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Politico
14-07-2025
- Politics
- Politico
Why billions in disaster aid go unspent
As disaster experts continue to piece together the events that led to more than 100 people dying in this month's Texas floods, the tragedy is highlighting a deadly gap between abundant federal dollars for disaster preparation and the ability of states to put it to use. Texas has relinquished $225 million in federal aid over the past 10 years that Washington had granted it to ready communities for disasters, according to federal records reviewed by Thomas Frank and Mike Lee. In fact, Texas officials twice turned down the county that experienced the worst of this month's flooding when it asked for a small portion of available federal money to set up a flood warning system. Texas is not unique in letting federal disaster money lie fallow. Since 2015, the federal Hazard Mitigation Grant Program has heaped more than $23 billion on states to prepare for floods, hurricanes, tornadoes and other threats. The funding is automatically approved for mitigation against future hazards when a federal disaster is declared, and it is provided in addition to federal funds doled out to clean up and rebuild after disasters strike. But roughly $21 billion of that federal grant money remains unspent. The federal government has clawed back some of the disaster money because states never used it. Over the past decade, states have relinquished $1.4 billion of federal mitigation grant money, including Texas' $225 million. The problem: Federal officials stress that the untapped federal funds are a lost opportunity to prepare for instead of simply respond to deadly events. But states and counties often lack the staff, expertise or bandwidth to navigate a cumbersome federal process to tap those funds. Even though the federal grants are automatically approved after a disaster declaration, applicants have to drum up hundreds of pages to prove to federal disaster agencies that their proposed projects are feasible, make financial sense, and comply with environmental and historical preservation laws. It's a potentially deadly inefficiency within the federal bureaucracy of disaster preparation, Thomas and Mike write, even as climate change intensifies the extreme weather that can hurtle through communities with little notice. A former emergency management official in Nevada, David Fogerson, summed up the federal grant program as a 'blessing and a curse.' 'It almost becomes overload,' he said, 'when you're trying to manage the disaster and then you're trying to measure how to protect against the next disaster.' It's Monday — thank you for tuning in to POLITICO's Power Switch. I'm your host, Heather Richards. Power Switch is brought to you by the journalists behind E&E News and POLITICO Energy. Send your tips, comments, questions to hrichards@ Today in POLITICO Energy's podcast: Zack Colman breaks down how Democrats are shifting their messaging on energy ahead of the 2026 midterm elections. Power Centers U.S. disengagement in red, white and blueClimate and energy experts were swept up in the mass firing of State Department employees Friday — thwarting U.S. engagement just as China grabs the reins on clean energy development, former diplomats say. Around 75 people focused on climate have left State since President Donald Trump took office. Two-thirds of the Bureau of Energy Resources were let go Friday, according to estimates. The State Department declined to confirm those figures, Sara Schonhardt reports. 'It's crippling,' said Dan Reifsnyder, a former diplomat who spearheaded U.S. climate efforts at the State Department from their beginning. 'I think the biggest thing that the United States brings to these international fora are really very bright people, very dedicated people, people with ideas, people with creativity, people with talent.' State says the restructuring will make it 'more accountable, more accessible, and more transparent.' The move comes as Trump defunds the transition to clean energy, withdraws from global climate efforts and cuts weather and disaster spending. Check the 'yes' boxA representative from the Department of Government Efficiency told the Nuclear Regulatory Commission's chair and top staff that they were expected to 'rubber stamp' new reactors tested by the departments of Energy or Defense, Francisco 'A.J.' Camacho and Peter Behr report. Trump has said he wants to quadruple the U.S. supply of nuclear power by 2050. Tech industry allies, Republicans in Congress and Secretary of Energy Chris Wright have been sharply critical of the NRC for what they say is an unreasonably slow approval process for nuclear technology. Defenders of the agency say the political push to build more nuclear reactors, and fast, doesn't change NRC requirements under the law to ensure new reactor designs are safe. Shrinking agenciesHouse Republican appropriators unveiled their fiscal 2026 funding legislation for the Interior Department and the Environmental Protection Agency, with steep cuts proposed for both agencies, Kevin Bogardus, Garrett Downs and Michael Doyle report. The bill would approve about $38 billion for agencies under its purview, nearly $3 billion below the fiscal 2025 amount. Interior would get about $14.8 billion and EPA would be funded at $7 billion, a 23 percent cut for the environment agency. Sierra Club boss is on leaveBen Jealous is on leave from his job as the Sierra Club's boss after a tumultuous stretch leading the organization, Robin Bravender reports. The green group informed staff in a cryptic message Friday that Jealous was on leave and that an acting boss would be filling in. But the group didn't provide details about the cause of Jealous' leave or how long it would last, raising questions about the long-term leadership of the iconic environmental group as it faces off against the Trump administration. In Other News Metal mania: A site in Arizona is being fast-tracked to become the first new big U.S. copper mine in more than a decade after Trump said he'd impose a 50 percent tariff on imports on Aug. 1. Overstated: Grid experts say a Department of Energy report on blackouts is using questionable math to back up its claims. Subscriber Zone A showcase of some of our best subscriber content. Union leaders are pleased with New York Gov. Kathy Hochul's recent openness to nuclear energy and gas pipelines. Delays to California's cap-and-trade program made the state lose out on nearly $3 billion in revenue last year, a climate advocacy group says. House Republicans included a provision in their 2026 transportation spending bill that would prevent federal funds from being awarded for high-speed rail projects in California and Texas. That's it for today, folks! Thanks for reading.
