desire that you and i do. they also have this desire to be reelected. once that entitlement is put in place, then the game has changed. interest groups form around protecting that entitlement, pressing for more assistance. money starts flowing to politicians who protect those benefits and the game changes. >> john cogan on u.s. federal entitlement programs. sunday night at 8:00 eastern on c-span's q&a. >> wednesday morning, we are live in tallahassee, florida for the next step on the 50 capital ss tour. >> next, fema administrator

outlines the disaster relief funding request. he testified before the house appropriations subcommittee. >> we will call this hearing to order. we are welcoming the administrator of the federal emergency management agency, mr. brock long, here to discuss the response recovery to hurricanes harvey, irma, and maria, as well as the wildfires that spread across california. thank you very much for being here and joining us. i want to thank you and the thousands of fema personnel who

have deployed and continue to work tirelessly to help communities and families get back on their feet in the wake of devastating events. congress has passed two y supplementals which have provided an additional $46 billion to ensure fema's ability to respond to the aftermath of such disasters. while some of these efforts are already underway, there is still a very long road ahead. today, we look forward to hearing from you on how this third supplemental request will enable the communities to start down the path, the long path of long-term recovery. mr. long, before i get to you, i want to introduce my ranking

member, who is a good friend. >> thank you, mr. chairman, and good morning, mr. administrator and welcome to your first appearance before the subcommittee. i wish it were not necessitated by the hurricanes that prompted -- thirdistrator supplemental funding request in the last few months. but we are nevertheless a good to spend a some time with you to get your perspective on fema's response and recovery activities and the challenges that lie ahead. i know this has been a difficult time for your agency. you were at fema for only a few months when hurricane harvey struck the gulf coast followed close behind by irma and maria. i would be remiss if i did not mention the wildfires that devastated large parts of california, my home state. we want to help support the efforts of fema personnel and we want to make sure that fema's programs are working to support recovery efforts, particularly

in puerto rico because of the level of devastation there and the fiscal challenges it was already facing. again, we appreciate your joining us this morning and i look forward to a productive discussion. rep. carter: we are also joined by the full committee member, ms. lowey. >> administrator long, thank you for being here and all your hard work assisting the states and u.s. territories that have suffered recently. there have been more than 50 major disaster declarations so far in 2017. 20 of them were for disasters that have occurred since your confirmation, including hurricanes harvey, irma, and maria.

after superstorm sandy, it was very difficult to garnish support for the disaster assistance we needed and i remember that very clearly. there are similar concerns now about the adequacy of funding proposed by the administration for this supplemental, particularly with regards to puerto rico, which has faced significant fiscal challenges for some time. it is my hope that today we could have a productive discussion about how fema can best help those impacted by harvey, irma and maria. with a particular focus on how to assist puerto rico with a vital repairs and improvements to the system, water infrastructure, transportation system and other important infrastructure. the traditional fema programs will only bring puerto rico just so far. and it will be important for us to understand what the limits are and what additional flexibilities might be helpful.

for recovery beyond the scope of fema programs, we need to understand fema's role in determining unmet needs that will need assistance from other federal agencies. it is simply not acceptable to restore infrastructure and public facilities to predisaster condition's, especially in puerto rico, which suffered unprecedented damages. we must use assistance funding to mitigate the impacts of future disasters, or else we will find ourselves in this exact position in short order when the next hurricane blows through, forcing taxpayers to pay more because investments were not made in an appropriate time. resiliency is the only sensible path forward. so, administrator long, i want to thank you for being here today and i look forward to this discussion. thank you, mr. chairman. >> thank you, ms lowey.

