NIMS Overview
The National Incident Management System, established March 1, 2004, outlines standard incident management processes, protocols and procedures so that all local, state, federal and private sector emergency responders can coordinate their responses and share a common focus. All local governments and state agencies must comply with NIMS to be eligible for federal preparedness assistance. Pennsylvania adopted NIMS on December 20, 2004.
Authorities and References
Federal
Compliance and Training
A core principle of NIMS is training. Training is outlined in the NIMS Training Plan (9/2011) and must be reported for tracking compliance with NIMS annually.
Consortium Schools (EMI, CDP, CTOS, NCBRT, NDPC, EMRTC, RDPC, TEEX) Application Process:
•All individual applications should be forwarded to the PEMA Area Office for your county or task force region.
•All TEMD requests should be forwarded to PEMA – Bureau of Strategic Planning. Application lead times and acceptance criteria are determined by each individual school. PEMA maintains an ongoing correspondence with each of the schools, and will receive notification from a school if the application criteria are going to change. PEMA shall be responsible for forwarding this information to the Responder community in a timely manner. Course information for all DHS/FEMA approved courses is available on:
https://www.firstrespondertraining.gov/content.do under the respective category.
Timelines & Deadlines
Individual forms, approved federal courses: CDP/Anniston, New Mexico Tech, CTOS, ACBIRC, TEEX, LSU, TTCI, and NDPTC. Application lead times and acceptance criteria are determined by each individual school.
Your request may be declined by the school due to full enrollment or insufficient processing time if your application is not submitted more than 42 days prior to the course start date. Neither PEMA nor the PEMA Area Office will decline to process an application. It may take up to 90 days for approvals.
Individual forms, non-approved federal courses: courses with AWR, PER, MGT prefixes or any course not listed in the DHS State Sponsored or Federally Sponsored Catalogs. Application lead times and acceptance criteria are determined by each individual school.
Your request may be declined by the school due to full enrollment or insufficient processing time if your application is not submitted more than 42 days prior to the course start date. Neither PEMA nor the PEMA Area Office will decline to process an application. It may take up to 120 days for approvals.
Emergency Management Institute (EMI) forms: PEMA will verify the course and student eligibility. Your request will be declined by the school due to full enrollment or insufficient processing time if your application is not submitted more than six (6) weeks prior to the course start date. Neither PEMA nor the PEMA Area Office will decline to process an application. It may take up to 90 days for approvals. Due to declining funding levels, less offerings of courses will be available in 2015 and out-years. The earlier an application is submitted, the better chance of being admitted into the course.”
TEMD – Federal Sponsored and State Sponsored Courses: courses can be found in Federal or State Catalogs. Your request may be declined due to insufficient processing time. Please allow up to 90 days for approval.
TEMD – NON-DHS Approved Course: Any course not listed in the DHS State Sponsored or Federally Sponsored Catalogs. Your request may be declined due to insufficient processing time. Please allow up to 90 days for approval.
Mobile Training Team (MTT) forms: Additional time is needed by PEMA to verify non-approved course content, suitability, and eligibility for use of grant funds. The lead time is typically 180 days to process this request.
Resource Typing Resource typing is another key principle of NIMS. NIMS requires that states and local jurisdictions type resources – especially those purchased with HSGP and other federal preparedness funding – to either Tier 1 National or Tier 2 State/Local resource typing definitions. The initial round of Tier 2 State/Local Resource Typing Definitions have been completed and are listed by discipline below. More will be released as they are completed. Any questions, comments, or suggestions for inclusion of other resources should be directed to the Commonwealth NIMS Coordinator at
RA-EMNIMS@pa.gov
Animal and Feed Emergency Response Tier 2 Resource Definitions
National Integration Center
NIMS Point of Contact:
Kirsten Cohick – NIMS Coordinator, Bureau of Planning, Training, and Exercises
717-346-4448
kcohick@pa.gov NTED/TEMD Point of Contact:
John Breive – Emergency Management Specialist, Bureau of Planning, Training, and Exercises
717-651-2163
jbreive@pa.gov