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New FEMA policy shifts could shift disaster costs to local governments, county emergency manager warns
Summary
The county’s new emergency management director briefed council on recent federal FEMA changes that could raise the state disaster threshold, pause preparedness grants and reduce federal mitigation funding; council unanimously empowered the administrator to pursue a set of preparedness and financial resilience actions.
Justin Pierce, Charleston County’s new director of Emergency Management, told council May 8 that recent federal policy changes and administrative actions have the potential to shift a larger share of disaster recovery and preparedness costs to state and local governments.
Pierce described three core federal shifts: (1) the federal government is proposing to push more responsibility for preparedness and recovery to state and local governments, (2) the administration is aligning and pausing preparedness grants while reevaluating priorities, and (3) FEMA is refocusing on what it calls “catastrophic” disasters, which could raise the cost threshold for a federal major…
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