Summary of a Workshop on Using Information Technology to Enhance Disaster Management (2005)

Ramesh R. Rao, Chair, is currently a professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, and director of the San Diego Division of the California Institute of Telecommunications and Information Technology, at the University of California, San Diego. His research interests include architectures, protocols, and performance analysis of wireless, wire line, and photonic networks for integrated multimedia services. Prior to his appointment as the Director of the San Diego Division of the California Institute of Telecommunications and Information Technology (Cal-(IT)²), he served as director of the UCSD Center for Wireless Communications (CWC) and was the vice chair of Instructional Affairs in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. Rao did his undergraduate work at the Regional Engineering College of the University of Madras in Tiruchirapalli, obtaining a B.E. (honors) degree in electronics and communications in 1980. He did his graduate work at the University of Maryland, College Park, Maryland, receiving his M.S. in 1982 and his Ph.D. in 1984.

Yigal Arens is director of the Intelligent Systems Division of the University of Southern California’s Information Science Institute in California. He is also co-director of DGRC, the USC/Columbia University Digital Government Research Center, and a research professor at USC’s Daniel J. Epstein Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering. His primary research interests have been digital government, information integration, planning in the domain of information servers, knowledge representation, and human-machine communication. In 1983, he joined the faculty of the Computer Science Department at the University of Southern California. He joined USC’s Information Sciences Institute (USC/ISI) in 1987, where he first worked on the Integrated Interfaces project, a multimedia presentation design system combining text, tables, maps, and other graphics. For almost 10 years he headed the Single Interface to Multiple Sources (SIMS) research group specializing in integration of heterogeneous databases and other information sources. Arens has been director of the Intelligent Systems Division, one of the largest artificial intelligence research laboratories in the United States, since 1999. Also, since 1999, he has been co-director of the DGRC. In 1999, together with two colleagues from ISI, Arens founded Fetch Technologies, a company that specializes in extracting data from Web sites. In 2002, he joined the Daniel J. Epstein Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering as research professor. In 2003, Arens founded USC’s Center for Research on Unexpected Events

(CRUE), which he headed for its first year. Dr. Arens also was a part of the National Research Council’s Committee on Information Technology and the States: Public Policy and Public Interests. Arens received his Ph.D. from the University of California at Berkeley.

Art Botterell is an internationally recognized expert in emergency communications who has served on the front lines of some of the biggest national disasters in recent U.S. history. Former FEMA director James Lee Witt hailed him as a “national asset.” He has served as a consultant to the Department of Homeland Security and a number of other state, federal, and international organizations. He led the development of the Common Alerting Protocol (CAP)—the first international standard format for all-hazard public warning across multiple media. An experienced analyst, broadcast and multimedia producer, writer, and manager, Mr. Botterell studies the ways communities use information technology to manage the effects of sudden change.

Timothy X Brown is an associate professor at the University of Colorado, Boulder. He received his B.S. in physics from Pennsylvania State University and his Ph.D. in electrical engineering from California Institute of Technology in 1990, when he also joined the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. In 1992 he joined Bell Communications Research. Since 1995 he has held a joint appointment with the Electrical Engineering and Interdisciplinary Telecommunications Departments at the University of Colorado, Boulder. His research interests include adaptive network control, machine learning, and wireless communications systems. His laboratory has developed extensive experience in the design, implementation, and testing of wireless networking protocols. He has published over 50 papers in networking and wireless systems. He is a recipient of the NSF CAREER Award and was selected as the GWEC Wireless Educator of the year.

