“Unless he or she is obviously incompetent, I will cede control to the person whose fire district it is” (Informant 60).
In Allegheny County, according to informants, formal authority to assume command of an emergency incident derives largely from the city, township or borough in which the event occurs. Thus it follows that when a group of officers is assembled to command a large multijurisdictional incident, the lead incident commander will be the senior official present from the host jurisdiction. Accordingly, an analysis of the semi-structured interviews shows that jurisdictional authority is most often the primary means by which a leader emerges. Informant
33 cites the typical example. “Once a unified command team is assembled, it’s assumed that the highest ranking officer from the township or borough where the incident is taking place will become the leader of the group.”
Difficulties with the jurisdictional approach arise when the senior leader lacks the experience to command a large scale event, or to coordinate the efforts of a team of incident commanders. Informant 33 has witnessed numerous instances where an inexperienced officer takes the lead not because of his or her expertise, but because “it’s my town, it’s my scene, and it’s my command.” Informant 7 relays a similar but more detailed description of this phenomenon:
I've seen many situations where the local individual is someone who does not have the depth and breadth of experience to handle the incident at hand. Yet he will still place his personal flag pole in the ground and leave it there in spite of all evidence to the contrary, just because it’s his jurisdiction. Then the whole command system becomes confused, without any trust or respect for that individual from the other team members. This leads to a dangerous situation where other commanders begin to freelance and take their teams in different directions.
6.1.1.1 Agency Expertise in Command of Major Events
“In our municipality, nine out of ten big incidents are fire related, so nine out of ten times the fire commander will take the lead” (Informant 33).
Another element of jurisdictional authority is the selection of which public safety discipline will assume the lead command role within a particular political sub-division. Analysis of the semi-structured interviews reveals a situation where the fire service agencies and their chief officers take the lead in the vast majority of events in Allegheny County. This practice results from the fire-related nature of most major emergencies, as well as from the fire service familiarity with the Incident Command System. Accordingly, fire service chief officers are those
most likely to rise to the first among equals position described by informants. Consider these thoughts from Informant 6:
The fire service has utilized the military styled Incident Command System since the late 1970s. Fire service leaders have become so indoctrinated with the capabilities, limitations and nuances of the Incident Command System, and so very skilled in its use, that other agencies will often times defer to them, even if it is only a marginally firefighting related incident.”
Informant 74, a Pennsylvania emergency services official, concludes that, with the exception of crowd control or minor epidemics, most police and EMS incidents are usually smaller in scope or less complex than fire related events. This leads to a situation where most agencies become subsumed within the fire service command structure. Informant 74 states that police and EMS responders “are simply minor players in a fire related scenario, and so they naturally fall under the coordination of the fire service commanders.”
Informants are in broad agreement that the county’s law enforcement agencies, in particular, have ignored the joint command concept, following instead, as Informant 55 states, a “lone ranger” approach to incident management. According to Informant 27, a Law Enforcement leader, the “old hands-off approach” has worked well in light of the “relatively small incidents police officers deal with, mostly on a one-on-one basis.” Yet with the modern concerns over mass shootings and potential incidences of terrorism, Informant 57, a regional political leader, states that police officials “are finally coming to the realization that any number of large, nightmare scenarios can happen anywhere.” He indicates that the law enforcement situation seems to be slowly changing, and lists as evidence the “active shooter” exercises and practical and tabletop style police training sessions that are “cropping up all over the county.” He cautions, however, that such training efforts represent “only a first step” by law enforcement agencies eager to learn how to lead and coordinate large regional events.
Emergency medical services agencies in many parts of the county are also beginning to close the command knowledge and abilities gap. Regional EMS providers and ambulance authorities have established command schools to hone the incident management skills of their leadership cadres. Informant 43 described a large regional command school for EMS agencies that is rapidly expanding into all areas of the county. He explains that these command schools provide an opportunity for EMS supervisors, who “were once taught to go with the flow at the command post,” to learn how to coordinate the considerable efforts of “triage, treatment, and transportation,” just as they would be required to do at a mass casualty event. The impetus for such training, in the words of Informant 58, has been “the realization that the potential exists for mass casualty incidents that have little or nothing to do with the fire service, and so we must learn to command them ourselves.”
6.1.1.2 Standard Operating Guidelines of the Lead Agency
Standard operating guidelines often refine and add weight to the jurisdictional issue by defining when it is appropriate for the fire, police, or EMS agency to take the lead role in incident management. Informant 59 explains that such guidelines are determined by consultation among political leaders, town managers, and principals from the various public service agencies. The senior officer on the scene from the lead agency is then expected to lead the efforts of the multidisciplinary command team.