skip to main content
US FlagAn official website of the United States government
dot gov icon
Official websites use .gov
A .gov website belongs to an official government organization in the United States.
https lock icon
Secure .gov websites use HTTPS
A lock ( lock ) or https:// means you've safely connected to the .gov website. Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites.

Explore Research Products in the PAR
It may take a few hours for recently added research products to appear in PAR search results.


  • NSF Public Access
  • Search Results
  • Understanding Multi-Sector Stakeholder Value Dynamics in Hurricane Michael to Facilitate Collaborative Decision Making in Disaster Contexts
Title: Understanding Multi-Sector Stakeholder Value Dynamics in Hurricane Michael to Facilitate Collaborative Decision Making in Disaster Contexts
Despite the broader acknowledgement of shared responsibilities in emergency management, one of the hidden and overlooked issues in disaster literature is the integration of multi-sector stakeholder values: the things that are of importance to the stakeholders (e.g., safety, profit, electability). Stakeholders (e.g., different levels of government, the private sector, the non-profit sector, and the communities) hold numerous values with varying degrees of importance, forming a system of value priorities. Stakeholder values and value priorities—referred to as value systems—are not static in a disaster context; they are dynamic, time-sensitive, and event-driven. A more in-depth understanding of the dynamics of stakeholder value systems is surely needed to allow policy-makers to introduce more pro-active and timely measures towards more resilient communities. To address this need, this paper focuses on identifying and understanding the stakeholder values in the context of Hurricane Michael. Semi-structured interviews (n=24 with 30 interviewees) were conducted to understand what public and private stakeholders value in different phases of Hurricane Michael. Based on the interview results, ten stakeholder values were identified: safety, resource efficiency, natural resource preservation, culture preservation, community growth, community adaptability, community cohesion, social welfare improvement, personal achievement, and business development. This study advances the knowledge in the area of disasters by empirically investigating public and private stakeholder values across different phases of the disaster. Such knowledge will help practitioners implement disaster resilience strategies in a way that accounts for diverse stakeholder needs and priorities, thus facilitating human-centered decision making towards building more resilient communities.  more » « less
Award ID(s):
1933345
PAR ID:
10311159
Author(s) / Creator(s):
; ;
Date Published:
Journal Name:
Construction Research Congress 2020
Format(s):
Medium: X
Sponsoring Org:
National Science Foundation
More Like this
  1. ; ; ; ; ; ; ; (, New Librarianship Symposia)
    Lankes, R.David (Ed.)
    Resilience is often treated as a single-dimension system attribute, or various dimensions of resilience are studied separately without considering multi-dimensionality. The increasing frequency of catastrophic natural or man-made disasters affecting rural areas demands holistic assessments of community vulnerability and assessment. Disproportionate effects of disasters on minorities, low-income, hard-to-reach, and vulnerable populations demand a community-oriented planning approach to address the “resilience divide.” Rural areas have many advantages, but low population density, coupled with dispersed infrastructures and community support networks, make these areas more affected by natural disasters. This paper will catalyze three key learnings from our current work in public librarians’ roles in disaster resiliency: 1) rural communities are composed of diverse sub-communities, each which experiences and responds to traumatic events differently, depending on micro-geographic and demographic drivers; 2) public libraries are central to rural life, providing a range of informational, educational, social, and personal services, especially in remote areas that lack reliable access to community resources during disasters; and 3) rural citizens tend to be very self-reliant and are committed to strengthening and sustaining community resiliency with local human capital and resources. Public libraries and their librarian leaders are often a “crown jewel” of rural areas’ community infrastructure and this paper will present a community-based design and assessment process for resiliency hubs located in and operated through rural public libraries. The core technical and social science research questions explored in the proposed paper are: 1) Who were the key beneficiaries and what did they need? 2) What was the process of designing a resiliency hub? 3) What did library resiliency hubs provide and how can they be sustained? This resiliency hub study will detail co-production of solutions and involves an inclusive collaboration among researchers, librarians, and community members to address the effects of cascading impacts of natural disasters. The novel co-design process detailed in the paper reflects 1) an in-depth understanding of the complex interactions among libraries, residents, governments, and other agencies by collecting sociotechnical hurricane-related data for Calhoun County, Florida, USA, a region devastated by Hurricane Michael (2018) and hard-hit by Covid-19; 2) analyzed data from newly-developed fusing algorithms and incorporating multiple communities; and 3) co-designed resiliency hubs sited in public libraries. This research leverages a unique opportunity for the co-development of integrated library-centered policies and technologies to establish a new paradigm for developing disaster resiliency in rural settings. Public libraries serve a diverse population who will directly benefit from practical support tailored to their needs. The project will inform efficient plans to ensure that high-need groups are not isolated in disasters. The knowledge and insight gained from disseminating the study’s results will not only improve our understanding of emergency response operations, but also will contribute to the development of new disaster-related policies and plans for public libraries, with a broader application to rural communities in many settings. 
    more » « less
  2. (, New Librarianship Symposium)
    Lankes, R. David (Ed.)
