The Disaster Relief Fund (DRF) is running dangerously low as the busiest time of the disaster season arrives and as lawmakers debate spending levels for the coming year. Members of Congress are negotiating a budget deal to fund the federal government for FY 2024, as well as a Continuing Resolution as a stopgap measure for the month of October to avoid a government shutdown. Due to elevated spending on recent disasters, FEMA has had to implement what’s called Immediate Needs Funding – a type of restriction on the use of DRF money, used when funds are running low, to only “lifesaving and life-sustaining activities” such as response and urgent recovery activities. The DRF is the source for myriad programs under the Federal Emergency Management Agency that provide disaster assistance to impacted communities. These include assistance provided under a disaster declaration – such as Individual Assistance, Public Assistance, and Hazard Mitigation Grant Program – as well as Fire Management Assistance Grants and disaster readiness and support activities. Even with INF implemented,
September 24, 2023
Testimony to the House of Representatives Committee on Rules’ Subcommittee on Legislative and Budget Process for the Hearing: Using Budget Principles to Prepare for Future Pandemics and Other Disasters Testimony Submitted January 16, 2022 By: Jeff Schlegelmilch, MPH, MBA Thank you for the opportunity to testify before the Subcommittee today. In my role leading the National Center for Disaster Preparedness at Columbia University’s Climate School, as well as through other positions, I have dedicated my career to fostering the impact of disaster
January 19, 2022
On each anniversary of the tragedy which struck humanity on 9/11/01 we take a moment to reflect on those lives
September 10, 2021
The COVID-19 pandemic has demonstrated the importance of coordinated responses among emergency management and other stakeholders to implement an effective
May 12, 2021
This is not just an issue of fairness, victims and survivors...It is also a failure to capitalize on different perspectives that represent the community that emergency management serves.
August 8, 2019
This post was originally published on May 30, 2018 in Fortune. The 2018 hurricane season is upon us, and it looks like we are in for a very bad year. This is right on the on the heels of 2017, which was the most expensivehurricane season on record, requiring multiple emergency supplemental appropriations from Congress. Going forward, we need to accept the fact that the degree to which we rely on the federal government to underwrite our preparedness and response is no longer viable. We need a more sustainable approach to managing 21st-century disasters. The economic stress of disasters is now regularly measured in billions—and even sometimes in trillions of dollars—and has measureable impacts to GDP. Since 1980, the United States has experienced 230 separate billion-dollar weather events, totaling more than $1.5 trillion in costs. And that is just the weather and climate-related disasters. To understand the scale of these financial pressures on federal programs, one
July 26, 2018
This post was originally published on December 13, 2017 in The Hill. Recent acts of terrorism at home and abroad remind us that our first responders are on the front lines, and that our national
March 27, 2018