John R. Harrald is the director of the George Washington University (GWU) Institute for Crisis, Disaster, and Risk Management and a professor of engineering management in the GWU School of Engineering and Applied Science. He is a founding member, director, and immediate past president of the International Emergency Management Society (TIEMS). Dr. Harrald has been actively engaged in the fields of emergency, consequence, and crisis management and maritime safety and port security. He was the former director of the Disaster Recovery Institute (DRI) and served as the associate director of the National Ports and Waterways Institute for 10 years. Dr. Harrald was the principal investigator for maritime risk and crisis management studies in Prince William Sound, Alaska, the Port of New Orleans, and Washington State and for earthquake vulnerability studies funded by the National Science Foundation and the American Red Cross. He has studied the response to the Exxon Valdez oil spill, the Loma Prieta earthquake, Hurricane Hugo, Hurricane Andrew, the Northridge earthquake, the 1999 Turkey earthquakes, and the September 11 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. He has also written and published in the fields of crisis management, emergency management, management science, risk and vulnerability analysis, and maritime safety. He was a reviewer for the committee that produced the report Information Technology Research, Innovation, and E-Government. Harrald received his B.S. in engineering from the U.S. Coast Guard Academy, an M.A.L.S. from Wesleyan University, an M.S. from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he was an Alfred P. Sloan Fellow, and an M.B.A. and a Ph.D. from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.

Richard Howard is a researcher at Wireless Information Network Laboratory (WINLAB) at Rutgers University. He is also a principal at Research Innovations, LLC, and he is the founder and Sr. V.P. of Technology at PnP Networks, a start-up company focused on applying artificial intelligence techniques to the problem of making computers and computer networks truly simple for people to use. Howard was formally the wireless research vice president at Lucent Bell Laboratories, where he did research on wireless technology from materials, components,

packaging, antennas, modeling, analysis, communication theory, and integrated circuit design to systems-level projects like fixed wireless loop and advanced cellular base stations. His work has emphasized multiple antennas, signal processing, and system performance from basic communication theory to field deployment. Howard’s key achievements include new theory (and practical demonstrations) for dramatically increasing wireless system capacities based on multiple antennas. Other achievements have included algorithms and tool suites for optimization of cellular networks and application of advanced signal processing to linear power amplifiers for dramatic cost/size reduction and efficiency improvements. Howard received his Ph.D. in physics at Stanford University in 1977.

Nancy Jesuale has worked in local and state government since 1976 as a telecommunications strategic planner, and as director of public safety networks, telecommunications networking and network operations. Ms. Jesuale is the president of NetCity Engineering, Inc., a consulting practice dedicated to strategic planning and solution sets for government in public safety and fiber optic telecommunications systems. Current clients of NCE include the City of Los Angeles, the District of Columbia, the State of Oregon, the City of Charlotte, NC, and the Center for Wireless Network Security. As program manager for Public Safety for WiNSeC at Stevens Institute of Technology, Ms. Jesuale is responsible for establishing relationships, research programs, and public policy support. Ms. Jesuale has been an innovator in telecommunications strategies for local government since 1984. She is an appointee to the National Task Force on Interoperability and the Oregon State Interoperability Executive Committee. She is a past chair of the Public Technology Inc. Task Force on Information Technology and Telecommunications. She has been the director of strategic planning for telecommunications for the City of Los Angeles and has served on the Oregon Statewide Interoperability Executive Council.

David Kehrlein, now with Environmental Science Research Institute (ESRI), was the geographical information systems (GIS) manager for the California Governor’s Office of Emergency Services (OES) for over 9 years. Before that he worked in the Forest and Rangeland Resource Assessment Program (FRRAP) of the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection. Kehrlein was active on the Governor’s GIS task force in 1992. He is a past director of the California Geographic Information Association (CGIA), and he is the chairman of the data standards committee. He was also chair of the Firefighting Resources of California Organized for Potential Emergencies (FIRESCOPE) GIS Specialist Group. He has organized response and recovery GIS support for 16 presidentially declared disasters from incident-level response to decision support at the state and federal levels. His group at OES also deployed a response/training GIS trailer that is equipped with large format plotting and scanning capabilities, a statewide GIS data repository, as well as satellite cell phone and a high-speed satellite Internet downlinking capability. Kehrlein received his B.A., graduating with honors in geography, from California State University, Sacramento.

