By Calvin Biesecker
The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) is considering giving its regional administrations a greater role in the grant processes for states and localities, although how this role will evolve has yet to be determined and may differ from region to region, an agency official told Congress yesterday.
FEMA is creating a working group of headquarters staff, its 10 regions, and various state and local stakeholders and will host a teleconference in late July and then a face-to- face meeting in early August to better define how the grant process can be regionalized, Elizabeth Harman, assistant administrator for FEMA’s Grant Programs Directorate, told the House Homeland Security Subcommittee on Emergency Communications, Preparedness and Response.
Rep. Laura Richardson (D-Calif.), chairman of the subcommittee, agrees with FEMA Administrator Craig Fugate’s goals of giving regions more authority to respond to disasters and said it makes sense for the regions to monitor how grant monies are being spent, but that’s it.
“It’s not clear to me how handing control of the grants over to the regions will improve FEMA’s grant management functions,” Richardson said in her opening statement. “GPD also must work with DHS components like the Coast Guard for port security grants. Adding FEMA Regions to the mix of actors threatens to overly-complicate critical infrastructure grant programs.”
However, one city emergency management official said that having more involvement by the FEMA Regions in the grant process would be a good thing.
The established relationships between FEMA’s regional officials and state and local officials are valuable and would help with the monitoring of grant projects and with overcoming hurdles in the process, MaryAnn Tierney, director of Emergency Management for Philadelphia, testified.
Harman said that in her vision of the potential grant process, most of the functions leading up to and including grant awards would be managed by FEMA headquarters. But once an award is made, and FEMA has supplied the “rules and tools” for implementing an award, the regional authorities “can truly be that face to face contact with the grantees.”
The final approach will be established through the new working group, Harman said. The regional administrators are excited to be part of developing this new process, she added.
As for when the new grant process will be ready, Harman said she isn’t in a rush, in part because of staffing shortages within FEMA, and because of the need to ensure that she gets all the input she needs.
“It’s very much a work in progress,” Harman said.
Still, she hopes it can be rolled out for FY ’11.