOSING TOOLS TO ENHANCE COMMUNITY RESILIENCE
A variety of methods, techniques, measures, and approaches are applicable to efforts
to improve community resilience to dam and levee failure. They may be structural or be-
havioral, mandated or voluntary, and individual or community-wide. They are all intended
to improve the ability of a community to avoid and recover from an adverse event, that is,
to reduce the magnitude and duration of severe consequences of an event. The committee
characterizes all these methods, techniques, measures, and approaches as tools for improving
resilience. Their success depends on the availability of adequate relevant information about
risks and on agreement on a course of action that meets the needs of dam and levee profes-
sionals, community members, other stakeholder groups, and local and state governments.
The Federal Interagency Floodplain Management Task Force (FIFM-TF, 1994) stated
that managing flood hazards “encompasses both the process of making decisions and the
continuous challenge of seeking out and developing new strategies and tools to encourage
the wise use of floodplain lands” (p. 9). It noted that “using one or more . . . strategies (and
the tools that implement them) helps bring existing or proposed activities into compatibility
with the risks to human resources and the risks to natural resources” (p. 9). These strategies
include the following (p. 9):
• “Modify human susceptibility to flood damage and disruption.
• “Modify the impact of flooding on individuals and the community.
• “Modify flooding.
• “Preserve and restore the natural resources and functions of floodplains.”
The committee adapts these strategies, which focus on the concept of safety, and ex-
pands them to incorporate concepts that support resilience:
• Develop approaches to identify community members and stakeholders, engage in
resilience-focused collaboration, and communicate risk in clear, understandable,
and actionable terms.
• Determine characteristics of resilience for the community and decide on objectives
to make the community more resilient.
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DAM AND LEVEE SAFETY AND COMMMUNITY RESILIENCE
• Adopt an overall set of resilience systems-engineering principles and practices to
deal with the uncertainties and complexity inherent in dam and levee safety.
• Reduce the likelihood of harmful events.
• Reduce the consequences of dam or levee failure for the community.
Each of the strategies relies on a set of tools that in combination can enhance dam and
levee safety and resilience.
An assessment of existing community resilience programs and their strategies allows
the community to set realistic objectives and to identify additional tools that are likely to
provide cost-effective reductions in risk and improvements in overall resilience. Some com-
munities may already apply an all-hazards approach to improving community resilience.
In such cases, it is desirable for a dam or levee safety program to align itself with existing
efforts rather than create a new and possibly conflicting community effort; tools already
in use may be sufficient or may need some modification to accommodate dam and levee
safety-specific issues.
A means of assessing progress in risk reduction and improving resilience is described
later in this chapter.
Reducing the Likelihood of Harmful Events
The likelihood and location of flooding depend on hydrologic and upstream and down-
stream conditions, dam and levee design and operation, and failure mode. At a minimum,
the design and operation of dams and levees would include using tools that quantify and
reduce the likelihood of failure. Chapter 3 discusses the progression of safety practices from
standards-based methods to more risk-informed approaches. Still better for the broader
purpose of reducing risk are methods for designing and operating dams and levees that
address the direct and indirect consequences of failure and thus provide some basis for
departing from traditional criteria when indicated.
Another way to reduce or modify the likelihood of flooding and its consequences is to
promote individual and collective action through financial incentives. For example, changes
in reservoir allocation procedures can allow downstream interests to purchase increments of
reservoir capacity for flood storage, diverting it from other uses. The reservoir could then be
operated in such a way that the purchased increments of capacity are normally empty; this
increases the effective flood storage of the reservoir and reduces the likelihood of dam fail-
ure during flood events. However, such a strategy could have the unintended consequences
of amplifying the vulnerabilities of some communities that lack resources. Collaborative
consideration of community and stakeholder needs and priorities is especially important to
avoid hidden consequences. Additionally, whether that strategy is cost-effective depends on
the cost of compensating displaced storage uses compared with community benefits from
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Tools for Building Resilience
the increase in safety and reduction in risk. Once legal and regulatory authority allows such
transactions, a role of dam safety professionals is to assist the community in evaluating all
aspects of the issues.
Another commonly used method on large rivers, such as the Mississippi, is the pur-
chase of flood easements, which make it possible to divert flood flows away from the river
channel and ease pressure on downstream levees and communities. Financial incentives
to landowners may be coupled with appropriate changes in the governance framework to
define the circumstances under which diversions could occur.