William Maheu is chief of operations of the San Diego, California Police Department. A member of the police department for 23 years, Maheu is currently in charge of Child Abuse, Domestic Violence, Sex Crimes, Vice Operations, Mid City Division, Southeastern Division, Southern Division, Records, Property and various other programs. During his tenure with the department, he has had many assignments, including commanding officer of field operations/special resources, executive lieutenant of the Special Weapons and Tactics Team, special projects/long-range planning lieutenant, and narcotics sergeant. He has also been involved in several major projects, including the 2003 Super Bowl, the Republican National Convention, the Presidential Debate, development of the Psychiatric Emergency Response Team, and the development of the Homeless Outreach Team. Maheu graduated from the University of San Diego in 1983 with a B.A. in psychology.

Robin R. Murphy is a professor in the Computer Science and Engineering Department at the University of South Florida with a joint appointment in Cognitive and Neural Sciences in the Department of Psychology. She is an associate editor for IEEE Intelligent Systems and a member of the 1998-1999 Defense Science Study Group and is currently a member of the U.S. Air Force Scientific Advisory Board and the DARPA ISAT. She recently served on DoD Air Platforms FY2004 Technology Area Review. In addition, she is also a member of the board of directors for Continental Divide Robotics, which provides GPS and intelligent agent software for tracking parolees. From 1992 to 1998, she was an assistant professor in the Department of Mathematical and Computer Sciences at the Colorado School of Mines. Murphy joined USF in 1998, and in January 2002 she became director of the Center for Robot-Assisted Search and Rescue (CRASAR). In March 2003, she helped start the industry/university cooperative research center on Safety Security Rescue (SSR-RC) with the University of Minnesota and is the overall director. She leads the CRASAR rescue robot response team, the only such team in the world, and is a technical search specialist with Florida Task Force 3. Since 1995, she has focused on Urban Search and Rescue (USAR) as the test domain for her research, leading to her participation in the first known use of robots for urban search and rescue at the WTC disaster. Her USAR robotics work has earned a NIUSR Eagle award, and she serves on the executive board of the National Institute for Urban Search and Rescue. She has also won a USF Outstanding Faculty Research Achievement Award (2003), and the Honor Society of Phi Kappa Phi, USF Chapter Artist and Scholar of the Year Award (2004). Prior to graduate work, Murphy worked in the process control industry as a software project engineer. Murphy has also served as a member of the Army Unmanned Ground Vehicle Technology Committee at the National Academies. Murphy received a B.M.E. in mechanical engineering, and an M.S. and a Ph.D. in computer science (minor: computer integrated manufacturing systems) in 1980, 1989, and 1992, respectively, from Georgia Tech, where she was a Rockwell International Doctoral Fellow.

Robert Neches is director of Information Sciences Institute’s Distributed Scalable Systems Division and a research faculty member of the University of Southern California Computer Science Department. He received his Ph.D. from Carnegie Mellon University in 1981 for work in machine learning, spent a year at the University of Pittsburgh’s Learning Research and Development Center, and has been at USC ISI since 1982 (with the exception of service at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency from 1994-1997). His personal interests span control and coordination in distributed systems; collaboration and visualization aids for information management; and “system of systems” frameworks for information integration. The Distributed Scalable Systems Division looks at the full range of issues bearing on organizations gathering information, assessing it, making decisions, de-conflicting, and effecting resulting actions. Research within the division addresses distributed software systems engineering, information management, intelligent human-computer interaction, computer-supported cooperative work, resource management, and decision support. Applications within the division include all levels of command-and-control, crisis management, intelligence analysis, logistics, design and manufacturing, and space applications.

