IBTS OnHAND: Online Help & Advice for Natural Disasters
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Before a Disaster
Now is the time to focus on the disaster plan. When no natural disasters are looming, local and state governments and other stakeholders should incorporate disaster planning as an ongoing, scheduled process. Once a natural disaster is imminent, the disaster plan is activated.
In the hours and days following a disaster, communities first prioritize life saving operations in the response phase, then meeting basic needs during the post disaster response. The focus then changes over the next few weeks to helping the community re-establish normal operations during recovery administration.
At the end of the post-disaster response, it may seem like funding options are ending; the FEMA process is now largely complete and funds from that process have been distributed, and initial donations from charitable organizations have also decreased or stopped.
Although communities may feel like they have been abandoned at this stage, the recovery process and funding options for it are largely just beginning. Numerous long-term recovery funding options should be explored, primarily from HUD’s Community Development Block Grant Disaster Recovery (CDBG-DR) program but also from hazard mitigation funding and other sources.
