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Director, Office of Operations Coordination and Planning Richard "Rich" M. Chávez
Mr. Chávez is a career Senior Executive in the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). He provides counsel directly to the Secretary of Homeland Security on a wide range of operational issues to include prevention, protection, mitigation, response and recovery operations, continuity of operations (COOP), and planning. He leads an office of approximately 550 people who are responsible for monitoring the security of the United States on a daily basis and providing national situational awareness and developing the national common operating picture. His office provides vital decision support information to the Federal interagency, Governors, Homeland Security Advisors, law enforcement, private sector and critical infrastructure operators in all 54 States and territories and more than 50 major urban areas nationwide.
Mr. Chávez has over 30 years of government experience serving with DHS and the Department of Defense (DoD) as an Air Force officer and senior civilian in the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy. While assigned to the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Global Strategic Affairs, Counter Weapons of Mass Destruction, he served as the Senior Advisor and provided policy oversight of DoD’s Foreign Consequence Management program. Mr. Chávez was responsible for developing procurement, force development, and force management policy for DoD’s chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear (CBRN) capabilities to support a host nation's consequence management efforts. He worked directly with the Department of State and foreign governments to provide guidance on DoD’s capabilities and the request for assistance process to enable host nation support to prepare for and respond to a CBRN event.
While assigned to the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Homeland Defense and Americas' Security Affairs, he served as Director, Domestic Consequence Management. He led a staff of senior military and civilian subject matter experts that developed and coordinated DoD strategic policy regarding Defense Support of Civil Authorities preparedness and response operations with 32 Federal agencies, the Joint Staff, the National Guard Bureau, Service component staffs, and DoD agencies. Domestic support operations included: protection of the President; military assistance for civil disturbances; disaster mitigation and response; mass migration emergencies; mission assurance; National Special Security Events/Special Events; CBRN; and high yield explosive consequence management; and critical infrastructure protection. Mr. Chávez was responsible for leading DoD's largest, most comprehensive, and most extensive civil support mission ever in response to Hurricane Katrina, and he led DoD's Pandemic Influenza preparedness and response efforts.
Mr. Chávez holds a Bachelor of Science Professional degree in Corrections and Law Enforcement from East Carolina University in Greenville, North Carolina. He also holds a Master’s degree in Public Administration from Golden Gate University, San Francisco, California, and a Master's degree in Strategic Studies from the Air War College, Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama.
This page was last modified on October 31, 2011