Homeland Security: Public Restructuring and Private participation

1
Homeland Security Public Restructuring and
Private participation

• Drs. Simon Hakim and Erwin Blackstone
• Center for Competitive Government
• The Fox School of Business Management
• Temple University

2

• Topics Covered
• The problem and its significance
• Objectives of this presentation
• The nature of catastrophic events
• Alternative solutions
• Restructuring emergency services
• Private participation
• Insurance

3
The Problem

• In spite of the substantial increase in federal
  spending, only one quarter of state emergency
  operations plans and 10 percent of municipal
  plans are sufficient to cope with a natural
  disaster or terrorist attack (Flynn, 20075). The
  majority of plans cannot be categorized as fully
  adequate, feasible or acceptable to manage
  catastrophic events (U.S. DHS, June 2006).

4
Significance of Problem

• Additional funding required to cover potential
  emergency response needs are approximately 98.4
  billion over five years. This figure does not
  include overtime, training, and police force
  needs across the U.S. (Council of Foreign
  Relations, Rudman Report, 2003
• 31). All expect the federal government to carry
  this additional burden.

5
Objectives of presentation

• Examine whether resources within existing
  emergency services can be shifted to HLS with no
  loss in public good provision.
• Examine outsourcing of emergency services
• Examine incentives for greater private
  participation in HLS
• Regulating insurance to encourage private
  precautions

6
Nature of catastrophic Event

• Uncertainty of event. Timing, location, target,
  and nature are unknowable but consequences can be
  devastating. This implies difficulties in
  relying on preventive measures. Also, the
  uncertainty leads to excessive insurance
  premiums.
• Peak-time nature. When an event occurs, normally
  unavailable resources are necessary.
• Appropriate strategy requires on-going
  preparation and training and not just reaction
  when event occurs. Included are training of
  first responders, developing plans, procedures
  and protocols, conducting desktop exercises

7
Restructuring Public Emergency Services Police

• Police services that do not involve public good
  attributes include attending and investigating
  minor traffic accidents, escorting funerals and
  oversized vehicles, animal control, unlocking
  vehicles, recording citizen complaints, checking
  on peoples welfare, and traffic control during
  road construction.
• The largest single item on police budgets is
  response to burglar alarms of which 94-99 percent
  are false.

8
Restructuring Police Services

• Current local alarm ordinances prevent private
  response
• - 3-5 free false response a year
• - Escalating fines
• - Cease response after certain number of false
  activations a year
• - Educating repeat activators
• - Police treat activators as criminals while
  they are consumers

9
Restructuring Police Services

• Private services provided by public police
• When alarm owners accidently activate their
  system or when a system malfunctions then there
  are no social benefits from catching or deterring
  burglars when police respond.
• Inequitable since non-alarm owners or
  non-activators share the cost of response

10
Restructuring Emergency services Police

• Our calculations show that if police indeed
  eliminate the delivery of non-public goods then
  13 percent or 55,000 patrol officers could
  effectively be used for other services with no
  social loss. In dollar terms the total annual
  savings will be 2.8 billion (Blackstone, Buck,
  and Hakim, 2007).
• Solution Verified response. Private security
  responds and if it is real burglary, police
  respond at high priority.

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Restructuring Emergency services Police

• If police choose to respond to all activations
  then consumers must pay for actual response
  service rendered at long run average cost. No
  cross subsidization with other public services
  provided by police. No annual fees. Free entry
  of private response companies should be allowed.

12
Contracting Out Police Services

• Some police services could be produced under
  market conditions where many potential suppliers
  exist. This will most likely improve efficiency
  in their provision. Police could contract out
  such services as handling abandoned vehicles,
  providing criminal information databases,
  enforcing traffic and parking regulations,
  providing lost and found services, guarding
  prisoners,

13
Contracting out police Services

• protecting court rooms and public
  infrastructures, processing reports, and
  fulfilling office administrative duties.
  Basically, wherever civilian workers could
  replace expensive sworn officers, savings on the
  order of 30 percent will be realized.
  Contracting out will lead to an additional annual
  savings of 1.15 billion or the equivalent of
  23,000 officers (Hakim, Buck, and Blackstone,
  2007).

14
Restructuring Emergency services Fire

• Extinguishing fires is a public good since fires
  spread and cause harm and injury to others.
  However, responding to a false alarm is not a
  public good. If a resident overheats his stove
  causing a false alarm and a fire engine responds
  then others in the community gain no benefits
  while bearing a long run marginal cost between
  365 and 1,050. Fifty-eight percent of fire
  responses are to false calls.