Reducing the Consequences of Dam and Levee Failure
Identification and selection of tools that assist communities in withstanding the effects
of dam and levee failure occur during the preparation and revision of hazard mitigation
plans, which can stand alone or be integrated into a comprehensive urban development
plan. Citizen involvement in mitigation planning is vital if tool selection is to reflect com-
munity interests and values. For example, citizen involvement in flood risk assessment and
mitigation planning is required in the member states of the European Union (see Box 5.2).
BOX 5.2
European Union Requires Public Participation in Flood Risk Assessment and
Management
The European Union, through its directive on the assessment and management of flood risks (Directive
2007/60/EC), requires member states to carry out preliminary assessments of flood risks to flood-prone river
basins and coastal areas. For zones at risk, the directive requires member states to draw flood risk maps and
prepare flood risk management plans. It also states that the public will be involved in production, review,
and updating of all assessments, maps, and prepared plans. All such products will be publicly accessible so
that citizens and other interested parties can have a say in the planning process.
SOURCE: EU (2007).
Various tools have been identified by planners and others to improve a community’s
ability to be resilient in the face of dam or levee failure, including
• requirements to provide flood hazard information through delineated flood hazard
zones on subdivision plats, through disclosure of hazards by real estate agents, and
posting of signs warning of hazards (e.g., high-water marks on historical markers);
• codes that regulate building and housing design;
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DAM AND LEVEE SAFETY AND COMMMUNITY RESILIENCE
• zoning ordinances for land use and land development (e.g., for regulating housing
developments);
• land acquisition (e.g., purchase of riparian land for open space, vertical parks, or
greenways, land easements, or development rights) to move levees back from the
river, or for removing previous development from flood hazard areas (see Box 5.3
for an example from the Netherlands); and
• tax adjustments, for example, reducing property taxes for low-intensity land uses
in floodplains, or limiting property tax increases on property improvements that
reduce the effects of flooding.
A different kind of financial incentive could require each property owner to pay an amount
equal to the amortized cost of flood hazard reduction infrastructure (e.g., dams and levees).
For example, a community could itself construct levees, financing 100 percent of the project
with tax revenue (full-cost pricing). The community as a whole would then be motivated to
find a combination of hazard reduction infrastructure and resilience-improving measures to
minimize total cost. Such tradeoffs are rarely considered; local communities do not typically
pay the full cost of dams or levees. For that reason, resilience improvement seems expen-
sive in comparison, because the alternative (hazard reduction) appears to be inexpensive or
free. A rational community, responding to these incentives, might demand higher dams and
BOX 5.3
Room for the River Programme in the Netherlands
The combination of extremely high water levels in the Rhine and Meuse Rivers in 1993 and 1995—
barely contained by existing dikes and the cause of evacuation of one-fourth of a million people—and
expected increases in water discharge in rivers as a result of climate change prompted the Dutch govern- govern-
ment in 2007 to implement a different approach to flood risk management and safety. The old approach,
dominated by increased heights and sizes of dikes, was replaced by an approach that makes more room
for the river, improves safety, protects the land and people living behind the dikes. The Room for the River
Programme, expected to be completed by 2015, will provide flood control by allowing the branches of the
Rhine to expand naturally during higher levels of water dischage at over 30 locations. A variety of measures
are being implemented, such as lowering the floodplains, deepening the summer beds, and moving dikes
further inland. The program stipulates that only when alternatives to create room for nature are infeasible
will measures to strengthen dikes be implemented. The program is expected to improve safety but also to
improve environmental quality of the river region, and provide opportunities for public–private partnerships.
SOURCE: Room for the River Programme. Available at www.ruimtevoorderivier.nl/meta-navigatie/english/ (accessed
January 21, 2011).
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levees while neglecting any effort to increase resilience. An example of full-cost pricing for
flood-hazard reduction is the Miami (Ohio) Conservancy District, which has long provided
flood management services while collecting the full cost of doing so in the form of special
benefit taxes from the properties that benefit from management activities (see Box 2.1).