Scientific American
14-07-2025
- Climate
- Scientific American
Texas Failed to Spend Millions in Federal Aid for Flood Protection
CLIMATEWIRE | In the past decade, as extreme weather killed nearly 700 people in Texas, the state relinquished $225 million in federal grant money that it was supposed to spend on protecting residents from disasters, federal records show. The money had come from a special federal disaster program that's given states billions of dollars for projects such as flood protection, tornado safety and the type of warning systems that could have saved some of the 129 people killed in Texas' recent flash flooding. Texas had rejected two requests from the flooded county for a small portion of the federal money to set up a flood-warning system. But Texas, like most states, has chosen not to spend a significant chunk of its mitigation grant money. States routinely let the government reclaim unspent money — or let available money go unused for as long as 20 years, according to an analysis of federal records by POLITICO's E&E News. On supporting science journalism If you're enjoying this article, consider supporting our award-winning journalism by subscribing. By purchasing a subscription you are helping to ensure the future of impactful stories about the discoveries and ideas shaping our world today. In addition to ceding the $225 million, Texas has not spent $505 million of the $820 million — 62 percent — that it got for mitigation projects nearly eight years ago after Hurricane Harvey killed 89 people and caused $160 billion in damage, records show. The funds remain available. The unspent money highlights a central flaw in the nation's approach to protecting against climate change: The federal government gives states and communities both money and responsibility for disaster protection. Yet states and communities often lack the personnel and expertise to spend it fully. Since July 2015, the federal Hazard Mitigation Grant Program has showered states with more than $23 billion to protect their counties, neighborhoods and homes against future disaster damage. The grants have been given automatically after each federally declared disaster and are separate from the federal money that pays for disaster cleanup and rebuilding. But nearly $21 billion of the grant money remains unspent, E&E News found, leaving people vulnerable to the deadly flooding, winds and wildfires that climate change is intensifying. Some of the grant money was awarded in recent years, but most was awarded more than three years ago. In the same period since 2015, states also relinquished a total of $1.4 billion in mitigation grant funding that had been approved but states never spent. The figure includes the $225 million that Texas gave up over the past 10 years as the government closed a series of partially spent hazard mitigation grants it had awarded the state since 2001. The grants were worth a total of $850 million, which means Texas did not spend more than a quarter of the money. Most recently, on April 29, Texas ceded $5.7 million of a $13 million mitigation grant it got in 2016. 'It's a lost opportunity to build resilience,' said Peter Gaynor, who ran the Federal Emergency Management Agency from 2019 to 2021. FEMA operates the mitigation grant program. 'What happens time and time again is mitigation money becomes an afterthought,' Gaynor said. The Texas Division of Emergency Management, which handles the FEMA mitigation grants, did not respond directly to questions about unspent money. Andrew Mahaleris, a spokesperson for Gov. Greg Abbott (R), said in a statement, "The State continues to disburse HMGP funding as grants are awarded and encourages local officials to apply." The large amount of unspent hazard mitigation money prompted President Donald Trump in April to stop approving new allocations, a move that angered some state officials. A FEMA spokesperson said the agency is now helping states 'identify projects and draw down balances in a way that makes the nation more resilient, while also responsibly safeguarding American taxpayer dollars.' Trump has assailed FEMA since taking office but on Friday offered unusual praise when he visited the damaged area in Texas. 'FEMA has been really headed by some very good people,' Trump said. Although states had automatically received FEMA grant money after each disaster, spending the money has been excruciating at times. FEMA typically must approve each grant-funded project. 'It's such a cumbersome process,' said David Fogerson, who ran Nevada's emergency management and homeland security agency from 2020 to 2024. States and communities — or their contractors — must submit detailed plans showing that a project is feasible, complies with environmental and preservation laws and makes sense financially. States, counties and municipalities also must have a written plan — typically a couple of hundred pages and updated every five years — showing its broad strategy to reduce disaster damage. A Government Accountability Office report in 2021 found that state officials were 'overwhelmingly dissatisfied' with the application process. 'It almost becomes overload when you're trying to manage the disaster and then you're trying to measure how to protect against the next disaster,' Fogerson said. Nevada has spent only a quarter of the $3.4 million hazard grant it got from FEMA after a wildfire in 2016, records show. 'It's a blessing and a curse,' Fogerson said of the grant money. Federal funds rarely used for warning systems Kerr County, Texas, the site of the flash flooding that began July 4, encountered the administrative gantlet in 2016 when it asked the state in 2016 and in 2018 for a small piece of its FEMA mitigation money to establish a flood warning system. Warning systems are a crucial but low-profile part of worldwide strategies to protect against natural hazards, particularly in places prone to flash flooding, which occurs when sudden, intense precipitation causes rivers to overflow. Texas officials are scrutinizing the limited warnings that were transmitted as the Guadalupe River surged in the middle of the night and devoured areas including a girls' sleepaway camp where at least 27 campers and counselors were killed. In Kerrville, Texas, which was at the center of the flash flooding, City Manager Dalton Rice on Saturday pledged 'a full review of the disaster response.' Trump's staff reductions and proposed budget cuts to the National Weather Service offices have set off their own alarms that inadequate weather alerts will increase the number of disaster-related deaths. Kerr County's request for grant money was denied in 2016 by the Texas Division of Emergency Management because the county did not have the required mitigation plan. When the county of 50,000 people in central Texas Hill Country applied again after Hurricane Harvey, the state denied the application after deciding to spend all the grant money in Harvey-damaged counties. 