>> the people of southeast texas suffered more than we have -- certainly, in my memory. we had over 52 inches of rain, and over 150,000 homes flooded, a number of people -- tens of thousands of people in my district are living on the second floor of their homes with the first floor torn out because they don't have anywhere else to go. we, all of us, are immensely grateful to the work that fema has done to help the people of eastern and southeast texas, who suffered from this catastrophic rain event and to all the volunteers that came from all over the country. one of the silver linings to the storm or the people who showed up spontaneously with food, supplies, water.

i am specifically grateful to the people of the navy that just showed up with boats and food and jambalaya. i did not even know there was such a thing as the cajun navy. we all found ourselves in houston doing what had to be done to help our neighbors and friends. that is one of the reasons i am so proud to represent the community of people who looks to our neighbors, our faith and our state to help each other, but the federal government's role is it essential and administrator long, we appreciate the work that fema has done. we are grateful for the help that you provided, but a lot more has to be done and without you directly addressing the disaster relief fund, i want to say at the outset that the request is woefully inadequate. it is embarrassing. it is deeply embarrassing to the people of texas to see that the largest housing disaster, there is not one time recommended for housing relief in the request. so, we are very grateful to speaker ryan and the chairman

for opening up this process to make sure the appropriations committee is the one that makes a decision on what the people in the nation need in response to this hurricane. on this committee, we always have and we will once again make the decision on what is necessary to heal the people of texas, the people of florida and the people of puerto rico and virgin islands from this storm. we look forward to working with you in my colleagues to be sure that the people of the united states who suffered are made whole. thank you. >> administrator long, at this time, you will make your statement. we have a written copy. we ask that you try to limit yourself to five minutes because we have a lot of questions coming your way. mr. long: mr. chairman, members of the committee, it is an honor to be here today. it marks the end of the 2017 hurricane season. the word unprecedented does not do it justice.

i want to start by thanking the members of the committee and members of congress for considering the first two supplemental. it is vital funding and we are in the middle of a third request, which i will get to. for 97 days we have been actively responding around the clock. and just to -- not only to harvey, irma, maria, as well as the california wildfires, but right now we are working 30 one disasters across the country in 21 different jurisdictions. my staff is tapped out. they worked around the clock and bust their rear ends every day to help those in need. we are doing the best we can do to move as quickly as we can. this has been the longest activation in fema's history and i am externally proud to work with the members of fema and we have a long way to go in the spirit of improvement.

i have many ideas and i have not had the chance to catch my breath. some of my ideas i can do with my own authority and some will require changes to the stafford act. just those four events impacted 25 million people. you know, in a 97 day time period, we put almost 5 million people into the individual assistance program. to put that into context, that is greater than sandy, katrina and wilma combined. it is a tenfold increase over what we did last year for the entire fiscal year. while these statistics -- i could go on, while we put 80,000 people in hotels in texas for harvey alone, i could go on with it though statistics. the nation needs to stop and take a deep breath and figure out how we collectively become more resilient. not just fema, but it is the whole community, trying to figure how we better utilize from the cajun navy to the federal emergency agency.

i am ready to change the face of emergency management in the way we tackle emergency in this nation. it will require your help as well. today we have received roughly 42 billion when you include not only the drf funding, but the nsip debt forgiveness and disaster loan funding and now we are asking for $23.5 billion. this is a tremendous amount of money. protecting the taxpayer dollars is of utmost importance, as well as saving lives. i get it. in this third supplemental, we are asking for special provisions that we need congress to consider. we need outcome based planning. you are asking for puerto rico to have an integrated recovery plan with clear outcomes so we are not just throwing money at recovery.

we have an outcome in mind going into this. the next thing is i am also asking for additional authorities, particularly around puerto rico. the stafford act allows me to rebuild communities to a predisaster standard, which would not be prudent. we are facing massive amounts of antiquated infrastructure. the average age of the power plants is 41 years old. globally the average age is 18 years old, as i understand it. when fema comes into this situation, i will need additional authorities to be able to put by puerto rico in a resilient or prudent manner based on what we does we are not here again having the same committee hearing about not only maria. the real question for me is, it is time to question, what is fema's role? what can we adequately handle as an agency? let's hit the reset button and let's carve out what every level of government and the community

should be responsible for. fema is not designed to be the first and only responder and a disaster, but that is where we find ourselves and we have got to fix that problem. doing so fixes the whole community issues that we face and bringing up a level of resilience. i have numerous ideas. starting first with the recovery is too complex, too fragmented. funding comes from too many different federal agencies, down to the local level. and it's difficult to understand what you are entitled to. it leads to confusion and frustration on your part, the citizen's part, and the disaster survivors' part. it is time to streamline the government's part down to the local level to achieve the governor and the local government's goals and responsibilities, not my goals and responsibilities.

