Federal Emergency Management Agency

For the past seven years, people in Goldendale have worked to build what’s called a microgrid. It could serve as backup power at the local hospital and school district. Then, the Trump administration pulled millions of dollars – all the construction money. FEMA leaders say the grants didn’t lessen hazards nationwide.

After about five years in the works, the Pierce County Council adopted a new Comprehensive Flood Hazard Management Plan that broadens the scope of what kinds of flooding the county will plan for – from coastal to urban flooding. Angela Angove is the floodplain and watershed services manager with Pierce County Planning and Public Works. She said different types of flooding are top of mind for people in the county, recalling the King Tides that caused tidal flooding last December.

Homeowners in Whatcom County have been waiting nearly two years for relief from flooding that devastated communities in northwest Washington and parts of Canada — and now, they have to wait even longer.Federal funding was supposed to come this week for 12 homeowners whose houses were destroyed during the November 2021 flooding. However, it’s been delayed, again.

A team of search and rescue personnel based out of the Pierce County Department of Emergency Management deployed to Hawaii Friday after President Joe Biden ordered federal aid to the state to help areas impacted by devastating wildfires.The 45-person FEMA team is made up of emergency responders and other professionals trained in search and rescue from Pierce and King counties.

NPR analyzed records from a Federal Emergency Management Agency database of more than 40,000 buyouts and found that most went disproportionately to whiter communities.

More than two months after the Camp Fire, the small city of Chico, Calif. is struggling to handle an influx of an estimated 20,000 new people from neighboring Paradise.

Tyndall Air Force base, home to 11,000 airmen and their families, sustained catastrophic damage when Hurricane Michael came through earlier this month. Residents don't know if they will ever go back.

Government and nonprofit agencies work in advance of storms to create distribution networks for critical aid, but the Category 4 storm damaged key communications and transportation infrastructure.