'If localities do not meet federal requirements, they will not be able to access the funding. The State works with applicants to support efforts to bring them into compliance,' said Mahaleris, the spokesperson for Gov. Abbott. The Texas Legislature will convene a special session July 21 to consider new laws that would improve warning systems in flood-prone areas. 'We're going to work on every single solution to make sure things like this don't happen,' Abbott said Friday. Despite the importance of warning systems and their moderate cost, states have spent only a tiny amount of their mitigation grants installing them, E&E News' analysis of federal records shows. The largest chunk of grant money has gone to flood protection, usually for individual properties. Roughly $4.5 billion has been given to homeowners in flood-prone coastal or riverside areas to elevate their house above flood level or to buy the property, demolish the home and leave the land vacant, E&E News' analysis shows. Each project costs federal taxpayers roughly $250,000. By contrast, states have spent just $275 million on warning systems. 'The cost of warning systems proportionately to other flood mitigation activities is relatively cheaper,' said Chad Berginnis, executive director of the Association of State Floodplain Managers. 'For a small community, it could be a siren and a gauging apparatus that's tied to that. That could end up being cheaper than one buyout.' Low-income nations such as Bangladesh have spent heavily on flood-warning systems, said Sarah Labowitz, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace who studies disasters. 'They're doing that without a lot of resources,' Labowitz said. 'We should be learning from other places and investing in early warning systems.' But one problem with using FEMA mitigation money for warning systems is that their benefits are nearly impossible to quantify, Berginnis said. FEMA generally requires proof that a mitigation project funded with its grants has a positive benefit-cost ratio. Although the agency makes exceptions for some projects such as warning systems, FEMA requires grant-funded warning systems to be part of a 'planned, adopted, and exercised risk reduction plan.' Berginnis acknowledged that states struggle to spend their mitigation grants. But he opposes Trump's recent decisions not to approve new grants. 'Mitigation happens when people are receptive to doing mitigation, and they are the most receptive to doing it in the immediate aftermath to do it, period. We are missing a key opportunity to do that,' Berginnis said.
Yahoo
13-06-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Moore requests Presidential Disaster Declaration for Western Maryland flood damage
CUMBERLAND — Although county and state funds have been allocated to repair some damage caused by the May 13 flood, a full recovery will require federal help. Gov. Wes Moore Thursday requested the White House issue a Major Disaster Declaration for areas of Allegany and Garrett counties damaged in the stormwaters. The Federal Emergency Management Agency, Maryland Department of Emergency Management and local officials estimate more than $15.8 million in emergency response costs and damage to infrastructure, 'including more than 200 homes, numerous businesses, roads and bridges, railroads, sewer systems, drinking water and public utilities,' according to a press release from the governor's office. 'Our communities in Western Maryland have experienced significant impacts to their homes, businesses, and critical infrastructure,' Moore said via the release. 'After a thorough assessment of the damage, it's clear that additional support is necessary,' he said. 'We must continue to deploy essential resources to ensure a full and robust recovery.' The declaration request marks an important continuation of that ongoing push, as work required to fully recover from the flood is beyond what state and local jurisdictions can provide, the release stated. 'With a natural disaster where residents, businesses and public infrastructure are impacted on this scale, recovery is an all-hands-on-deck approach,' Maryland Department of Emergency Management Secretary Russ Strickland said via the release. 'We are already working tirelessly at the local and state level, but the flooding caused incredible destruction,' he said. 'The addition of much-needed federal assistance is necessary to get those affected back to their regular lives and to allow those communities to fully recover in months instead of years.' The state can also request access to the Hazard Mitigation Grant Program under the federal Stafford Act. If approved, that support would help repair crucial infrastructure and publicly owned facilities in the impacted counties, as well as fund risk reduction projects to ensure that additional devastating impacts are minimized in the future, the release stated. Allegany County commissioners Thursday approved more than $91,000 in emergency procurements related to the flood. Work performed by various companies included creek and storm cleanup, hauling of gravel and dumpsters, and steel pipe replacement. 'A lot of work has taken place from the immediate aftermath of the flood to try to reopen roads and remove debris from streams, and things that need to happen in order to protect people from damage that occurred and damage that may occur,' County Engineer Dan DeWitt said. 'It's an ongoing effort that's gonna continue for some time.' County Administrator Jason Bennett talked of aid from the first-ever State Disaster Recovery Fund to support local flood recovery efforts. 'We got $459,000 ... this week from the governor,' he said. 'We are coming up with a plan to expend those dollars in the next couple weeks,' Bennett said. 'We will get that on the street as quick as possible.'
