Americans tasked with disaster preparedness

Retired Lt. Gen. Russel L. Honoré is perhaps best known for serving as commander of Joint Task Force Katrina responsible for coordinating military relief efforts for Hurricane Katrina-affected areas across the Gulf Coast.  At the time General Honoré was designated commander, Mayor Ray Nagin said, "Now, I will tell you this -- and I give the president some credit on this -- he sent one John Wayne dude down here that can get some stuff done, and his name is Gen. Honoré. And he came off the doggone chopper, and he started cussing and people started moving. And he's getting some stuff done."

General Honoré, retired from the military after 37 years, is now laser-focused on disaster preparedness for all Americans.  He is making media appearances, putting together projects and forming alliances with the intent that all of us can be better prepared as individuals, as families and as communities.

He has a good overview article on CNN.com, along with a link to a video appearance on CNN.  A short excerpt:

To create this culture of preparedness, we need to focus "left of the disaster," which means we focus on preparations and responses before the disaster. How, or if, each of us survives a disaster is directly related to where we were before it hit.

To create this culture of preparedness, we must change the way that academia, private industry, community groups and individual households think about preparedness in their daily lives. Disaster readiness is the responsibility of every part of our society and every individual.

In our free-market society, the private sector has far more response capability than our government. Governments need to work with private industries and make them part of the plan so we can quickly tap into all of our nation's best resources when we need them most.