The News & Observer by Nora O’Neill, Danielle Battaglia, David Catanese, and Luciana Perez Uribe Guinassi

Reports of job cuts at two federal agencies helping North Carolina recover from some $60 billion in storm damage are prompting calls for relief aid to keep coming.

Multiple news outlets this week reported potential job losses for the Federal Emergency Management Agency and U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Each is a primary player helping Western North Carolina put itself back together after remnants of Hurricane Helene struck last fall.

U.S. Sen. Thom Tillis said he supports cuts and FEMA reform if it speeds up the process of getting food and housing assistance to Helene victims.

“If it’s with an eye towards more efficiency, resiliency, great,” said Tillis, a Republican. “If it’s an eye towards cutting funding to Western North Carolina, not great.”

Like Tillis, Chimney Rock Mayor Peter O’Leary said he doesn’t have a clear idea as to how the cuts could impact recovery in the small town that was largely destroyed by Helene.

“We’re isolated, but we’ve got such huge problems and issues that we’re working on very hard,” he said. “I really don’t know what’s going on or how that’s going to affect the whole operation.”

Shortly after the storm, different FEMA employees would visit Chimney Rock, making it difficult to make progress in recovery efforts while often working with new FEMA employees, O’Leary said. Now that the town has worked with the same representatives for a while, he said he hopes they don’t get changed out again and stall progress.

Reports of the job cuts at FEMA and potential cuts at HUD surfaced the same week that North Carolina Gov. Josh Stein requested a lot more money: an additional $19 billion in federal assistance beyond the $15 billion already expected to come from Congress.

“While the reports of these cuts to HUD are concerning, the governor has had a number of productive conversations this week on recovery efforts and will continue to engage with the administration and our federal partners to ensure there are no delays in this critical funding,” said Kate Frauenfelder, a spokesperson for the Democratic governor.

Two groups of Democrats have penned letters demanding answers from Republican President Donald Trump and the HUD secretary about the potential cuts and urging them to reconsider any firings. Congressional Democrats said they worry about how the cuts could affect the department’s ability to carry out disaster relief efforts, particularly in Western North Carolina.

“You are personally familiar with the scale of the devastation in the region, having visited the disaster area within your first week in office,” Triangle Reps. Deborah Ross and Valerie Foushee and Charlotte Rep. Alma Adams wrote to Trump. “During your well-publicized visit, you promised to help the people of our great state. It is reprehensible that your administration would consider such drastic cuts to the federal agency responsible for providing that desperately need help.”

Spokespeople with the White House and the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees FEMA, did not respond to inquiries.

“This is part of the challenge, which is there’s no transparency about what they’re doing,” said Max Stier, the president and CEO of the Partnership for Public Service. “The reality is that they’re hiding the ball ... and they’re avoiding accountability for it in that way and making it real difficult for people to put it together. There’s plainly no master plan, there’s plainly no forethought. This is ad-hoc cutting and non-strategic and arbitrary.”

What’s happening where?

FEMA fired over 200 probationary employees from the agency over this week, and emails from top employees at FEMA indicate the Trump administration is on track to fire even more, according to reporting from Politico.

The emails indicate any employee who works primarily on issues related to climate, environmental justice, and diversity, equity and inclusion is at risk of firing, Politico reported. The email notes that the change would impact the majority of staff members.

And staff at the Office of Community Planning and Development, part of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, could be cut by 84% under the Trump administration, The New York Times reported this week.

This office manages the Community Development Block Grant Disaster Recovery grants fund, which helps provide money to states, local governments, and more to support long-term recovery after major disasters.

It has released a plan for how to use these funds, and the public can comment on it until March 19. Once the plan is finalized, it must be submitted to HUD for approval.

Another blow to FEMA?

Although the FEMA employees reportedly being targeted do not appear to be staff conducting on-the-ground recovery efforts, such change is concerning for an agency that has been understaffed for years, said Chris Currie, head of a department at the Government Accountability Office that oversees FEMA and other emergency management agencies.

“It’s obviously not going to have a good effect on morale at the agency, just like it’s not going to have a good effect on morale at all these other agencies where this is happening,” Currie said in an interview with the Charlotte Observer. “I think we’re particularly concerned about FEMA, because we’ve recorded over the years that they’re consistently short of their staffing goals.”

In 2022, FEMA’s disaster workforce was understaffed by 35%, Currie said. Retention, recruitment and morale has been a persistent challenge for the agency, he said.

FEMA has a list of hundreds of ongoing disasters it needs to respond to, Currie said. When understaffed, aid to previous disasters can get pushed aside to direct resources toward more recent and immediate needs. And disasters are becoming more frequent, he said.

“When you add all these recent disasters, you’re adding it on top of an already massive disaster recovery workload that they’re managing every day,” Currie said. “They just don’t have enough people with all the right qualifications.”

The Department of Homeland Security also fired four nonprobationary FEMA employees last week including Chief Financial Officer Mary Comans, CNN reported. The move came after Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency spent time interviewing FEMA employees and reviewing agency files.

Link to full article: https://www.newsobserver.com/news/politics-government/article300665294.html