Exercises

The State of Kansas Exercise Program promotes the importance of establishing and maintaining progressive, self-sustaining exercise programs across the state to help ensure jurisdictions have plans, policies, and procedures that have been tested and validated to reflect the capabilities of the whole community.

The KDEM Exercise Program follows the principles set forth in the Homeland Security Exercise and Evaluation Program (HSEEP), which provides guiding principles for exercise programs and a common approach to conducting exercises. To learn more about HSEEP:

• HSEEP Doctrine

Core Capabilities

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) published the Core Capabilities as part of its National Preparedness Goal and Presidential Policy Directive 8: National Preparedness (PPD-8) in September 2011. The Core Capabilities allows jurisdictions to assess our capacities and gaps in the five mission areas of prevention, protection, mitigation, response, and recovery. The capabilities form the foundation for the organization of objectives and evaluations for exercises.

For more information about the Core Capabilities:

• National Preparedness Goal (PDF)

Exercise Reporting

County emergency management programs funded with the Emergency Management Performance Grant (EMPG) are required to report their exercise activity through the Kansas Exercise Tracking System (KETS). The purpose of KETS is to provide a single-point location for reporting and managing requirements of EMPG in the State of Kansas. This online tool will allow you to enter data for your programmatic and individual exercise credits, as well as upload documents such as After Action Reports, Improvement Plans, sign-in sheets, and other supporting exercise materials

Counties that would like to request substituting a real incident for EMPG exercise credit may submit an application to KDEM. Follow the directions in the application to complete and submit the application for consideration.

Kansas Exercise Templates

The Homeland Security Exercise and Evaluation Program (HSEEP) provides a set of guiding principles for exercise programs, as well as a common approach to planning and conducting individual exercises. This methodology applies to exercises in support of all national preparedness mission areas and ensures a consistent and interoperable approach to exercise design and development, conduct, evaluation, and improvement planning. (See HSEEP Doctrine link above.)

In addition to the tools and resources available on the HSEEP website, KDEM has prepared the following templates to assist partner agencies with exercise program management.