Strategies that reduce the likelihood of dam or levee failure and susceptibility to re-
lated consequences, no matter how well devised and implemented, can be overwhelmed by
large storms or unforeseen events (such as errors in dam and levee design or operation and
maintenance). When a dam or levee failure occurs, its effects on members of the community
and stakeholders more broadly can be ameliorated or redistributed in time and space with
appropriate tools such as those that assist
• emergency preparedness, including for emergency preparedness planning, regional
public health planning, flood warning, flood fighting, evacuation, and sheltering;
• identifying and obtaining disaster relief from government and nongovernment sources;
• individuals and businesses to secure flood insurance to protect property and belongings;
• effective predisaster planning for post-disaster recovery and reconstruction, includ-
ing the identification of staging areas and sites for temporary housing;
• relocation of structures out of the inundation zone.
Some tools assist the community to become more resilient by providing specific in-
formation, for example, on the number of people likely to be injured or killed as a result
of a given event, and the time required for evacuation. One such model is the Life Safety
Model used by the Canadian power-generating company BC Hydro.2 Equipped with such
information, a community can design better evacuation plans and other strategies to reduce
exposure of threatened populations.
Environmental resilience is a part of community resilience, and floodplains provide
important habitat for plants and animals, and migration corridors for many species. Protec-
tion of floodplains from development can result in wildlife protection, lowered potential
flood heights, protection of downstream development from flood damage, improvements in
water quality, and preservation of environmental amenities for educational and recreational
purposes.
Strategies commonly employed to preserve and restore natural resources and functions
of floodplains include
• Public acquisition of floodplains (see Box 5.4);
• Acquisition of floodplains by land trusts and other nonprofit organizations (see
Box 5.5);
See www.lifesafetymodel.net (accessed January 21, 2011).
2
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BOX 5.5
Reconnection of Floodplain and River in Belgium
The European Union (EU) LIFEa Project (LIFE98/NAT/B/005171), which reconnected the Dijle River
and floodplain in the valley south of Leuven, Belgium, resolved two competing interests: nature conservation
and flood prevention. The Dijle valley is home to wetlands, ponds, and swamp forests, which are valuable
for floodwater retention in the region; however, agricultural development had diminished the valley’s natural
capacity to retain floodwaters and resulted in increased flooding in parts of Leuven. A plan to construct a
flood retention reservoir was proposed, but was dismissed after meeting resistance from local conservationists.
The final solution—reconnecting the river and floodplain—allowed restoration of the valley’s natural flood
retention capacity while preserving its alluvial habitats and protecting the interests of the local populace.
The LIFE project overcame several potential barriers—conflicts over land ownership, local resistance from
farmers, and overall cost—by setting priorities for land purchase through a conservation nongovernmental
organization, providing compensation to affected farmers, and avoiding the more expensive solution of a large
retention reservoir. The project achieved two main results: it contributed to more natural and less destructive
flooding dynamics in the Dijle valley, and it secured large blocks of overgrown land and restored them with
natural grassland habitats, partly through a direct marketing scheme with local farmers.
LIFE is the EU’s financial instrument for supporting environmental and nature conservation projects throughout the EU.
a
SOURCES: RESTORE (2011); see also EU LIFE Project (LIFE98/NAT/B/005171), available at ec.europa.eu/environment/
life/project/Projects/index.cfm?fuseaction=search.dspPage&n_proj_id=299.
Expanding risk-communication programs to include two-way risk communication
early in decision-making processes will help minimize conflicts based on differences in
expectations, and will help build social capital and promote the ability to act on increased
knowledge (Kasperson, 2005). Public outreach and risk communication programs can ex-
pand current efforts associated with, for example, public hearings, citizen advisory commit-
tees and task forces, alternative dispute resolution, citizens panels, surveys, focus groups,
technology-based approaches, and development of different deliberative methods (e.g.,
see NRC, 1996, for explanation of these various activities). Such efforts are important in
informing resilience-focused collaboration, as are other community-based activities such as
involving those at risk in surveillance demonstrations with professionals, and incorporating
community risk and preparedness concepts in primary and secondary school curricula. As
already described, discussion and feedback are vital for collaborative engagement, and dam
and levee professionals and the communities they serve need assistance identifying mecha-
nisms for engagement, whether for enhancing dam and levee safety related to infrastructure
operations or for providing their expertise in land-use, floodplain, or financial management.