15
Restructuring Emergency ServicesFire

• We estimated that if false alarms are eliminated
  between 18,600 and 48,900 fire-fighters or
  equivalently between 0.93 billion and 2.44
  billion could be saved or reallocated to other
  uses. Clearly, by pricing false alarms and
  enabling competitors to enter, cost of production
  will diminish, service level would remain the
  same, and social welfare will rise.

16
Restructuring Emergency ServicesFire

• Charging for false activations will reduce their
  number and the burden on public budgets. Also
  private companies or other response entities
  should be allowed to compete with the public fire
  department.

17
Annual Savings from Elimination and Contracting
out of Services
18
Private Participation Guards

• Peak time demand create HLS regional reserve
  units of pre-trained paid security guards. In
  2005 in the US, 2.1 M guards and only 700K public
  law enforcement officers.
• Pre-trained volunteer medical units In Boston
  unit is trained to establish clinic to provide
  mass inoculations. A church group in Beaverton
  OR stuffed a flood information and referral line.
  

19
Private participation

• In New York City more than 1,000 private security
  organizations are linked with the police to
  prevent, prepare for, and respond to homeland
  security incidents. They work together on
  building evacuation plans, security screening of
  vehicles entering facilities and adjacent
  parking, checking suspicious individuals and
  packages, and sharing terrorism alerts. In Las
  Vegas, private security forces guide police in
  casino related criminal events, and the police
  train private security in the usual criminal
  incidents .

20
Private Participation Executives

• Tap expertise of private executives to head
  regional HLS existing and reserve units at time
  of catastrophic event. During non-emergency
  times, these executives will plan and train. It
  could include existing or former public
  officials, retired military leaders, corporate
  executives. These reserve management positions
  offer appeal to talented people. For example,
  Mayor Bloomberg, NJ US Senator Lautenberg, NJ
  Governor Corzine. Heading HLS efforts eases
  entry to elected position.

21
Private Participation Capital

• A major event requires far more equipment than
  government normally maintains. This equipment
  includes fire engines, rescue vehicles, heavy
  construction type vehicles, medical equipment and
  other equipment that is event dependent and is
  difficult to anticipate. Since the private
  sector owns most of such equipment we need to
  develop a process by which such equipment could
  be transferred to the management of the event.
  The state legislature could grant the homeland
  security directors the power to requisition with
  appropriate compensation necessary personnel and
  equipment from the private sector.

22
Private Participation Legal Issues

• Numerous legal, administrative, and payment
  issues arise whenever private resources are
  shifted to the public sector to respond to
  natural or terrorist events. Responders have to
  be assured that they will enjoy protection
  against liability for their interjurisdictional
  activities performed with usual care and
  diligence. Normally, police officers have
  everywhere within a state the authority to
  enforce the state law. Prior agreements for
  private sector resources including personnel and
  equipment have to be arranged to include their
  authority, duties, protection against liability,
  and payments for damages or injuries incurred in
  the course of their public deployment.

23
Insurance as a Catalyst for Efficiency

• Problems
• Few incentives exist for owners of infrastructure
  to take sufficient HLS precautions.
• Uncertainty about the extent of the damage means
  that the federal government reinsures insurance
  companies only for large damages most properties
  are not insured for HLS.
• Suggestion
• The federal govt could require all commercial
  property above some amount to have terrorism
  insurance
• Anticipated Outcome
• Competition among insurance companies will
  establish reasonable premiums and the insureds
  will be offered discounts for undertaking
  adequate security precautions in buildings
  safety, guards, electronic warnings etc.

24
Conclusions

• HLS Services could be significantly improved by
  greater participation of the private sector
• Shedding non-public services
• Contracting Out security services that are
  amenable to competition
• Create regional HLS reserve units to handle peak
  time which might include private sector
  executives in leadership positions
• Developing market incentives through regulated
  insurance.

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References

• Blackstone, Erwin A., Andrew J. Buck, and Simon
  Hakim (2007). The Economic of Emergency
  Response, Policy Sciences, Vol. 40 (4)
  313-334).
• Council of Foreign Relations (2003). Emergency
  Responders Drastically Underfunded, Dangerously
  Unprepared. The Rudman Report, NY, NY.
• Clarke, Richard A. Rand Beers, et al. (2006).
  The Forgotten Homeland A Century Foundation Task
  Force Report, the Century Foundation, New York,
  NY. 
• Flynn, Stephen (2007). The Edge of Disaster
  Rebuilding a Resilient Nation. Random House, New
  York.
• Hakim, Simon, Andrew J. Buck, and Erwin A.
  Blackstone (2007). Funding the Local War on
  Terror, Milken Institute Review, Vol. 9 (1),
  First Quarter 46-56.
• Kunreuther, Howard and Erwann Michel-Kerjan
  (2004). Challenges for Terrorism Risk Insurance
  in the United States, Journal of Economic
  Perspectives, Vol. 18 (4), fall 201-214.