we have to increase predisaster mitigation. you have got to get hit to have access to hundreds of millions of dollars of mitigation funding. that is reversed. it is backwards. it does not make sense. we need to move 404 section money out of the stafford act, where people can play not mitigation strategies, rather than having to get hit and then figure out how to do mitigation. the formula needs to be changed. we ask to make sure state and local governments have the ability to push out life-sustaining commodity distribution. they cannot be just on the shoulders of the federal emergency management agency to push food and water out. every state should have a capability. large states should have the capability. we should be able to back that capability, not supported fully. we have to make sure we find low to no cost ways to implement a true culture of preparedness.

we don't have it. and it is time to hit the reset button on how we become more resilient, not only at the citizen level, because citizens are the true first responder. they are the true first responder in an active shooter event, when a tornado hits, or when a flood occurs. we need to give tangible skills, how to be properly insured as a homeowner and business owner. we have to fix the business process. i run a program that is structurally broken will stop it goes into debt every time we have a major event and i have to ask for supplemental. we continue to go into debt. trina forced it into debt. sandy forced into debt. harvey, irma forced into debt. we have to fix the structure of that framework. i run a program that is not financially solvent. i have about 100 more ideas that i could share and i look forward to working with you, but i am here in the spirit of improvement and i look forward to having a fruitful discussion today. thank you.

>> thank you, that was very spectacular. i love that outside the box thinking. let me remind our panel here, we are going to be on the clock. we are going to try to sift through it. i will do a little cruising over, but not a lot. well, that was bliss. i would love to hear the other 100 ideas you have got. and let's hope we can figure out a way to do those things. we've been -- that's -- so, you started off with the big picture. that's right where we need to start. here's the concerned, the big picture. what's the status of fema at this time and the impact it takes on response and recovery in this year's hurricanes.

what do you anticipate your biggest challenges will be in the coming months and how do you plan to address them? with more than 80% of fema's workforce currently deployed. are you concerned with fema's ability to respond if another catastrophic event occurs? mr. long: great question. in regards to harvey and irma, we are rolling forward the initial recovery and long-term recovery phases. the biggest challenges that face us are housing, obviously. congressman, you hit the nail on the head. there are not enough travel trailers and in some cases, hotels to service. fema is not a housing expert, by the way. i often question if fema should be in charge of disaster recovery housing, and that is another discussion we should have. it is on my plate and we work with it everyday. housing is tremendously different, not just from texas,

but the california wildfires, which is one of the most disturbing events i have ever been a part of it my career, and based on the urban nature of those wildlife fires. the housing mission is tremendously different there because there is nothing to rebuild. it has been burned completely down, versus where we have to go into harvey and understand what anmbi rebuild. apartments that could be available. so, in puerto rico, it is an antiquated power system that we are trying to figure out day and and day out. the complexities of it being an island in the logistical complexities ants to it. everything we do in puerto rico is hard. that is not a complaint, it is just a reality. so, power and housing is also a

problem in puerto rico. if you are trying to fix homes in puerto rico, putting a blue tarp on a house is not easy because there is not a structure to connect it to. you have to first rebuild the structure before you put the blue tarp on it. in many cases, it is try to figure out who owns the home. those are issues that are there. we are having to delicately deal with millions of dollars of taxpayer money. one of the things i have recognized that we have to improve is oversight and grants management, which is a responsibility of the entire community, not just fema. we have got to increased the grants management, provide more training as to how this funding rights. but we have to solve this fragmented recovery from different types of money coming from female or the federal highway, wherever it comes from with different policies, different rules and it just said everybody up for failure in the long run.