Mint
11-06-2025
- Politics
- Mint
The Trump Administration Keeps Denying Disaster Preparedness Aid to States
The Trump administration is increasingly skipping a form of federal disaster aid that helps states better prepare for future storms, flooding and wildfires. The Federal Emergency Management Agency rejected requests for such resiliency money, known as Hazard Mitigation Grant Program funding, for Iowa, Mississippi, Missouri and Oklahoma last week, part of a trend that started this spring. These denials are one way the administration is trying to cut costs and narrow the scope of FEMA, the nation's primary agency for disaster work that sits under the Department of Homeland Security. The administration is weighing the approval of hazard mitigation funding 'with states' ability to execute those funds,' said White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson. 'To date, we are observing large unobligated balances across the board,' she added. On Tuesday, President Donald Trump reiterated his plan to eliminate the agency, possibly as soon as the end of hurricane season in late fall. 'We're going to do it much differently,' he said in the Oval Office. Standing near Trump, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said: 'You've been very clear you want to see FEMA eliminated as it exists today. So I'm preparing all these governors that they will have more control over the decisions on how they respond to their communities so that they can help it happen faster.' The federal hazard mitigation money is used for flood buyouts of homes and constructing tornado safe rooms. Not receiving it 'would mean that there would be fewer funds available for Missouri communities to fund such projects,' said Mike O'Connell, communications director for the Missouri Department of Public Safety. A new tack on disaster preparedness The requests for hazard mitigation funds were part of the states' applications for major disaster declarations, a status that comes with federal assistance. Missouri experienced back-to-back severe storms in mid- and late March. That same month, Iowa experienced a severe winter storm, while Mississippi was hit by strong storms and Oklahoma was affected by straight-line winds and wildfires. In each case, the destruction from the disasters overwhelmed local and state responses, prompting Republican Governors Kim Reynolds of Iowa, Tate Reeves of Mississippi, Mike Kehoe of Missouri and Kevin Stitt of Oklahoma to seek federal assistance. On May 21, Trump signed major disaster declarations that greenlit some funding to help affected communities in the four states recover and rebuild. But the states' specific requests for money to invest in projects to boost defenses and preparedness against future storms and other disasters remained under review. Less than two weeks later, on June 2, FEMA denied the hazard mitigation requests, according to a review of three of the five rejection letters and interviews with state officials. It's a pattern that started in March, when the Trump administration stopped automatically approving hazard mitigation requests tied to major disasters. It later denied two state requests, in May. The denials represent a big change from how previous administrations, including Trump's during his first term, responded to such requests, when the approval of this money as part of large post-disaster aid packages 'was considered to be almost automatic,' said Michael Coen, who used to review the requests as FEMA's chief of staff under former President Joe Biden. Jackson said in a statement that the White House is 'working with states to assist them in identifying projects and drawing down balances in a way that makes the nation more resilient.' Neither she nor the DHS provided any additional details. Missouri officials said they are preparing to appeal FEMA's denial of hazard mitigation funds, while Iowa and Mississippi are still considering their options. Oklahoma has decided against appealing because it received other federal funding it can use in a similar way, according to state officials. This article was generated from an automated news agency feed without modifications to text.
Bloomberg
11-06-2025
- Politics
- Bloomberg
The Trump Administration Keeps Denying Disaster Preparedness Aid to States
The Trump administration is increasingly skipping a form of federal disaster aid that helps states better prepare for future storms, flooding and wildfires. The Federal Emergency Management Agency rejected requests for such resiliency money, known as Hazard Mitigation Grant Program funding, for Iowa, Mississippi, Missouri and Oklahoma last week, part of a trend that started this spring.
