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efforts in improvisational ways under the federal-state, state-
local, internal to state, external to state, and public-private
partnerships through logistical, jurisdictional and governance
domains of response coordination was particularly closely
studied. They recognize that coordination in both vertical and
horizontal dimensions is not easy to manage during the
emergency response period.
B. Horizontal-Interlocal Collaboration
Horizontal-interlocal collaboration refers to collaboration
among local governments. In the U.S., local governments refer
to cities, counties, special districts, and other smaller units. In
order to efficiently deliver community services, local
governments often decide to collaborate and build partnerships
through signing interlocal agreements. This kind of voluntary
coordination mechanism is particularly popular in metropolitan
areas where the problems of fragmentation are frequently
serious and institutional complexity makes the implementation
of standardized solutions difficult (Feiock, 2008). Based on
Feiock’s (2013) Institutional Collective Action framework, local
governments expect to reduce costs and increase benefits
through functional or geographical collaboration with other
units when delivering public services. In other words, joint
actions happen only when organizations conclude that the
potential benefits of joint actions outweigh their costs.
In the EM context, local governments collaborating with
one another is indispensable because the impacts of disasters can
be huge and cross-jurisdictional. Therefore, local governments
commonly share information and jointly respond to
emergencies or disasters. For example, a local government may
cooperate with other nearby jurisdictions within a region to
suppress a fire that has spread across administrative boundaries,
or design feasible standard operating procedures throughout a
metropolitan area (McEntire & Dawson, 2007). The local