Dive Brief:
- The Federal Emergency Management Agency on Monday announced that communities can apply for a total of $1.35 billion in grants to build climate resilience.
- The Building Resilient Infrastructure and Communities annual grant program is offering a total of $750 million, and the Flood Mitigation Assistance program is offering $600 million for projects that reduce flood risk.
- Local governments, states, tribes and territories can submit applications for the grant programs until 3 p.m. ET on April 18. FEMA plans to host webinars detailing changes made to the grant programs for the current grant cycle.
Dive Insight:
Heat waves, storms, floods, droughts and wildfires are becoming more frequent and intense as the effects of climate change progress. The annual number of billion-dollar disasters in the U.S. has risen in recent years, with 24 such events occurring last year as of Nov. 1, 2024.
The FMA grant program was created in 1994 by Congress through funding from the National Flood Insurance Program. The BRIC program is much newer, having launched in fiscal year 2020. Both programs are supported by the 2021 bipartisan infrastructure law, which invested more than $4.5 billion total into them through fiscal year 2026.
FEMA has received large numbers of applications for these programs in the past. In March 2024, the agency said communities that applied in that fiscal cycle requested a total of almost $8 billion — more than quadruple the $1.8 billion FEMA had available between the two programs.
FEMA has received criticism from some stakeholders that disadvantaged communities may not have the capacity to apply for and administer large grants under BRIC or meet cost-share requirements. One 2023 analysis by nonprofit research group Headwaters Economics found that the BRIC program distributes funds unevenly across the nation, with larger cities that have more resources tending to be the most successful at securing funding.
To distribute grants across more geographic areas in this funding cycle, FEMA is applying a $150 million cap per applicant on total available BRIC funding. “This will help to ensure a more diverse distribution of BRIC funds across the nation,” the agency said in a press release.
The funding announcement comes in the weeks leading up to President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration on Jan. 20. Trump’s pick to run the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees FEMA, is South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem. Politico reports that Noem has been skeptical of climate change and did not claim or pursue certain FEMA resilience funding for her state.