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ASSESSING THE STATE OF PRACTICE WITH RESPECT TO RESILIENCE
To improve safety programs and community resilience, it is essential that current pro-
gram practices be evaluated and decisions be made about which tools—implemented to
what degree or with what coverage, and at what level—are most appropriate and beneficial
given the abilities of a program at a specific time. This requires the ability to assess the
present state of practice with respect to resilience and to identify where additional efforts
are needed. To assess the state of practice, the committee introduces two concepts:
• Tool maturity. A tool can be applied in different ways, for different reasons, or with
different degrees of coverage of a community. A tool is said to be more mature if it
improves how well a process is accomplished and if its use increases or leads to an
increase in resilience.
• Maturity matrix. A maturity matrix is a table that displays the relative maturity of
efforts, for example, efforts to improve resilience. Rows of the matrix correspond
to specific program activities and goals. Columns, moving from left to right, reflect
continuous improvement in tools or processes and indicate level of maturity. The
cells of the matrix contain specific tools and processes; their position depends on
the related program goal and relative maturity of a tool or process. In addition to
characterizing the current state of practice, the maturity matrix provides a system-
atic approach for identifying opportunities and priorities to improve processes and
increase resilience.
The remainder of this chapter is devoted to the concept of maturity and its assessment.
The chapter concludes with an example of a tool that can be used by dam and levee safety
programs to promote program and community-level engagement, assess processes that are
in place, and establish and set priorities among goals.
Maturing a Tool
The effectiveness of a tool or process in improving community resilience depends in
large part on using the tool of the right maturity level for the given circumstances. This
principle can be illustrated by considering an important tool in use by dam owners: pe-
riodic safety reviews for identifying potential and actual structural deficiencies. The U.S.
Army Corps of Engineers has conducted safety reviews of dams since the 1970s, and since
enactment of the National Dam Safety Program Act in 1996,3 has inventoried dams and
identified those that pose hazards to downstream populations and property. Safety reviews
The National Dam Safety Program Act was passed as part of the Water Resources Development Act of 1996. See
3
epw.senate.gov/dam.pdf (accessed February 9, 2012).
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originally were intended to provide a sense of where a dam stood relative to a limited set of
deterministic engineering standards, such as the ability of a spillway to discharge the inflow
design flood, and the stability of structures against overturning and sliding failures under
a variety of loading conditions. Although rudimentary, the measures were straightforward
to calculate and provided some consistency in screening criteria.
One result of early dam safety reviews was that dam owners were forced to undertake
expensive rehabilitation to meet the standards-based criteria. Despite those efforts, dams
continued to fail. For example, the Taum Sauk Pumped Storage Project reservoir—built
in 1965 in the Missouri Ozarks—met Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC)
standards in a number of safety reviews, but the reservoir failed catastrophically on De-
cember 14, 2005. Post-incident investigations pointed to a number of causal factors that
allowed the reservoir to be overfilled and fail, including the miscalibration of a water level
gauge and a lack of redundancy in instrumentation that would have caught the error (FERC
IPOC, 2006). The state of practice of dam safety reviews at the time could not account
for such factors.
To address inadequacies observed in FERC’s dam safety review process, FERC intro-
duced the Potential Failure Mode Analysis (PFMA) process, which owners are now re-
quired to apply. PFMA is intended to capture the “chain of events leading to unsatisfactory
performance” (FERC, 2005, p. 14-2) that might not be detected through standard reviews
(FERC, 2005). Failure mode analysis had been practiced by a number of progressive dam
owners, but was not a standard practice in the industry. PFMA improves an owner’s ability
to understand how a dam system performs, to identify events and conditions that could
lead to unsatisfactory performance (including dam failure), and to put appropriate controls
into place. This process allows dam safety reviews to mature beyond assessing whether a
dam meets design standards. PFMA allows operational measures that affect performance
and safety to be addressed—a true maturation of the review process.
PFMA represented an early stage of risk assessment, but there remained a need to move
beyond the qualitative and into quantitative risk analysis. Quantitative risk analyses were
relatively new to dam safety professionals, but applications in other fields, such as nuclear
energy, offshore oil and gas production, and other hazardous industries, could be drawn on
(Ibrahim et al., 2001; SEI, 2010a; NASA, 2012). Eventually, procedures were developed
for risk-informed safety reviews and calibrated against procedures used in other hazardous
industries to clarify the divisions between risk criteria (unacceptable risk, tolerable risk, and
acceptable risk). This is the state of advanced practice applied by some in the dam safety
industry, although it is not universally applied. The maturation of the safety review process
continues, led by a number of professional organizations and risk practitioners in the dam
safety field.
