Midland Daily News: McDonald Rivet, Moolenaar back legislation to expedite FEMA funding
Legislation that creates an expedited timeline for the Federal Emergency Management Agency to reimburse cities for emergency recovery projects has passed through the U.S. House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure.
The bipartisan Rapid Disaster Relief Act was sponsored by Reps. Kristen McDonald Rivet (D-Bay City) and John Moolenaar (R-Caledonia), among others, and comes in the context of the 2020 flooding and dam failures in the Midland area.
“In the wake of the 2020 floods, red tape has delayed FEMA from reimbursing Midland County cities and towns for their work to clear roads and get essential services up and running,” McDonald Rivet said in a press release. “That left small communities with massive debts, and only further delayed the rebuilding process. Our commonsense bill will cut government overregulation and put communities on the fast track to recovery when disasters strike.”
Under the act, FEMA would be required to disburse funds within 120 days of validating 90% of a community’s expenses.
The legislation comes after years of funding delays for both Midland and Gladwin counties, Moolenaar said in the press release.
“The Rapid Disaster Relief Act is a common sense, bipartisan proposal to keep FEMA responsive to the victims of natural disasters and ensure communities in Mid-Michigan do not endure years of delays in receiving disaster relief funding,” said Moolenaar.
Recovery following the May 2020 storm has been slow, especially for Sanford, which was devastated by the flooding.
Sanford Village President Dolores Porte said in June that the community was set to receive $700,000 in long-awaited FEMA funding. Of that money, she told the Daily News on Wednesday, that Sanford has received $400,000 in federal assistance.
In four to six weeks, the village expects to get another $200,000 for about 17 properties it bought in the floodplain, but it is still working on answering questions from FEMA about the funds, according to Porte.
An additional $100,000 remains available to Sanford, but has not been spent. The village wants to use the funds for a boat dock project but is waiting to hear back from FEMA on whether the use will be approved, Porte said.
Porte had not yet been able to review the legislation to comment on it specifically, but said she had been in contact with McDonald Rivet's and Moolenaar's offices with feedback on the FEMA reimbursement process.
Her main piece of feedback was that she wished there had been one point of contact from FEMA for her to consistently be in touch with throughout the process.
“It would've been nice to have somebody at the end with me who was there at the beginning,” Porte said.
As of May, Midland County was also owed approximately $437,000 by FEMA, according to Midland County Administrator/Controller Bridgette Gransden.
On Wednesday, Gransden said she spoke with new FEMA leadership a few months ago in a conversation facilitated by U.S. senators Gary Peters and Elissa Slotkin.
Gransden told the Daily News the county recently learned it had been approved $100,000 in previously denied funding, and had been approved for another $200,000 in funding that it had not expected to be approved for.
Grandsen said she had not yet had time to review the bill, but “at this moment in time, I have nothing but complimentary things to say about the way the current group of team members at FEMA is handling our requests.”