Waterfront Alliance Issues Public Comment on FEMA Notice

WASHINGTON, July 28 -- Karen Imas, vice president of programs at the Waterfront Alliance and Rise to Resilience, New York, has issued a public comment on the Federal Emergency Management Agency notice entitled "Request for Information on FEMA Programs, Regulations, and Policies". The comment was written on July 20, 2021, and posted on July 21, 2021:

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Overview

The following comments are submitted by the Waterfront Alliance and Rise to Resilience, a campaign and coalition spearheaded by the Waterfront Alliance and composed of over 100 partner organizations. We represent residents, volunteer organizations, scientists, environmental advocates, design professionals, and leaders in business, labor, community and justice collectively calling on our federal, state, and local governments to make climate resilience an urgent priority.

Our comments reflect a series of interviews of coalition partners - experts in housing, resilience, and emergency management, and community members that have lived experience with FEMA programs and policies - as well as the input of the coalition. Anecdotes and quotes are included to provide specific, illustrative examples of experiences following Hurricane Sandy in the NY-NJ metropolitan region.

In addition to policy and program adjustments, many of these challenges or barriers are reflective of underfunded agency needs. FEMA must be funded adequately to meet basic needs as well as effectively support programs to serve communities and fund state, local, and nonprofit partners.

In the following document, you will find this input organized by the questions posed by FEMA in its Request for Information.

Responses to general questions

Question 1: Barriers - Are there FEMA programs, regulations, and/or policies that perpetuate systemic barriers to opportunities and benefits for people of color and/or other underserved groups as defined in Executive Order 13985 and, if so, what are they? How can those programs, regulations, and/or policies be modified, expanded, streamlined, or repealed to deliver resources and benefits more equitably?

FEMA programs intersect with many existing barriers facing people of color and low-income communities, which are related to income inequality, historically racist land use policies, access to home ownership (redlining), and basic services. Historically, lands of lower quality and at higher risk of flooding were among the few options for many Black and low-income communities, a pattern which persists to this day. Overall, a greater understanding of how these historic injustices inform today's risks could help to support a more equitable approach to policy and investment. The following are primary barriers identified by the coalition: Short deadlines for FEMA program applications: for many homeowners in communities comprised of people of color, low-income populations, and immigrant populations, the accessibility of FEMA programs is a challenge. Pamela Pettyjohn, longtime Coney Island resident and President of Coney Island Beautification Project, shared that in her community, information about available FEMA programs did not flow quickly or clearly after Hurricane Sandy. Homeowners were given a 30-day window to sign up for certain support programs, often finding out about those programs after the deadline.

A lack of emergency and essential services disproportionately affecting vulnerable communities: immediately following Hurricane Sandy, a lack of government response significantly impacted community safety and function. Lost cars, electricity, heat, fuel shortages, and flooded and offline subways meant that many people were unable to get to work to earn income, secure critical medical supplies, or otherwise access daily needs for safety and wellbeing. In Red Hook, Tevina Willis, a Brooklyn-based organizer, shared that New York City Housing Authority buildings were without electricity, gas, internet and hot water for one month, requiring residents to take up to 14 flights of stairs and use candles in the hallways.

In many areas, disaster response was initially led by volunteers and local non-government organizations that were able to quickly respond due to local knowledge and community trust. In Red Hook Brooklyn, for example, Red Hook Initiative (RHI) brought in generators, food, and medical resources, and developed a community grid. Like other community organizations across the City, RHI became a volunteer and assistance hub, and even provided battery-operated machines for people with serious respiratory issues. Since 2012, RHI has trained 250 people in the community for emergency preparedness, CPR, and First Aid, providing a stipend for participation.

But resources for these organizations are limited. In New Jersey, Keith Adams, Executive Director of New Jersey Voluntary Organizations Active in Disaster, shared that currently, FEMA only gives non-profits funds for a limited number of purposes after a disaster (e.g. sheltering people, debris removal). Expanding these resources and making them available to community organizations before disaster could fill gaps where FEMA has been unable to reach residents or has been occupied with other simultaneous disasters, as was the case in 2017.

