This line from a story in the New York Times today triggered a lot of questions about how FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Agency) works when disaster strikes in sparsely populated places, aka #rural America. The story is about the massive Bootleg fire in rural southeast Oregon. More than 160 homes have destroyed there. But given that it's the biggest fire in the country right now at 413,000 acres burned, that could be stated as just 160 homes. And that ratio of homes to land area illustrates how sparsely populated the region is. The story's dateline is Beatty, Oregon, a Census Designated Place in Klamath County.
Here's what got me thinking about what seems perversely wrong with FEMA--perversely wrong given the correlation between wildfire and rurality:
In the aftermath of the fire, Mr. Valens and Ms. Golden are uncertain whether they and others who lost their homes will receive any state or federal aid. In a meeting with President Biden and a group of governors on Friday, Gov. Kate Brown of Oregon asked the president for flexibility in using federal disaster-relief money in sparsely populated areas, which are currently ineligible for Federal Emergency Management Agency funding, a spokesman said.
Mr. Valens is Marc Valens, a retired environmental attorney. Ms. Golden is his wife, Anne Golden, a business consultant. Lucky for them, they have a second home a few hours away in Ashland.
Why would the status quo be a lack of flexibility "in using federal disaster-relief money in sparsely populated areas"? This seems illogical given the association of disaster with rural places.
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