The Department Of Homeland Security - 1338 Words

After the attacks on September 11th, 2001 the United States was forced to reassess its policies over the defense of the country within its borders. Until that time the United States’ homeland security was under the jurisdiction of the Department of Justice (Masse, O’Neil, Rollins, 2007). After the attack the Executive branch of the government created a new organization that would be responsible for deciding where the biggest threats to the country were. This was the birth of the Department of Homeland Security. The Department of Homeland Security is responsible for assessing all risk to the Nation within its borders and developing way to mitigate these threats before a disaster can take place. One of the documents that the Department of†¦show more content†¦Security councils are designed so that a group of people that usually include city, county, or state offices can gather information and decide what and where the biggest threats to the jurisdictional area a re. Some of the departments that would most likely be included in a council would be emergency services, the finance department for the area, and local leadership. These councils may also elect to work with private sector companies if the security review incorporates cyber security. I the case of the State of Oklahoma, two documents have been formed to attempt to identify hazards for their communities. The first is the Standard Hazard Mitigation Plan. This committee consists of members from the Oklahoma Department of Emergency Management, Oklahoma Climatological Survey, Conservation Commission, Department of Commerce, Department of Health, and many others (State of Oklahoma, 2014). This group of people developed this document that outlines every major environmental threat to the State. They even went as far as to set a level of prioritization that has a scale from 1 to 4. They rated the natural hazards in order to triage which events were most likely to happen and which ones would c ause the biggest impact to the state. A lot of emphasis is placed on