Masanobu Shinozuka is a distinguished professor and chair of the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at University of California, Irvine, and Norman Sollenberger Professor Emeritus of Civil Engineering at Princeton University. He is a member of the National Academy of Engineering (NAE). His research activities involve random vibration, reliability of structural systems, structural dynamics, structural control, continuum mechanics, and infrastructure systems, including lifeline networks. In particular, his pioneering and original research on digital simulation of stochastic waves is noteworthy. He has more than 500 publications in refereed journals and proceedings of national and international conferences in mechanics, structural engineering, and natural/man-made disaster mitigation. His contributions to

these areas have been recognized with a number of prestigious awards, such as Newmark, Freudenthal, and Von Karman Medals from the American Society of Civil Engineers, of which he is an honorary member. Shinozuka’s recent research deals with the detection of damage and its locations within a network of utility and highway transportation systems subject to natural and man-made disturbances. In this regard, his most recent effort, under the sponsorship of the National Science Foundation, focuses on the development of energy-efficient and self-powered sensor networks and wireless data transmission systems that can be applied to real-time diagnosis of these systems after serious security breaches. He has a long history of working relationships with engineers and managers at Caltrans (California Department of Transportation), LADWP (Los Angeles Department of Water and Power), and MLGW (Memphis Light, Gas and Water), and more recently with SCE (Southern California Edison) to estimate the seismic performance of their systems. He also served as president and executive vice president of the International Association of Structural Safety and Reliability (IASSAR). Shinozuka received his Ph.D. from Columbia University from the Department of Civil Engineering and Engineering Mechanics in 1960 and an M.S. in civil engineering (1955) and a B.S. (1953) from Kyoto University.

Ellis Stanley is the general manager for the Emergency Preparedness Department of the City of Los Angeles. Currently he serves as an advisor to the Multidisciplinary Center for Earthquake Engineering Research (MCEER) and is a member of the center’s Industry Advisory Board, and he chairs the Metro Emergency Manager’s Forum of the International Association of Emergency Managers. He is vice-president for the public sector of the Business and Industry Council on Emergency Preparedness and Planning (BICEPP) and is on the Emergency Services Committee of the American Red Cross Los Angeles chapter. The city council has also appointed him to the Emergency Preparedness Commission for the county and city of Los Angeles, and he is a member of the city’s Emergency Operations Board. Ellis was recently appointed to the board of directors of the National Institute of Urban Search and Rescue (NIUSR). He was the director of the Atlanta-Fulton County Emergency Management Agency and has been the director of an emergency management program for the city of Durham, Durham County, North Carolina and Brunswick County, North Carolina. In addition, he also served as a county fire marshal, fire and rescue commissioner, county safety officer; as president of the International Association of Emergency Managers (IAEM), the American Society of Professional Emergency Planners (ASPEP), the National Defense Transportation Association (NDTA), and the Metropolitan Atlanta chapter of the National Forum for Black Public Administrators (NFBPA); and as vice chair of the Association of Contingency Planners (ACP). He also chaired the Certified Emergency Managers Certification Commission. Stanley is a 1973 graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill with a degree in political science.

Peter Steenkiste is a professor of computer science and of electrical and computer engineering at Carnegie Mellon University. His research interests are in the areas of networking and distributed computing. After joining CMU, he worked on a number of high-performance computing and networking projects, including Nectar, the first workstation clusters built around a high-performance, switch-based local area network. He has also done research in the areas of network quality of service, large-scale self-configuring network services, and network measurements. Steenkiste’s current research is in the areas of pervasive computing and wireless networking. For example, he is working on technologies that will support the widespread deployment of context-aware services for mobile users. In the wireless area, he is developing protocols and algorithms for a “self-managing” wireless network and he is also looking at better techniques and methods for evaluating and testing wireless networks. Steenkiste received the degree of electrical engineer from the University of Gent in Belgium in 1982, and the M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in electrical engineering from Stanford University in 1983 and 1987, respectively.

