Because the hurricane and flooding revealed many gaps in American emergency management, President Don Menzel selected American Society for Public Administration (ASPA) members who were emergency management practitioners or academics who study emergency management to examine the disaster and its management. The Denver conference, six months after the event, featured a panel discussion on immediate research and trends. D. C. Jensen, Louisiana Office of Emergency Services/Homeland Security, pointed out that public can exercise and plan, but this does not prepare a community for every actual event. University of Baltimore's Lenneal Henderson noted that best practices from other states and around the world had been incorporated into disaster planning. Bruce Baughman, co-leader of the task force, said that emergency management is not a federal problem, but that all disasters are local. Planning should have a bottom-up approach, starting with the individual. Strong executive leadership from elected officials is necessary.