Robbie Westbrook, representing county emergency management, summarized Pickens County’s five-year hazard mitigation plan update at a work session, explaining how the plan affects the county’s eligibility for FEMA mitigation grants and describing practical limits on using those funds.

Westbrook said the federal Disaster Hazard Mitigation Act requires states and counties to develop and maintain mitigation plans; without an approved plan, local governments are ineligible for FEMA mitigation funding. He explained that once the county and its municipalities (the city of Jasper, Falcon Rock and Nelson) approve the updated plan, the jurisdiction again becomes eligible to apply for mitigation funding but must provide a local match for any awarded project.

“While the funding stream will be available to us, we still have to be careful about moving forward,” Westbrook said, noting that typical mitigation grants are structured with a 75 percent federal share and a 25 percent local match. He added that the county must weigh cost-benefit and its ability to provide the required local funds before applying. Westbrook also emphasized that FEMA’s grant process can be slow: projects applied for years earlier can take multiple years to secure approval, and some grants the county applied for previously were approved only after local funds had already been spent on the work.

The plan identifies potential mitigation projects — largely public-works projects such as elevating frequently damaged roads, replacing repeatedly failing culverts with more resilient crossings and other drainage improvements — and county staff said they have identified five additional projects to add to the plan once the commission approves it. Westbrook and Public Works staff member Kirk discussed the repetitive-loss logic FEMA uses to prioritize projects: if engineering shows elevating a road would stop repeated damage, that project may qualify as mitigation.

Commissioners asked about the availability of other local funds to meet grant-match requirements and whether previously awarded mitigation funds could be redirected; staff said matches can sometimes be covered by other local sources if the project fits the approved project list and that the state occasionally adds additional match funding but that these arrangements vary by program. Westbrook said mitigation grants are not an immediate fix, and urged the commission to keep an active project queue to be ready when grant windows open.

Westbrook also noted county emergency-preparedness work ahead of a forecasted storm, urged residents to sign up for the county’s CodeRED alert service and to follow Pickens County Emergency Management on Facebook for updates from the National Weather Service. He said the weather-service confidence for an approaching event will increase in the 48–72 hour window, and that county crews had pretreated critical routes in anticipation.

No formal action was taken on the plan at the work session; staff asked the commission to place the plan on an upcoming regular meeting agenda for approval so the county and its municipalities can regain full eligibility for FEMA mitigation funding and add prioritized projects to the plan.