Some members of the dam and levee safety community do realize the benefits of a
safety program that includes elements of community resilience. However, even the relatively
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mature practice of safety review falls short of fully integrating concepts of community risk
reduction and resilience because communities likely have not been engaged in negotiat-
ing the criteria for defining risks or in choosing and implementing appropriate tools to
minimize or deal with risks. The next steps in the maturation process include evaluating
practices against actual community priorities to define what constitutes acceptable hazard
reduction and community resilience.
Figure 5.1 shows the evolution of dam safety analysis as a maturing tool, ranging from
its earliest, most simplistic forms to a fully matured risk-based assessment process that
incorporates community values. In this case, the current state of dam safety analysis for
most dam owners is near the middle of the scale, where failure mode analysis is practiced by
many large dam owners and some analyses include quantitative risk assessment. However,
even when quantitative risk assessment is applied, the decision criteria are typically those
of dam owners rather than of the broader community. Resilience will be improved when
dam safety reviews mature and include the community in defining decision-making criteria.
History of Assessing Process Maturity
Dams and levees serve a wide variety of functions and provide an array of services to
a broad community of commercial, institutional, and civic stakeholders. Dam and levee
professionals manage a complex “package” of procedures and deal with a large and diverse
community of stakeholders. The status and maturity of complex processes are systematically
assessed in a number of fields, sometimes under the rubric of “resilient systems engineering”
( Jackson, 2009). In some cases, such assessments use a maturity matrix to display maturity
status and highlight opportunities for improvement and prioritization of processes.
FIGURE 5.1 The dam safety review maturation process. The continuum of the process begins with deter-
ministic processes, such as are mandated by the National Dam Safety Program Act in 1996, and continues
through advanced processes of risk-based assessment conducted with full input from the community.
Figure 5-1
Bitmapped
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The Capability Maturity Model Integration (CMMI) concept was originally proposed
for the software and systems engineering industry to address the daunting complexity of
developing software products and processes and the effects of their failure (Paulk et al.,
1994). This application later expanded to encompass all systems (SEI, 2010b). Over the
last decade, the model has been extended to personnel, supply management, and manufac-
turing. The model is also used in the electricity generation industry (e.g., Hydro Quebec,
2010). The CMMI concept was further adapted to characterize the preparatory measures
needed to improve the capacity of communities to withstand a catastrophe (King, 2010).
Ontario Power Generation (OPG), operating 240 dams and 65 hydropower stations in the
Province of Ontario, Canada, has developed a model similar to that of the CMMI concept
and applied it at a detailed level to assess its ability to manage flood events and their effects
on dams (Bennett and Sykes, 2010).
CMMI was developed to gauge improvements in product and service development, but
it is not limited to this application. It incorporates best practices with respect to develop-
ment and maintenance activities for the duration of the product or service life cycle. CMMI
is a framework to describe the key elements of an effective process, including operations and
maintenance, and stakeholder involvement. CMMI guides the evolutionary improvement
that occurs incrementally from ad hoc immature activities to mature, disciplined processes.
The processes are improved by the introduction of more advanced (mature) practices specific
to the particular product or service being developed.
W hen applied to processes required for product and service delivery, CMMI generally
defines maturity according to five levels: (1) merely performing the activity, (2) planning and
executing the process in accordance with policy, (3) tailoring the process using the organiza-
tion’s set of standard processes and guidelines, (4) management that includes quantifying
product and service quality, and (5) changing and adapting successively to meet current
projected business objectives (SEI, 2010b).
Engaging stakeholders about specific engineering, management, and support operations
has proved successful in delivering value (related to schedule, cost, and quality) to organi-
zations that have adopted CMMI (Goldenson and Gibson, 2003). The CMMI approach
defines a stakeholder as a group or individual affected by outcomes of a process, and the
CMMI process requires integrating stakeholders into process development. Stakeholders
include residents and customers as well as managers, operators, and regulators account-
able for outcomes. Relevant stakeholders are identified to participate in specified activities.
Without such involvement, process improvements are less likely to occur or will occur more
slowly. Stakeholders are brought into the process as it matures from a basic to a managed
process (e.g., from the third to the fourth level as described above). This is challenging in
part because of the broad interests of stakeholders, and because they have been traditionally
outside decision-making processes.