"When we have a disaster, these relationships are already formed. Let's do it before the storm...and identify trusted agents," Adams said. "We need to expand our thinking about what a disaster is... [In emergencies], what we're really called to be is community organizers...Sandy came and those people who were barely getting by are now homeless...those are the relationships that are missed because we are viewing disasters as one-offs," he concluded.

Disparities in information access regarding FEMA programs between poor communities comprised of people of color and whiter, wealthier communities: residents interviewed described disparities in access to FEMA information and inconsistencies in information and resources between communities, providing anecdotal evidence of broader patterns./1

When interviewed, Coney Island resident and President of Coney Island Beautification Project Pamela Pettyjohn shared that she found limited assistance or information available from FEMA following Hurricane Sandy beyond recommendations for mold treatment. Pettyjohn travelled to other neighborhoods to attend community meetings and found that in other neighborhoods, there were several FEMA programs and resources that were not being offered in her community, ranging from technical assistance regarding FEMA maps to home elevation estimates.

Keith Adams, Executive Director of New Jersey Voluntary Organizations Active in Disaster, shared that "historically, FEMA hasn't prioritized direct outreach to impacted communities." Most of FEMA's public assistance and mitigation efforts flow through state block grants, establishing a reliance on the state to reach vulnerable populations. Often, vulnerable populations aren't engaged with state government under normal circumstances, so it is hard for states to engage them post-disaster. Additional resources for information access are needed for under-resourced communities, and those communities must be prioritized.

Challenges with language access and cultural sensitivity: for many immigrant communities, language and trust in government are barriers to participation. After Hurricane Sandy, there were attempts to provide language access, but there was often a lack of locally-appropriate language interpretation, cultural sensitivity, and depth of knowledge. Pamela Pettyjohn, Coney Island resident and President of Coney Island Beautification Project, shared that the translators made available were often not knowledgeable about FEMA policies and programs, and had difficulty answering critical technical questions and effectively assisting in navigating insurance claims - "I saw homes where children - elementary kids - made decisions and conducted business for the family because the parents didn't speak English," she said. In the Lower East Side of Manhattan, an emergency management expert shared that following Hurricane Sandy, FEMA arrived in the neighborhood with Italian interpreters, when Spanish and Chinese were the dominant languages of the neighborhood.

The need for local contextual awareness and cultural sensitivity was echoed by a community development and insurance assistance professional. Following Hurricane Sandy, she observed an initial disparity in the number of claims between Canarsie, a predominantly Black and Immigrant neighborhood in which 40% of residents are foreign-born,/2 and wealthier, whiter neighborhoods, leading to an initial perception by FEMA that Canarsie was less affected. Recognizing that this was more likely a reflection of distrust and lack of information, she subsequently went door to door with her team and found that there had been an enormous unmet need for claims assistance.

Barriers specific to low-income populations: many residents are uninsured due to insurance costs, preventing quick payouts and the ability to recover financially after repairs drain limited financial resources./3

Even when policies are in place, the periods of time between application submission, approval, and disbursement, respectively, are too long for low-income individuals or entities within the community. Ultimately, funds may cover only temporary repairs. Applications require resources like access to a computer and internet, documents (e.g. social security cards, financial statements), or time off work, all of which can be barriers to low-income, immigrant, and elderly residents. An emergency management policy expert interviewed highlighted that even local governments in impoverished areas have had to take out loans while they wait for FEMA funds to reach them.

Last, it is important to acknowledge the cascading health effects of FEMA policies on low-income and marginalized communities. Recurrent flooding increases the occurrence of mold, leading to asthma and other public health issues. An increase in asthma-related hospital visits and fatalities, especially with children, has been documented in North Carolina since 2010./4

These impacts are disproportionate to low-income and minority communities that are more likely to experience recurrent flooding and do not have the resources to properly clean up after a flood event.

Further, a study in Prehospital and Disaster Medicine found a large negative impact of recurrent flood on mental health outcomes and psychological and physical function, likely related to an erosion of social, environmental, and material circumstances./5

In addition, there is an increase in substance abuse and hospitalizations following flood events, specifically with low-income and minority individuals./6

All of these mental health issues induce costs on the health care system.

Recommendations:

Particularly in communities with high populations of people of color, immigrants, and low-income residents:

* Increase the ease of applications and outreach and extend application windows, especially in socially vulnerable communities.