    Resilience is often treated as a single-dimension system attribute, or various dimensions of resilience are studied separately without considering multi-dimensionality. The increasing frequency of catastrophic natural or man-made disasters affecting rural areas demands holistic assessments of community vulnerability and assessment. Disproportionate effects of disasters on minorities, low-income, hard-to-reach, and vulnerable populations demand a community-oriented planning approach to address the “resilience divide.” Rural areas have many advantages, but low population density, coupled with dispersed infrastructures and community support networks, make these areas more affected by natural disasters. This paper will catalyze three key learnings from our current work in public librarians’ roles in disaster resiliency: rural communities are composed of diverse sub-communities, each which experiences and responds to traumatic events differently, depending on micro-geographic and demographic drivers. Rural citizens tend to be very self-reliant and are committed to strengthening and sustaining community resiliency with local human capital and resources. Public libraries are central to rural life, providing a range of informational, educational, social, and personal services, especially in remote areas that lack reliable access to community resources during disasters. Public libraries and their librarian leaders are often a “crown jewel” of rural areas’ community infrastructure and this paper will present a community-based design and assessment process for resiliency hubs located in and operated through rural public libraries. The core technical and social science research questions explored in the proposed paper are: 1) Who were the key beneficiaries and what did they need? 2) What was the process of designing a resiliency hub? 3) What did library resiliency hubs provide and how can they be sustained? This resiliency hub study will detail co-production of solutions and involves an inclusive collaboration among researchers, librarians, and community members to address the effects of cascading impacts of natural disasters. The novel co-design process detailed in the paper reflects an in-depth understanding of the complex interactions among libraries, residents, governments, and other agencies by collecting sociotechnical hurricane-related data for Calhoun County, Florida, USA, a region devastated by Hurricane Michael (2018) and hard-hit by Covid-19. We analyzed data from newly developed fusing algorithms and incorporating multiple communities and developed a framework and process to co-design resiliency hubs sited in public libraries. This research leverages a unique opportunity to library-centered policies and technologies to establish a new paradigm for developing disaster resiliency in rural settings. Public libraries serve a diverse population who will directly benefit from practical support tailored to their needs. The project will inform efficient plans to ensure that high-need groups are not isolated in disasters. The knowledge and insight gained from the resiliency hub design process will not only improve our understanding of emergency response operations, but also will contribute to the development of new disaster related policies and plans for public libraries, with a broader application to rural communities in many settings. 
    more » « less
  3. ; ; ; (, Environment and Planning B: Urban Analytics and City Science)
    The objective of this study is to examine spatial patterns of disaster impacts and recovery of communities based on fluctuations in credit card transactions (CCTs). Such fluctuations could capture the collective effects of household impacts, disrupted accesses, and business closures and thus provide an integrative measure for examining disaster impacts and community recovery. Existing studies depend mainly on survey and sociodemographic data for disaster impacts and recovery effort evaluations, although such data has limitations, including large data collection efforts and delayed timeliness results. Also, there are very few studies have concentrated on spatial patterns of disaster impacts and short-term recovery of communities, although such investigation can enhance situational awareness during disasters and support the identification of disparate spatial patterns of disaster impacts and recovery in the impacted regions. This study examines CCTs data Harris County (Texas, USA) during Hurricane Harvey in 2017 to explore spatial patterns of disaster impacts and recovery duration from the perspective of community residents and businesses at ZIP-code and county scales, respectively, and to further investigate their spatial disparities across ZIP codes. The results indicate that individuals in ZIP codes with populations of higher income experienced more severe disaster impact and recovered more quickly than those located in lower income ZIP codes for most business sectors. Our findings not only enhance the understanding of spatial patterns and disparities in disaster impacts and recovery for better community resilience assessment but also could benefit emergency managers, city planners, and public officials in enhanced situational awareness and resource allocation. 
    more » « less
  4. ; ; (, Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction)
    This design fiction re-imagines an important informational element of the flood early warning system in order to unpack some of the questionable assumptions that society makes about disaster. In presenting an updated, ironic, vision of an alternative system, we highlight some of the ways that received ideas about the root causes of disaster, who is responsible for public safety, and the role of private sector innovation, are so embedded in the design of technologies used in crisis management that they have become taken for granted. This work demonstrates the potential for design fiction to serve as a tool in the evaluation and critique of safety-critical information systems and as a communication tool for conveying the complex findings of disaster research. It also points to new avenues of exploration for crisis informatics work on public warning systems. 
    more » « less
  5. ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; et al (, Journal of Marine Science and Engineering)
    Low elevation coastal zones (LECZ) are extensive throughout the southeastern United States. LECZ communities are threatened by inundation from sea level rise, storm surge, wetland degradation, land subsidence, and hydrological flooding. Communication among scientists, stakeholders, policy makers and minority and poor residents must improve. We must predict processes spanning the ecological, physical, social, and health sciences. Communities need to address linkages of (1) human and socioeconomic vulnerabilities; (2) public health and safety; (3) economic concerns; (4) land loss; (5) wetland threats; and (6) coastal inundation. Essential capabilities must include a network to assemble and distribute data and model code to assess risk and its causes, support adaptive management, and improve the resiliency of communities. Better communication of information and understanding among residents and officials is essential. Here we review recent background literature on these matters and offer recommendations for integrating natural and social sciences. We advocate for a cyber-network of scientists, modelers, engineers, educators, and stakeholders from academia, federal state and local agencies, non-governmental organizations, residents, and the private sector. Our vision is to enhance future resilience of LECZ communities by offering approaches to mitigate hazards to human health, safety and welfare and reduce impacts to coastal residents and industries. 
    more » « less
  • Citation Formats
  • MLA
  • APA
  • Chicago
  • BibTeX
  • Save / Share this Record
  • Send to Email