and we never trained people have to utilize the funding that comes down from the federal government and the best way possible. here is what you are entitled to. here is what your goals are. let's grab the money you need and put it to work in concert in an efficient and effective matter. there is a lot we have to talk about. housing is going to be the most difficult mission ahead of us. rep. carter: that is an excellent -- to respond, this year's disaster activity and in my understanding, there is $33.5 billion requested in the supplemental funding.

why does this funding in fy-18 in puerto rico and the virgin islands -- and you plan to submit another supplemental in addition to support these disasters? mr. long: that is another excellent question. we are performing our due diligence. it is hard to project what the true cost will be after fy-18. as we transition to recovery and we are asking puerto rico to have an integrated outcome based plan for the recovery effort. it helps to project what we need. we also, as we get into recovery based on what a governor might ask for when a disaster happens, we try to estimate out. i think if we go beyond 2018, i don't think the estimates we will provide you will be remotely accurate based on the work and that is why we decided to stay there. >> administrator long, the administration has proposed

giving you discretion to waive the predisaster condition limitation on public assistant grants for puerto rico and to fund the repair of a replacement of public facility components that were not damaged. replacing them is essential to restoring the overall facility. can you talk more about why this facility is needed in the case of puerto rico. do you expect it will help speed up recovery efforts? did you consider extending this to the u.s. virgin islands as well and if not, why not? mr. long: in regards to puerto rico. i am concerned i don't have the authority to implement recovery in a manner that is needed. because where fema gets in trouble is when we start fixing issues that were not damaged as a result of the actual disaster. if you take the roadway system inside puerto rico, there are

plenty of deferred maintenance issues where the system was not maintained for the roadways. they were damages there before the storm and in some cases, as a result of the storm passing through, the damages are increased because of a lack of maintenance. if i fix infrastructure that has not been maintained, then oig comes back and rightfully so says, hold on a minute, is this the federal government's responsibility or should this be on the backs of the local and state government? in this case with puerto rico we are running into some and he deferred maintenance issues with regards to the entire infrastructure and antiquated systems that i don't think you can put it back to a predisaster stance. i am working with the authorities i have to prevent public health issues and loss of future life, but once we get into the permanent work that is required to rebuild to a higher standard -- for example, just

putting the standard for the power grid on to puerto rico is greater than the pre-storm condition we found the power grid in to begin with. so, this is why we are asking for those authorities. i need protection when it comes to putting puerto rico back in a more resilient manner so we're not sitting here again having this discussion. rep. roybal-allard: if you get that authority, how will you decide when to use it? do you anticipate you will broadly used it? or will you use it only in certain circumstances, or for certain kinds of projects? mr. long: right now we don't have a full understanding. we are still in the response phase of puerto rico. once we get into permanent work -- or categories c through g, like fixing the public infrastructure, we know we will run into it. we are already into the emergency work, trying to get into areas of the power grid, where you are having to do debris and brush removal because

of the overgrowth, and that is deferred maintenance. we know we will see it. we are anticipating that going into fy-18. rep. roybal-allard: under this authority or other existing authority, will fema be able to fully fund the federal share of a more modern efficient type of electrical grid system for puerto rico, or will puerto rico only be eligible to receive an amount sufficient to construct a brand-new version of its current system, which would still be vulnerable to future hurricanes? the fema funding reflect the higher cost? mr. long: all of that is being taken into consideration. i will have to respond to you in writing on all of the issues that are there. the problem we are facing in puerto rico is the liquidity issue, when it comes to the reimbursement or the issues that you are referencing.