The application of CMMI or related methods to dam and levee systems may result in
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opportunities to change the dam and levee safety cultures in ways that will contribute to
enhanced safety and resilience. Transition from structure-centric solutions to stakeholder-
centric and outcome-driven solutions is necessary for dam and levee safety programs to
mature. Using an approach similar to CMMI allows dam and levee professionals to address
infrastructure safety as a system rather than as a collection of loosely connected components.
A description of how such an approach could be used by dam and levee professionals to
build community resilience into safety programs follows.
Assessment of Community and Stakeholder Engagement
The committee presents a tool to facilitate a common understanding among all com-
munity members and stakeholders of the shared and individual responsibilities, risks, and
processes associated with continued safe operation of dam and levee infrastructure and the
continuum of measures to improve community resilience. Tools that ensure transparency
and understandability at the community level, both in and outside dam and levee safety
programs, are fundamental to success; the Maturity Matrix for Assessing Community
Engagement, described below, is such a tool. It is based on the CMMI concept and, like
CMMI, it uses a maturity matrix to illustrate and summarize system status. The maturity
matrix introduced here considers five levels of maturity for each set of processes or goals,
which are gauged with respect to relative success in enhancing community resilience. Table
5.1 defines levels of maturity with respect to regulatory compliance, best industry safety
practices, and contributions to resilience. The maturity levels should not be seen as discrete
conditions; rather, they exist on a continuum of practices, from those that do not contribute
to community resilience (Level I) to those that do the most to enhance resilience (Level V).
On the basis of the descriptions in Table 5.1, the committee derived, for illustrative
purposes, a generic and rough outline of a maturity matrix with a few examples of specific
tools applicable at different maturity levels. Table 5.2 provides a general idea of how a ma-
turity matrix could be constructed for a community. Because of the unique risks, resources,
and priorities of a given community, actual maturity matrices developed for a specific
community will have many more rows and detailed descriptions of specific tools. OPG,
for example, has generated a highly detailed maturity matrix for its operations intended to
move its program toward industry best practices.4 In the consideration of flood manage-
ment alone, OPG identified 14 areas of activities, each of which was subdivided. If the
matrix maturity had been extended to processes involving community collaboration and
consideration of community member and stakeholder priorities, the matrix could have been
larger. In developing its matrix, OPG defined the scope of the program and identified the
purpose, goals, and objectives to develop or improve the program.
T. Bennett, OPG, presentation to committee, May 5, 2011.
4
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TABLE 5.1 Description of Maturity Levels
Level I Level II Level III Level IV Level V
Poor Currently Current best Best practice Best practice plus
performance accepted practice practice (due plus community/ full community/
or regulatory diligence) stakeholder input stakeholder
compliance collaboration
Ad hoc practices; Meeting Level II plus Level III plus Level III plus
inconsistent minimum levels additional additional additional measures
with industry of industry measures based measures based on robust
practice or practice or on industry best reflecting dam community and
with regulatory regulatory practice or due- and levee safety stakeholder
compliance requirements diligence analysis professionals’ input, including
objectives and collaboration on
priorities but with both tools and
consideration of goals; decisions
community input reflect community
objectives and
priorities
Operationalizing community resilience requires a toolset of various analytical models
(e.g., the assessment of interdependencies, of regional economic, environmental, and so-
cietal impacts, or regional risk assessments), best practices, and guidelines for community
and multijurisdictional community resilience. Because it is not currently possible to measure
resilience directly, assessment of actions taken to enhance resilience is necessary. The first
steps in applying the Maturity Matrix for Assessing Community Engagement are to define
what is to be evaluated (e.g., safety program areas or community practices) and then to
define in the maturity matrix the existing conditions and tools already in use. The level of
detail of the matrix will need to be decided upon and will depend on expertise and other
resources available for the job. Depending on the level of detail desired, there may be many
rows outlining specific goals and activities.
Development of the existing-condition maturity matrix is useful for a number of rea-
sons. For example, compiling the matrix facilitates a complete assessment of a safety pro-
gram and all its safety, communication, and engagement processes. It compels dam and levee
owners to scrutinize current technical and resilience goals and processes, and it helps them
set and prioritize goals for increased safety, engagement, and resilience. The more detailed
the matrix, the more rigorous the scrutiny will be. Additionally, the matrix itself becomes
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a tool for communication among dam and levee professionals and the broader community.
The committee found even the development of the matrix concept useful in bridging com-
munication gaps among those with different expertise. In collaboratively evaluating and
deciding on processes to populate the matrix, dam and levee professionals and the broader
community can learn a common vocabulary.
