James Lee Witt's FEMA

In 1993, James Lee Witt was appointed director of FEMA by President Clinton, and he came into the agency knowing more about FEMA’s functions, limitations and possibilities than even the long-term employees of the agency. There was a lot of pressure on Witt to fix the emergency management system, because poor federal response to disasters in previous years had a lot of people and Congress calling for the abolishment of FEMA. But Witt transformed FEMA into an agency that had connections within the public sector, the media and the private sector, that gave authority and responsibility to its employees and that changed FEMA’s main focus from national preparedness to emergency management, all using the rational decision-making model. Overall, I

Witt innovated public policy within FEMA by making connections with the public sector, the media, and the private sector. In the previous years before Witt, the agency had been bypassed in times of natural disasters and the jobs of response and recovery was given to other governmental officials in other agencies. The media often highlighted the downfalls of FEMA, and many of their initial reports were often inaccurate and incomplete. Congress called FEMA the “federal turkey farm” (Roberts), because appointed officials were usually placed there when they did something wrong, and presidents did not give FEMA the authority to act in times of disaster. But President Clinton had faith in James Lee Witt when he appointed him as FEMA director, and elevated him to cabinet level status. One of the first things that Witt did was meet with members of Congress and ask that they wait at least a year before they abolished FEMA so that he might have a chance to turn the agency around. He spent a lot of his free time with Congress and cabinet members, doing special assignments from the White

He implemented an open door policy, making himself available for appointments with anyone on Tuesdays to talk about anything, either through phone appointments from regional offices, or in person appointments at headquarters. Witt strongly believed in his people, and he actively sought employee input. He also kept employees constantly informed, sending out weekly director’s reports about what was going on in the agency and how the agency was achieving its goals. Because of the way that Witt treated his employees, I think that his most usual style of decision making was behavioral decision making because he worked well with others, was very open to suggestions from his employees, and relied heavily on meetings for communication. He was also very concerned with their achievement, and gave everyone responsibilities and trusted them to do their jobs. By empowering his employees, his employees helped him better achieve the new goals of the