bottom line is, liquidity is standing in the way of doing thingsin a normal fashion, but i will have to get back to you on the specifics. mr. garrett: and what is your understanding on other federal resources that might be available to puerto rico to cover any gaps between what fema will provide and the added cost of more resilient structure? mr. long: and this goes back to what i refer to as fragmented recovery. every day we have what are called recovery meetings with our partners across the recovery perspective. and other agencies are in the joint field office. we are having those meetings daily when it comes to how our funding works together and where our authorities begin an end. we work in a very detailed conversation with secretary carson yesterday about housing, and how fema can handle the housing our homes with less than

50% damage, but after that it will be a hud mission. i still believe that as a nation as a result of going to this, we can still do a much better job of streamlining all of these programs and assigning a already that is clear. authority that is clear. thank you. rep. roybal-allard: thank you, mr. chairman for holding this hearing and after hearing from mr. brock, i just want to say that i am so impressed. it seems to me you are handling this just right. the only question i have before i get to my questions, when you are talking about rebuilding to standard, whether its homes, the electric grid, or the highways, or roads, i was there with the speaker not too long ago, i do

hope, if we ever get this budget process going, we'll be able to give you a number that will provide for adequate funding to do this. i understand as you are saying, you have to combine your efforts with hud and other agencies. but knowing you are there will help me sleep better tonight. i thank you for your presentation. mr. long: thank you. ms. lowey: so, first question. congress authorized the alternative procedure's pilot program as part of the sandy improvement and recovery act because a more efficient approach to rewarding public assistance grants was needed. how has the alternative program worked with regard to superstorm sandy recovery efforts? do you anticipate that puerto rico will choose this approach? and if so, do you anticipate any changes in how the program will work for puerto rico?

mr. long: that is an excellent question, thank you. what i believe you are referring to is section 428 of the stafford act. for larger events, it makes sense to go the 428 route. a governor has to elect to go that route. puerto rico has elected to go that rotue. going back to the roadway system, if there are thousands of problems within a roadway system, which there are in puerto rico, instead of having to generate thousands of project works sheets to fix those problems -- and those worksheets can be re-versioned for many years and there seems to be no end. the 428 program, which the governor proactively agreed to, forces us to be outcome based and we can write one project works she for the entire roadway grid. now, where we have got to do a better job in helping the city

of new york or other communities is they obviously have some concerns over, when we do the cost estimate at front at the beginning of the 428 program, did we accurately estimate how much it was going to cost? that alone sometimes is frightening for the community, and i understand it. two major they have hit the nail on the head. as far as the efficiency goes, the 428 program truly is, in my opinion, the way we need to go forward and improve. ms. lowey: following up on that, what is the process by which fema and puerto rico find agreements on the cost estimates to the hurricane damage. i know you are in the process of evaluating this. how long will that process take? i'm hoping that the current supplemental, which is inadequate, can reflect some of your recommendations. i do want to put you on the spot, but i think it is important that we have a good and accurate idea.

mr. long: sure, and you know what, this process never moves as fast as citizens wanted to move because we have to be careful with the inspections required and the technical expertise. for example, i don't know much about rebuilding a roadway system. i rely on u.s.dot, puerto rican authorities on what needs to work and what doesn't. it's a comprehensive process that cannot be done in a vacuum that requires many members to come in and tackle the situation and produce an accurate estimate. if you would like the details, i would be happy to provide you with several examples that we are already going through in puerto rico to make sure we nail this up front. ms. lowey: following up, i would like to better understand how the alternative procedures approach can potentially help puerto rico with its resiliency efforts. how will puerto rico use other federal agencies to supplement,

whether it is through fema, to improve other administrations which will better withstand future events? mr. long: so, the 428 pilot program does allow for improvements to become more resilient, not just putting things back to the predisaster condition only to have them knocked out again. we can provide details on that as well. it is also more incentive-based. once the project is complete under the investment, there are incentives for them to do so when it comes to retaining some of that funding. rep. roybal-allard: mr. chairman, i used up all my time already. armie flexible today? rep. carter: we will give you a little bit more time, but you already passed. ms. lowey: i will hold the rest of my questions. then, maybe i will take back a couple of minutes. thank you.