Once the existing-condition matrix has been developed, it becomes a transparent mech-
anism for planning and evaluating processes intended to enhance technical decision making
and community resilience. Opportunities for improvement become immediately apparent.
Processes that are less mature can be visibly highlighted, and priorities for improvement
can be chosen, for example, on the basis of availability of funding. Regular assessment of
safety and resilience programs using the matrix can result in visual updates that reflect
changing conditions.
The matrix can assist decision makers in seeing which tools need to be added or aug-
mented to bring the safety program and community up to target levels of safety and resil-
ience. The maturity matrix and the procedures for designing and using it constitute assess-
ment of community and stakeholder engagement. Once introduced to the community,
this tool can be a powerful communication aid that allows all to understand why some tools
or processes are more desirable than others and how priorities are defined. Safety programs
and communities can create extremely detailed maturity matrices that can serve to inform all
manner of technical decisions, or decisions related to social aspects of enhancing resilience.
The Maturity Matrix for Assessing Community Engagement supports communication and
engagement by providing visual pictures of existing conditions and of planned improve-
ments while incorporating the technical detail needed for implementation and assessment.
The Federal Role in Assessing Community and Stakeholder Engagement
Creating a maturity matrix for assessing community engagement is a complex process
that will be, to a great extent, unique to each community, just as the maturity matrix itself
will be. Dam and levee safety programs and communities will need assistance in understand-
ing the maturity matrix and its application and will need incentives to make the effort. The
application needs to be at the community level to be effective. The committee provided a
generic outline of such a tool, but the federal government could conduct research and further
develop a framework for its application, and training for its use. It may also be beneficial to
facilitate a pilot application in a community to research and demonstrate its utility.
With better understanding of the maturity of safety programs and community resil-
ience, the agencies that support dam and levee safety programs could have the information
needed to enhance communication with programs and communities to, for example, build
knowledge and solicit community and stakeholder concerns. They may be able to assess
when to loan staff to assist with the preparation of community hazard mitigation plans and
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TABLE 5.2 Sample Entries for a Maturity Matrix for Assessing Community Engagement
Elements Level I Level II Level III
Dam or levee safety reviews No activity Standards-based Introduction of
only additional review
criteria (e.g., failure
mode analysis)
Other programs related to Each tool is defined at different levels to show progression
conventional dam/levee safety from minimum activity (Level I) through best industry practice
activities to full community member and stakeholder engagement and
collaboration (Level V)
Emergency action plans No activity EAPs developed EAPs developed with
internally by owner input from emergency
management agency
Specific tools related to Each tool is defined at different levels showing progression from
emergency planning response, minimum activity (Level I) through best industry practice to community
including development of member and full stakeholder engagement and collaboration (Level V)
community preparedness
measures, warning and
evacuation procedures, and
recovery plans
Floodplain management No floodplain Floodplain Floodplain management
management plans management plans plans accommodate
in place shadow floodplain
associated with
catastrophic dam or
levee failure
Specific tools such as those Each tool is defined at different levels showing progression
related to land-use planning from minimum activity (Level I) through best industry practice
and floodplain management, to community member and full stakeholder engagement and
including initiatives for financial collaboration (Level V)
incentives and zoning reform
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Level IV Level V Examples of Possible Outcomes
Application of quantitative risk Application of quantitative risk Community is fully apprised of
assessment by using criteria assessment by using criteria that current level of risk
developed by owner or regulator reflect the community’s societal
with input from community values
members and stakeholders
EAPs developed with input Community collaboration with Community collaboration
from community members and owners or operators to develop results in EAPs that minimize
stakeholders and emergency integrated EAPs that reflect consequences of defined
management agency and community values emergencies by incorporating
shared with selected community community values and the
representatives potential for community
resilience
Floodplain management plans Floodplain management plans Full participation by both
integrated into community fully integrated into dam and community and dam and
comprehensive or general plans levee owners’ planning processes levee owners in floodplain
management facilitates adoption
of complementary resilience-
enhancing measures
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post-disaster recovery plans, or when to acquire or assist in the acquisition of land subject
to deep flooding to prevent its development for urban uses. They may also be able to assist
in arranging with financial institutions for low-cost loans to fund flood-proofing of resi-
dences and businesses, and with training and certifying remodeling companies to increase
the supply of flood-proofing services.
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