| Much of the Canadian scholarly literature concerning municipal government policy-making focuses on economic development issues, which tend to generate visible and conflictual politics among citizens and politicians. Less research has been devoted to municipal choices regarding the provision of basic services to people and property, as these issues generally do not attract as much public or political interest. Policy choices in this allocational arena are relatively routine, but they should be of interest to political scientists, as they significantly affect who gets what, when and how.;High-quality municipal emergency management policies are found to be the product of interaction among several variables. Emergencies ("focusing events") prompt citizens to question their community's emergency planning, and this attracts the interest of politicians. This heightened attention creates a window of opportunity for a public entrepreneur---generally the city manager, or the local emergency planner---to secure political support for further policy development. Elected officials show support by allocating resources, and by conferring policy-making autonomy on an administrator who demonstrates expertise in emergency management. This individual is then well-positioned to design policies based on his or her sense of the community's needs. Policy quality is not significantly affected, however, by pressure from provincial officials, relative disaster risk (objective need for emergency planning), or fiscal capacity.;Keywords: public policy, public administration, local government, municipal government, emergency management, emergency planning, Brantford, London, Ontario, St. Thomas. Sarnia, Stratford, Windsor.;This study examines the routine policy field of emergency management, which involves efforts to prepare for emergencies, mitigate their impacts, ensure an effective response, and facilitate recovery. What influences municipal policy choices about emergency management? What explains variation in the quality of municipal policies in this field? To answer these questions, the study constructs an explanatory framework grounded in existing scholarship, draws on this framework to develop testable propositions, and tests these propositions through case studies of six Ontario municipalities: St. Thomas, Stratford, Sarnia, Brantford, Windsor and London. Policy quality is measured using an index of 30 outputs, derived from existing literature. |