rep. carter: mr. culberson? mr. colberson: your testimony is one of the most encouraging and really, it is marvelous to hear your commitment to help the people of the united states, but you also have a very clear understanding for the genius of the united states and our greatest strength is relying on the good hearts and good sense and the values the americans called within their hearts to look after each other. the very best first responders are americans themselves looking after their families, neighbors, friends and local communities. i am thrilled to hear what you said. i want to make her i get a picture with you and we will put your testimony on my website and get it out to all the people of houston, texas. it is just superb. you are exactly right. in your your willingness to be

creative and innovative. i did not encourage you to ask your staff to go through all the statutes you are responsible for, administering all the programs you are responsible for, and i asked them where do you have flexibility? for example, one thing that you have got authority to do, and you have done repeatedly, which we appreciated is extending the deadline. with the scale of the disaster in texas, it is just unheard of what we have faced and you have been very accommodating in extending those deadlines. another area you have discretion in, and i hope you will exercise, we in houston, all of the major synagogues in houston flooded. they were destroyed prior to the high holy days and a number of churches were flooded. but you have the discretion to allow fema disaster assistance funding to help defray the cost of rebuilding a religious institutions.

i encourage you to go ahead and do so. they are trying to raise the money to rebuild. is that something you would be interested in and able to do? mr. long: that is a great question because there is a little bit of a misunderstanding about the houses of worship. they are eligible for public assistance reimbursement, , if they provide a critical service to the community. so that is what we are working through and we are under litigation right now, so i have to be careful with what i put forward. but yeah, i think we have to relook at all 501-3c eligibility -- compliant nonprofit organizations that are active in disaster as well and the eligibility requirements around that. and we are actively doing that. rep. culberson: you are under a conjunction to prevent you from doing so? mr. long: no, no, no. not right now. we are in the middle of litigation. rep. culberson: they need your help. another concern -- if you you take a look at the fema buy out program, we have other neighborhoods in houston, where

there were homes that were bought out by fema and under fema rules, the land cannot be developed, even if the local community or the individual who wants to buy the land is willing to mitigate it. i hope you will look at it. i think you have discretion in that area, where you can allow a local entity to go back in and buy these lots that are in the middle of nice neighborhoods, you have all of these great homes, and they make it -- and bang, a vacant lot that has weeds three feet high -- why not allow somebody to go in there and mitigate it? i think you have the authority to do that. mr. long: let me get back to you on that one and i would be happy to get back to you. rep. culberson: you are also only able to elevate a home if you elevate the existing structure. why not allow the owner of the property elevate a home, tear down the old one and build a brand-new one?

i would be a lot cheaper and a lot less money for the taxpayers as well. you have a whole variety, of i think, flexibility within your authority and things you could do that would be tremendous help. i know this committee would like to help you. you will find no better friend when it comes to helping you be innovative and creative and think outside of the box when judge john carter, the chairman of this committee. he has been terrific on helping on this. we deeply appreciate the help in houston, we really do. also on the pre-mitigation money in section 404, that money could be used to mitigate and protect an area from future flooding, for example. correct? mr. long: yeah. absolutely. rep. culberson: you are right, get the money out front, and push it out front into a community and make sure it is able to protect against the next flood or hundred year event would be a tremendous help in protecting southeast texas, where 80% of the nation's petrochemical refining capacity is.