* Increase on-the-ground staff and fund preparedness efforts through locally embedded and trusted community organizations. FEMA's CERT program is a step in the right direction to increasing an on-the-ground community presence. But many organizations are already embedded within communities, have built trust, and are equipped to prepare and coordinate rapid deployment following a disaster.

* Train technically and culturally competent multi-lingual inspectors and translators or create mechanisms for rapidly funding local organizations to provide these services.

* Increase targeted engagement and awareness-building regarding programs and insurance availability and support in communities. Evaluate innovative strategies to expedite payouts to socially vulnerable individuals and entities, such as parametric policies that automatically pay out a percentage based on a triggering event, to provide some resources until a full inspection (if needed) can take place.

Question 2: Resilience - Are there FEMA programs, regulations, and/or policies that do not bolster resilience to impacts of climate change, particularly for those disproportionately impacted by climate change, and, if so, what are they? How can those programs, regulations, and/or policies be modified, expanded, streamlined, or repealed to bolster resilience to the impacts of climate change?

FEMA program eligibility requirements are not adequately focused on climate resilience: historically, eligibility requirements for FEMA funding have not adequately required grantees to address climate resilience (where relevant) in project design./7

Moreover, in addition to not requiring climate resilience, FEMA often declines to pay for climate resilient designs even when the property owner wants to build them.

FEMA risk mapping does not adequately reflect future risks: while FEMA's risk mapping practices reflect the current risk of climate events, they do not adequately reflect future risk. Since 2012, FEMA has been required to include future risk in mapping by the Biggert-Waters Flood Insurance Reform Act of 2012. Accurate mapping of risks is fundamental to the future of FEMA programs. The Department of Homeland Security's Inspector General revealed that 58% of all FEMA flood maps are considered inaccurate or out-of-date./8

It was reported that as little as 17% of homes flooded during Hurricane Harvey had flood insurance, many not even in the flood zone. Over the three decades before Harvey, 47% of the flood claims in the region came from properties outside of the 100-year flood zone./9

This flooding outside of the flood zone disproportionately impacted Black and Hispanic communities in the Houston region./10

Recommendations:

* Integrate a requirement to consider future climate projections in hazard mitigation grant funding criteria.

* Accelerate the updating of NFIP maps to current and future projections of risk across the country, in accordance with the Biggert-Waters Flood Insurance Reform Act of 2012.

Question 3: Environmental Justice - Are there FEMA programs, regulations, and/or policies that do not promote environmental justice? How can those programs, regulations, and/or policies be modified, expanded, streamlined, or repealed to promote environmental justice?

See response and recommendations to General Question 1, Barriers.

Pollution disproportionally impacts marginalized communities: additionally, pollution sources and hazardous substance storage are more likely to be located in communities of color and low-income communities. However, these compounding vulnerabilities and impacts are not adequately factored into assistance programs. FEMA should coordinate extensively with the Environmental Protection Agency's Emergency Planning and Community Right-to-Know Act (EPCRA) program to ensure collaboration and integration of hazardous materials planning and information into FEMA programs in communities of color and low-income communities./11

FEMA's benefit-cost analysis is biased against the underserved: one major opportunity to promote environmental justice is the benefit-cost analysis (BCA) for FEMA's Building Resilient Infrastructure in Communities (BRIC) program. Currently, the BRIC program's BCA is biased against underserved communities. This point was explained thoroughly in public comments submitted by the Enivronmental Defense Fund (EDF) to the Office of Management and Budget./12

The following excerpts from EDF's comments are instructive: ...the BCA for FEMA's BRIC program relies on avoided property losses to estimate benefits. The central challenge is that underserved communities, communities with both high flood risk and increased socioeconomic vulnerability, often do not have the property values to justify costs within [FEMA's BCA framework]. The result is that those in chronically underserved communities most vulnerable to losing their wealth and livelihoods in floods are largely unprotected...Notable economists with deep experience with BCA are in agreement that federal agencies should not be bound by strict benefit-cost tests, and that a good analysis also identifies important distributional consequences.

...Overall, the BRIC program definition [of a small impoverished community] encompasses a very limited number of communities and leaves many underserved communities out. Additionally, tribes are often grouped as one tribal population, even when individual towns or subsets of populations are geographically very rural and separated.

