FEMA’s Hazard Mitigation Grants
A smart practice that makes us safer before the next disaster
“In policy analysis a ‘best’ or ‘smart’ practice is a clear and concrete behavior that solves a problem or achieves a goal. Smart practices take ‘advantage’ of an idle opportunity at a low cost and little risk.”
One of the smart practices in homeland security today is the Federal Emergency Management Administration’s (FEMA) Hazard Mitigation Grant Program (HMGP). Following a disaster declaration, Section 404 of the Stafford Act funds the HMGP for state, local, and tribal agencies, plus community members represented by them. The goal of the program is to provide local communities with federal grant funds for projects that reduce risk to life and property from future disasters to reduce reliance on federal disaster funds. A guidance document for grant applicants is updated every few years, and outlines the grant process.
A case exemplar for this smart practice is a computerized early warning system that permits emergency workers to mass call residents by phone in the event of an emergency or evacuation in Jackson County, Texas. The grant was announced after Hurricane Rita. It funded a reverse 911 plan that also allows residents to sign up their phones for alerts. It was awarded as a mitigation plan for all hazards, not just hurricanes. It mitigates disaster risk for people and property when an early warning of storm or emergency can be sent to the public.
In his Smart Practices Research, author Eugene Bardach explains that characterizing a smart practice should be “generic and flexible, not prescriptive.” The grant program itself is generic and flexible by design. The HMGP is successful as a smart practice for several reasons.
First, the HMGP does not dictate to local communities the mitigation steps that need to be taken. Rather, it leaves to the local communities the determination of the strategies, methods, and projects that mitigate the risks facing the state and local agencies that those agencies know best. Applicant agencies know best the disaster risks in their own communities, and they understand what mitigation programs should be undertaken against those risks. They identify the risks, mitigating steps, and network with local stakeholders to come up with a grant application. That makes the HMGP a locally executed program that varies by disaster and locality, which is a key function of a smart practice according to Bardach: “It should be left to local implementers to figure out the details.”
Second, this FEMA grant program is designed to ensure that grant applicants have a vested interest in the success of the mitigation plan being funded by the grant, since 25% of the cost was borne by the applicant agency or non-government source. The HMGP-funded hazard mitigation plan within the local community at 75% of the cost. In Jackson County, a private source funded the nongovernment portion of the plan. This incorporates a savings to the government in two ways. Financially, the plan will cost the government a quarter less. But furthermore, it enjoys the free lunch Bardach explains is core to a smart practice. Since the community is investing in the plan as well, it has a greater opportunity for success and less vulnerability for failure. The partnership naturally created by the joint funding between FEMA and the community insulates the smart practice from wasteful spending that may not reduce recovery costs after a future disaster.
Third, communities must demonstrate that the savings obtained from the mitigation being undertaken is greater than the cost of the HMGP funding. This increases the likelihood that the investment from the grant will reduce future reliance on disaster relief funds — a chief goal of the program. By demonstrating the funded mitigation plan will save more than it costs, the applicant community is encouraged to be comprehensive in its application, which could include metrics to demonstrate success. Therefore, by estimating success in the grant application, the applicant has increased the chances of the mitigation plan succeeding.
Fourth, FEMA has made the program a smart practice by broadening the grant awards to applications with an all hazards approach. The disaster at hand, which was the subject of the declaration creating the funding in the first place, is not necessarily the most likely recurring disaster that needs mitigation. By requiring an all hazards approach, the HMGP enjoys increased effectiveness in reducing reliance on future disaster funds.
Finally, an obvious fifth reason that HMGP is a smart practice is that it helps a community prepare in advance of the next disaster, which reduces reliance on post-disaster relief funds that would be needed.
The core idea embodied in the smart practice of the Hazard Mitigation Grant Program is that investment in preparedness for future disasters yields less reliance on federal disaster funds. The HMGP is a smart practice that takes advantage of ‘community will’ to mitigate future risks to life and property. It is this community will that represents Bardach’s ‘latent opportunity’ leveraged in the grant program. Since the HMGP funds mitigation plans that are intended to reduce future reliance on federal disaster funds, it “creates value on the cheap” for the government — a base criteria of a smart practice for disaster preparedness and an excellent example of government success which can be modeled in other homeland security government grant programs.
