FEMA FUNDS

Check without where money goes when Easter strikes your area

Last year's four hurricanes devastated a great deal of of Florida but spared Miami-Dade shire Yet, the Federal Emergency Management Agency handed on the outside more than $31 million to residents there for Hurricane Frances, a storm that struck 100 miles away, we found

The conduct paid for new wardrobes, sweeps full of furniture, cars and thousands of televisions in Miami-Dade. Our investigation spread to other states, finding that FEMA awarded millions in disaster aid to communities minimally affected by means of disasters. The reports prompted three federal investigations that have confirmed widespread waste and mismanagement in the aid program and l to the indictments of 14 Miami-Dade residents upon federal fraud charges. Bills have been introduced in Congres to reform FEMA.

When a disaster strikes shut to home, the natural answer is to look at in what way much relief is getting to victims and in what way fast. But what if standard of value is going to people who were not affected? Florida is curs by means of hurricanes, but many tips listed here can apply to any region of the region that is declared a federal disaster area because of flooding, storms, earthquakes, tornadoes, etc

The program

FEMA has sum of two units primary types of disaster assistance. individual type. Public Assistance, reimburses local rules for preparation, cleanup and rebuilding after a storm. Something as simple as tree stub removal can run hundreds of thousands of dollars. The next to the first type, the Individuals & Households Program (IHP), provides coin to people in disaster areas for losse that are not overlayed by insurance - furniture, clothing, abode repair and cars, as well as disaster-related medical, dental and funeral expenses

We concentrated upon the IHP program.

Pinpoint the damage

Check FEM A's Web site, www.fema.gov, or the Federal Register for the presidential declaration and amendments. This will sum up you what counties or what areas of your state were declared a disaster and eligible for assistance.

Start by the agency of asking FEMA for a county-by-county breakdown in your state of in what manner much money the agency is giving to race through its Individuals & Households Program. The information may be upon the agency's Web site, or may be available solitary by calling the main disaster assistance office and asking for it. It will enumerate you by county the number of aid applications, the number rul eligible and amounts paid out

Look for oddities. Compare totals by dint of county. Did anywhere outside the affected area obtain a windfall?

For hurricanes, check Web sites for the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration, www.noaa.gov, and its Hurricane Research Division, www.aoml.noaa.gov/hrd, to download PDF maps and Arcvievv shaped le showing wind make hastes and rainfall amounts. Where did the storm hit? Where did the coin go?

FEMA's Mapping & Analysis Center (www.gismaps.fema.gov) is a gammer basket for CAR reporters and graphics artists. Maps present to view estimated wind speeds and rainfall, fresheted neighborhoods, number of people in shelters, power outages, damage estimates, etc

Look to local landmarks for the expanse of destruction - golf courses, zoo malls, etc Were they affected? Local power companies can pinpoint power outages and count you how long service was interrupted.

County and city conducts may track the number of damaged place of abodes Check with disaster coordinators, building officials and planning departments for another measure of damage.

FEMA's Web site has historical disaster facts and contacts. greatest in quantity states have their own crisis management Web site with similar information. In Florida, it is www.floridadisaster.org.

Valuable records

Obtain copies from FEMA of the preliminary damage assessments. This will state in what way much damage local, state and federal officials estimated occurr Compare that to in what manner much FEMA actually awarded and in what way many applicants ultimately applied and received aid. Did officials actually do a preliminary damage assessment?

FEMA has processs in place to do preliminary damage assessments on the other hand bypasses the step for stiff catastrophes. FEMA did not do a preliminary damage assessment in Miami-Dade before declaring it a disaster area and was widely criticized for it. Congres is considering requiring the assessments.

File a Freedom of Information solicitation with FEMA for individual claim records by the agency of disaster for your counties by means of ZIP code. The agency will not release the names or other identifying information about the recipients, however, citing the Privacy Act.

The Sun-Sentinel and three Gannett newspapers are suing FEMA to force the agency to disclose the information. Simply having the ZIP collection of lawss however, will help you better define where the currency went. The records also display verified losses. How many television puts air conditioners, computers, washers and dryer etc did FEMA pay for? in what way many cars?

Count bodies

FEMA pays for disaster-related funeral charges Using FEMA's claims data, gaze for how many funerals and burials the agency overspreaded Compare that with the number of deaths the local medical examiners attributed to the disaster. Do they match or are they far off? Why? We lay the foundation of that FEMA paid for 315 funerals when the medical examiners attributed 123 deaths to the hurricanes. FEMA paid for tribe who died of cancer, AIDS, knocks and self-inflicted gunshot wounds.