Florida plans for peak hurricane season amid storm of FEMA reforms

Politico

8 hours ago

TALLAHASSEE, Florida — The Trump administration's talk about drastically altering FEMA's role in disaster recovery has generated heavy uncertainty. But hurricane season is now in full-swing, and with more experience in storm recovery than any other state, Florida's local emergency management officials are trying to stay focused on staying prepared.
Florida's storm season began June 1. With the most active, historically volatile stretch a couple months away, county emergency managers have no time to plan for changes that FEMA, the White House and conservative allies have been discussing for some time. Instead, the state's disaster recovery network has decided to rely on itself — even if they may need federal assistance down the road.
Jonathan Lord, president of the Florida Emergency Preparedness Association, said most county managers determined the risk of a powerful storm is greater than six months of talk about ways to cut federal disaster funding.
'Emergency managers can't let that noise blur what they need to do for their community,' Lord said. 'Whatever our federal government decides to do, we at the local level will just morph or evolve our programs to adjust to that new reality.'
Florida has the history to back up their prep work: The devastation from Category 5 Hurricane Andrew in 1992 prompted officials to create a statewide emergency network that became a model for other states to follow. This safety net is fine-tuned after every hurricane season, from evacuation and sheltering plans managed by counties, to new training and education requirements for county emergency managers recently finalized by the state Legislature.
But despite Florida's experience and expertise, the state historically has also relied on tens of billions of recovery dollars provided by FEMA. In most cases, the agency will agree to reimburse 75 percent of recovery costs incurred by the state, counties and municipalities impacted by a hurricane. But in many cases, FEMA has also agreed to cover 100 percent of the costs if the loss was deemed catastrophic, or if the community had no other means to cover repair bills.
In 2022, Category 4 Hurricane Ian left Lee County with the largest cleanup bill in state history. A FEMA database of the $2.2 billion in funding requests awarded to Ian-impacted communities shows the agency agreed to cover 100 percent of Lee County's bills from the first several weeks after landfall.
The days of 100 percent coverage from FEMA are expected to be far less frequent as the White House continues to review wasteful government spending. Florida Division of Emergency Management Director Kevin Guthrie told a joint-legislative budget committee meeting in June a similar message.
'Instead of us getting 100 percent disaster declarations for a period of time, those days are probably over,' Guthrie said as he defended his request for $850 million to cover costs from the hurricanes, flooding and tornadoes that hit the state last year.
FEMA's case-by-case decision to award 100 percent funding has been a lifesaver for Florida's rural counties. After Category 5 Hurricane Michael tore through the Panhandle in 2018, FEMA had initially only agreed to cover 75 percent of the recovery costs incurred by counties impacted by the storm. Calhoun County was faced with millions in critical cleanup costs, but the county only had about $3 million on hand to front the millions more in cleanup costs that FEMA had agreed to pay. Those terms changed after Gov. Ron DeSantis took office three months after Michael made landfall and negotiated with the then-Trump White House to cover 100 percent of the costs that came up in the first several weeks after landfall.
Guthrie's prediction on future federal disaster funding mirrors an April memo drafted by then-acting FEMA Administrator Cameron Hamilton. The memo, which Hamilton sent to the White House Office of Management and Budget, summarizes options to cut federal disaster spending, including increasing the share of the costs left to states and localities, and no longer agreeing to cover more than 75 percent.
'This is an action the President has already taken and can continue to take to reduce disaster costs,' Hamilton wrote in the memo, later adding, 'The President would retain authority to grant cost share exceptions.'
President Donald Trump announced plans to eliminate FEMA shortly after he began his second White House term in January. Hamilton was fired by Trump in May after he told a House committee that FEMA should not be eliminated. He was replaced by now-acting FEMA Administrator David Richardson, who pushed forward with a reorganizational plan that sought to end FEMA's oversight of recovery projects meant to help shield communities from devastation left by future storms.
Richardson walked back his plans ahead of the start of this year's hurricane season on June 1, and Trump has since said plans to wind down FEMA will not take place until the season ends at the end of November.
Without any concrete decisions from Washington, Florida's county emergency managers have pressed ahead preparing for this year's hurricane season. Eric Poole, director for the Institute of County Government at the Florida Association of Counties, said most county managers are confident the terms of a disaster declaration, which dictate the amount of money FEMA is willing to pay for storm recovery costs, will still be left to the discretion of the president.
'There's always going to be the discretion of the president through FEMA to increase the cost of a disaster,' Poole said. 'It's all going to depend on the severity of the event and the community and its fiscal capacity, and someone in the executive saying we've got to help these guys out.'
Plans to slash federal disaster funding are not new to the Trump administration. FEMA's initial offer to only reimburse 75 percent of the devastation left by Hurricane Michael left Bay County, where the storm made landfall, to take out a $50 million loan to cover critical costs such as removing debris from roads. Other impacted counties, which are deemed as 'fiscally constrained' by the state based on low property tax revenue, saw recovery efforts stall for several months.
The limited cash assistance from FEMA was part of an effort led in coordination with then-Gov. Rick Scott to make counties and cities pay a larger share of the recovery costs. This tough love approach to cash assistance was reversed by DeSantis, who convinced Trump to cover a significant chunk of recovery costs in the first weeks after he became governor.
'There's definitely trepidation for not knowing what might happen, or concern for something that might have been reimbursable at some level but may not be available come year's end,' Lord, who is also the Flagler County director of emergency management, said. 'That impacts budgets and cash reserves, which there is concern about, but at this point we just don't know.'
One chronic problem with FEMA's Public Assistance grant program: The agency sometimes takes months to approve recovery funding requests. To help mitigate the delay, the Legislature in 2022 created a new trust fund that allows the state Division of Emergency Management to front cash for critical cleanup projects on behalf of counties and cities, allowing the recovery work to continue as the state negotiates reimbursements with FEMA.
'That $1 billion allows us to actually respond without having to worry about the federal government,' Guthrie told lawmakers as he explained his recent request for $850 million to cover last year's storms. 'We go out the door, we're ready to do what we need to do without dependency on the federal government.'
The state Division of Emergency Management is an offshoot of the governor's office. The new trust fund allows DeSantis' office to draw money to support all executive orders, which includes efforts to combat illegal immigration. But despite concerns from lawmakers, Guthrie said only $9 million of the $850 million he requested was to cover outstanding bills tied to immigration. The rest of the money, which the joint-legislative panel approved, will go toward unpaid bills from last year's flooding, tornadoes and hurricanes.
'We do have flooding and we do have tornadoes and then there's severe hurricanes,' Guthrie said, adding the unpaid immigration enforcement bills, 'came to a very small amount.'
State lawmakers will soon present their budget to DeSantis for the next fiscal year, which begins July 1, and talks between the House and Senate included plans by Trump to eliminate FEMA. State Senate budget chair Ed Hooper (R-Palm Harbor) said the prospects of losing the federal agency scared him when considering how to control state spending. One option already under consideration for future state budgets, should FEMA reduce federal recovery spending, was to add more cash to the state budget stabilization fund.
'We just have to take into account how we're going to get things done,' Hooper said.
Guthrie was once considered a candidate to become FEMA administrator, but he was instead appointed by Trump to the FEMA Review Council, which will advise the White House as it makes changes to the agency. State House Appropriations Chair Lawrence McClure said Guthrie's role could play to Florida's advantage, especially with freeing up chronic issues with the agency approving recovery funding requests made by the state.
'Although we look further to maybe a reconstruction or recalibration of FEMA, we also have the federal government — I mean this is the United States, right?' McClure said. 'We take care of each other.'