...the benefit-cost ratio (BCR) for FEMA is 1...If chronically underserved communities have lower BCR scores, the BCA policy as currently implemented is less likely to pass proposals from them, leaving the most vulnerable without flood protection.

...Natural infrastructure solutions have the potential to offer direct flood risk-reduction benefits as well as co-benefits to underserved communities. However, since [FEMA BCA] methodologies are required to use the 7% discount rate set by OMB Circular A-9412, even substantial benefits in the medium to long run do not enter meaningfully into the BCA.

The BRIC program BCA requires municipalities and states to estimate the value of ecosystem services. These calculations can be difficult and can require the expertise of expensive outside consultants. This could be a hurdle for underserved communities without funding or access to the necessary expertise to estimate potentially significant but hard-to-quantify benefits.

For all of the above reasons, the BCA for FEMA's BRIC program has been biased against marginalized and low-income communities.

Recommendations:

* Develop strategies that address compounding vulnerabilities like pollution sources and hazardous substance storage into assistance programs.

* Adjust the benefit-cost analysis (BCA) for FEMA's BRIC program in a way that removes the biases against underserved communities.

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Rise to Resilience is a campaign and coalition spearheaded by the Waterfront Alliance. We represent residents, leaders in business, labor community and justice, volunteer organizations, scientists, environmental advocates, and design professionals collectively calling on our federal, state, and local governments to make building climate resilience an urgent priority.

View full comment at: https://downloads.regulations.gov/FEMA-2021-0011-0236/attachment_1.pdf

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Footnotes:

1/ Flavelle, Christopher. June 7, 2021. Why Does Disaster Aid Often Favor White People? The New York Times https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/07/climate/FEMA-race-climate.html

2/ New York City Community District Profiles. https://communityprofiles.planning.nyc.gov/

3/ Dixon, L. et al. 2017. The Cost and Affordability of Flood Insurance in New York City. Rand Corporation.

4/ Bonner, Lynn. "As Mold Grows in the Aftermath of Hurricanes, More NC Asthma Patients Suffer." News & Observer, 20 Oct. 2020, www.newsobserver.com/living/article244970985.html.

5/ Wind, T., Joshi, P., Kleber, R., & Komproe, I. (2013). The Impact of Recurrent Disasters on Mental Health: A Study on Seasonal Floods in Northern India. Prehospital and Disaster Medicine, 28(3), 279-285. doi:10.1017/S1049023X13000290

6/ Moise IK, Ruiz MO. Hospitalizations for Substance Abuse Disorders Before and After Hurricane Katrina: Spatial Clustering and Area-Level Predictors, New Orleans, 2004 and 2008. Prev Chronic Dis 2016;13:160107. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5888/pcd13.160107.

7/ Frank, Thomas. "EXTREME WEATHER: IG: FEMA Never Followed 20-Year-Old Disaster Law." EXTREME WEATHER: IG: FEMA Never Followed 20-Year-Old Disaster Law -- Monday, July 12, 2021, www.eenews.net/stories/1063736879.

8/ FEMA Needs to Improve Management of Its Flood Mapping Programs. Office of Inspector General, Department of Homeland Security, 27 Sept. 2017, www.oig.dhs.gov/sites/default/files/assets/2017/OIG-17-110-Sep17.pdf.

9/ Highfield, Wesley E, et al. "Examining the 100-Year Floodplain as a Metric of Risk, Loss, and Household Adjustment." Wiley Online Library, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd, 22 May 2012, onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1539-6924.2012.01840.x.

10/ Smiley, Kevin T. "Social Inequalities in Flooding inside and Outside of Floodplains during Hurricane Harvey." Environmental Research Letters, IOP Publishing, 15 Sept. 2020, iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/aba0fe.

11/ Emergency Planning and Community Right-to-Know Act (EPCRA). Environmental Protection Agency, www.epa.gov/epcra.

12/ Environmental Defense Fund, Comments to Office of Management and Budget on Methods and Leading Practices for Advancing Equity and Support for Underserved Communities through Government (Jul. 6, 2021). https://www.regulations.gov/comment/OMB-2021-0005-0443

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The notice can be viewed at: https://www.regulations.gov/document/FEMA-2021-0011-0001

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