Gio Wiederhold is an emeritus professor of computer science at Stanford University, with courtesy appointments in medicine and in electrical engineering. His current research includes privacy protection in collaborative settings, large-scale software composition, access to simulations to augment decision-making capabilities for information systems, and developing algebra over ontologies. Prior to his academic career he spent 16 years in the software industry. His career followed computer technologies, starting with numerical analysis applied to rocket fuel, FORTRAN and PL/1 compilers, real-time data acquisition, and a time-oriented database system; eventually he became a corporate software architect. He has been elected a fellow of the ACMI, the IEEE, and the ACM. He spent 1991-1994 as the program manager for knowledge-based systems at DARPA in Washington, D.C. He has been an editor and editor-in-chief of several IEEE and ACM publications. Wiederhold served as a reviewer for several CSTB reports, including Information Technology Research, Innovation, and E-Government; Youth, Pornography, and the Internet; Technical, Business, and Legal Dimensions of Protecting Children from Pornography on the Internet: Proceedings of a Workshop; Non-technical Strategies to Reduce Children’s Exposure to Inappropriate Material on the Internet: Summary of a Workshop; Review of the FBI’s Trilogy Information Technology Modernization Program; and a letter report to the FBI. Wiederhold received a degree in aeronautical engineering in Holland in 1957 and a Ph.D. in medical information science from the University of California at San Francisco in 1976.

Jon Eisenberg is a senior program officer with the Computer Science and Telecommunications Board of the National Academies. At CSTB, he has been study director for a diverse body of work, including a series of studies exploring Internet and broadband policy and networking and communications technologies. Current studies include an examination of emerging wireless technologies and spectrum policy and a study of how to use information technologies to enhance disaster management. In 1995-1997 he was an AAAS Science, Engineering, and Diplomacy Fellow at the U.S. Agency for International Development, where he worked on environmental management, technology transfer, and information and telecommunications policy issues. He received his Ph.D. in physics from the University of Washington in 1996 and a B.S. in physics with honors from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst in 1988.

Ted Schmitt is a consultant for the Computer Science and Telecommunications Board of the National Academies. He is currently involved in the CSTB projects providing a comprehensive exploration of cybersecurity and the use of IT to enhance disaster management. Before working at CSTB, Ted was involved in the development of the digital publishing industry and has taken an active role in various standards groups related to digital rights management. Prior to that, he served as technical director at a number of small technology companies in Germany, Sweden, and the United States. He started his career in 1984 as a software engineer for IBM, earning two patents. Ted is currently working on his M.A. in international science and technology policy at George Washington University. His graduate work is supported by a fellowship from the Diplomat and Consular Officers – Retired. He received a B.S. in electrical engineering in 1984 and a B.A. in German in 1997 from Purdue University and studied at the Universität Hamburg, Germany.

Jennifer M. Bishop is a program associate for the Computer Science and Telecommunications Board of the National Academies. She is currently involved in several studies, including Telecommunications Research and Development, Information Technology for Enhancing Disaster Management, and an inquiry into the information needs of citizens during a disaster. She

also maintains CSTB’s contact database, handles updates to the CSTB Web site, coordinates the layout and design of Update, the CSTB newsletter, and designs book covers and promotional materials. Prior to her move to Washington, Bishop worked for the City of Ithaca, New York, coordinating the Police Department’s transition to a new SQL-based time accrual and scheduling application. Her other work experience includes maintaining the police records database for the City of Ithaca, designing customized hospitality industry performance reports for a research firm, and freelance publication design. She is a visual artist working in oil and mixed media. She holds a B.F.A from Cornell University.

Gloria Westbrook joined the Academies with 7 years of administrative experience. She previously served as the executive assistant to the directors of the Office of Youth Programs and the Youth Opportunity Grant Program at the D.C. Department of Employment Services (DOES). While serving in the Director’s Office Gloria received the Meritorious Service Award and the Workforce Development Administrator’s Award of Appreciation for Dedicated Service. She also became a member of the National Association of Executive Secretaries and Administrative Assistants. Gloria is currently a senior program assistant for the CSTB project titled “Sufficient Evidence? Building Certifiably Dependable Systems.” She attended Duke Ellington School of the Performing Arts for ballet and went on to further her dance education at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.