The Olson Group, Ltd. (OGL) led the 2017, 2018, and 2019 North Central Texas Council of Governments Threat and Hazard Identification and Risk Assessment (THIRA). OGL led 16 counties and 240 jurisdictions (“the region”) through the THIRA and SPR process. To begin the THIRA process, OGL conducted a risk assessment to the region’s susceptibility to over 30 threats and hazards. Through this process, OGL was able to identify ten (10) hazards that are most likely to impact the North Central Texas Region. Following the risk assessment process, OGL crafted ten (10) context descriptions for flooding, severe thunderstorms, tornadoes, wildland fire, gas pipeline explosion, dam/levee breach, biological attack, and a complex coordinated terrorist attack (CCTA).
Through a series of meetings and conference calls with regional partners and working groups, OGL developed impacts and desired outcomes for each scenario. Follow-up meetings were used to validate the impacts and desired outcomes to develop capability targets. Regional meetings with stakeholders and working groups were held to develop the capability estimation to agreed upon capability targets. Based on the results of these meetings OGL developed the Stakeholder Preparedness Review (SPR) identifying recent advancements in capability targets and regional gaps to be addressed in the upcoming year. Final deliverables for the project included an executive summary, THIRA final report, State Preparedness Report, and Regional Implementation Plan.