The nation’s state disaster-response system was at risk of becoming nonoperational Friday, when the Federal Emergency Management Agency temporarily failed to fund the group that operates it.
The Emergency Management Assistance Compact is a mutual aid disaster-response system for all 50 states that ensures resources can be quickly sent to areas in the aftermath of anything from a hurricane to an act of terrorism.
Funding for the group that manages EMAC, a nonprofit organization of state emergency-management officials called the National Emergency Management Association, expired Sept. 4. The grant costs just over $2 million for a year.
After inquiries from NOTUS about the lapse, FEMA said it extended the group’s funding.
“The funding for NEMA has been awarded, and DHS leadership remains in close collaboration with NEMA,” a Department of Homeland Security spokesperson said. “FEMA is working to guarantee all taxpayer funds are effectively utilized and spent to benefit the American people.”
It’s not clear what sort of extension was granted.
But prior to that announcement, NEMA officials told NOTUS they were concerned about the future of the program.
“We’re working very hard in trying to talk with the FEMA administrator and intergovernmental affairs to make sure there is an understanding of how urgent the timelines are for the grants right now,” Lynn Budd, the president of NEMA, said to NOTUS Thursday, the last day of the grant the program had operated under.
“We would not be able to fund the staff, which also supports the National Response Coordination Center and regional response-coordination centers in times of disaster,” she said.
“Our staff does that.”
The National Response Coordination Center, which FEMA operates, coordinates the deployment of federal aid in the aftermath of a disaster.
The compact, created by Congress in 1996, is designed so states are assured that they will be reimbursed for any resources they send into a disaster area, and can signal ahead of time which teams they have available to dispatch.
When deadly floods this year hit Kerr County, Texas, and when wildfires destroyed parts of Los Angeles, state governments from across the country sent resources mere hours into the disasters through the system. EMAC coordinated 49 different missions between 27 states to respond to the floods in Texas. Fourteen states deployed resources for the Los Angeles-area wildfires in California, according to Budd.
“FEMA requested that NEMA submit a no-cost extension request for the current grant, which we did. Radio silent otherwise,” Karen Langdon, NEMA’s communications manager, said Friday, when NOTUS inquired as to whether Budd’s efforts had been successful.
Later Friday, Langdon confirmed that she has no knowledge of where the grant approval is currently being held up, making it difficult to know who to reach out to in the agency.
“Is it sitting on the secretary’s desk? We don’t know. Did it get held up somewhere else along the line? We don’t know,” she said.
The stakes of such a response system going offline are very high, those who work on the program tell NOTUS — especially as the Trump administration continues to push the idea that FEMA’s role in disaster response should be delegated to the states.
“There’s no backup. There’s no replacement. So if, in the very worst case scenario, EMAC went away, then we have no mechanism in place for states to share resources, and that certainly flies in the face of the idea that states need to take on more responsibility,” Budd said.
“Even if we received a 90 day extension, we would not have enough money left in our current funding profile to fund the program through that 90 days,” she said.
It’s not clear how long EMAC can continue operations without the funds, Budd said when there was still risk of a lapse.
“As we reach the peak of hurricane season, now is not the time to be pinching pennies when lives are at stake,” Craig Fugate, who served as FEMA administrator during the Obama administration, wrote on LinkedIn. In his post, Fugate credited EMAC for the disaster response in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.
The Department of Homeland Security’s secretary, Kristi Noem, has for months insisted on signing approvals for contracts above $100,000, which reportedly slowed the federal government’s response in the aftermath of the Kerr County floods. DHS has repeatedly declared that reporting to be false.
“EMAC is critical for coordination between states during response to disasters,” said Michael Coen, FEMA’s chief of staff during the Obama and Biden administrations. “During the height of hurricane season, the program is essential. EMAC supports prioritization and deployment of states’ resources to support other states providing life-saving and life-sustaining activities.”
Many FEMA grants and contracts have been significantly delayed this year compared to previous years — not just the grant that funds NEMA’s contract to manage the mutual aid network.
FEMA did not release the information for many of this year’s grants until late August, and the agency has only until the end of the fiscal year, Sept. 30, to distribute this year’s funding. Budd is also worried about those other contracts, which she says are essential for the function of state and local emergency-management agencies that depend in many cases almost exclusively on that money.
“I understand the desire to reduce fraud and waste,” Budd said. “But let’s understand the consequences of what we’re doing and making sure that we’re thinking this through in a way that makes sense for the safety and security of the American people.”
—
Editor’s Note: This story has been updated with additional reporting.