70% of our few moves through port nations, and that is extremely important. i look forward to working with you on that and i thank you, mr. chairman, for the good work you have done to major this good man here is able to implement all the out of the box thinking. mr. long: mr. chairman, could i have a moment or two to comment? rep. carter: absolutely. mr. long: when you opened up, congressman, about your statement and we are talking about being innovative. one of the things we get beat up on in the media, by congress and by elected officials all over is inspections -- like when it comes to housing. "you are too slow." "you don't have enough inspectors." the magnitude of inspections that are needed from the california wildfire to the virgin islands is unprecedented. we have had over 6000 inspectors we've gotten our hands on to be able to put into the field. after that you start to run out of resources. when you run into that problem, it is twofold and this is an

example of fragmented recovery. how do we reduce the need for a physical inspector to be in the field without looking at technology, satellite imagery and flood maps without going, you know what, the houses flooded. do we really need to send an inspector out there just to verify and it takes more time? the other thing with the inspection process is, we have a staff member at fema who is a resident, a native of louisiana. not only does she work for fema around-the-clock, but her house was flooded. when i was asking for ideas, she said listen, you know what killed me? the number of inspections the federal government requires to get the assistance i need to fix my house. the flood program requires an inspection, hud requires the inspection, a private insurance inspection. how do we get it down to one inspection that covers the multitude of everything that may be needed in disaster recovery?

now, a question for me congressman, is what is in my authority to change that, versus where i will have to come back and say, please congress, consider this? >> my brother, who is recovering from stage for throat cancer, is living in his driveway in a trailer, and has been, as have all of his neighbors. god bless you. thank you. you are exactly on target and we are looking forward to helping you. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i've had some legislation, but i don't think fema followed up on this. redundancy elimination and enhanced performance of those grants. i'm very happy you are talking about some of the things we need to address. i'd like to talk to you later about the legislation on the books. let me go through a couple of

things we can confirm with governor abbott's office. we have permissions in texas and folks over here, i think there are four appropriators from texas that have been working on these issues permit the first one -- issues. the first one, how long -- how can the disaster relief funding be used? i know generally what we are talking about, but we want to make sure the information is connected with the state and the locals. >> when it comes to in general, and we can provide you details, the two major programs are individual assistance and public assistance. that is what we typically pay for. when it comes to public assistance, there are multiple categories. there is emergency work and permanent work. the emergency work offsets the cost of response. it also offsets the cost of debris removal. then as you get into the permanent work of fixing infrastructure, public facilities, funding can go to

not only fund that. on the individual assistance side, it is other needs, from anything to dental needs of someone who has had problems from the flood from that standpoint, to rental assistance, to direct critical needs assistance. $500 to help you buy groceries. all the way to the housing mission, it is there. it is a wide array and that is a small sample. >> what do you think the goal of disaster relief funding should be? as you know in texas, when we presented our thing to the white house, there seems to be a disconnect from the way we look at the goal of disaster relief funding. >> in my opinion, that is a tough question because it is to save lives, kickstart recovery. ok? >> sorry to interrupt, texas has

said, how do we prevent some of these issues? that is where we have been having disagreements. >> out of the drf, the post disaster funding we are talking about, section 404, a certain percentage of funding we obligate becomes available for mitigation projects. not just section 404, but section 406. there are opportunities to mitigate public assistance to damage and infrastructure. they can utilize the money, funding becomes available after the disaster to do mitigation. what i would propose is, you leave the 406 mitigation funding there to fix the infrastructure that was damaged. it was damaged, let's rebuild it to a higher standard with that money. 404 money needs to go up front. they don't have access to the funding they need to implement it. it is not fema's response ability to create resiliency.

that responsibility -- responsibility to create resiliency. i believe resilience relies in the hands of local officials. fema's assistance just supplements this capability. you know, if we move the 404 money to the front end, it does a couple things. it reduces the complexity of recovery and increasing how long recovery takes, but it allows communities to properly plan and execute mitigation plans up front before disaster strikes. >> i would ask you to continue working with our governor's office on this issue because i think my two other colleagues here from texas, we have been having different discussions as there is a difference of opinion from the state of texas of p or, which is basically the last question tied in, his disaster relief designed or intended to support long-term recovery to make communities whole?

do you just fix that issue, or do you use some of those resources for preventing some of those issues in the future? otherwise we will be back again. >> here again, i will never make a community whole. i don't think fema has the authority to make a community whole. nor is it my responsibility to make them whole. here is the thing -- let's say you have a tornado go through a texas immunity that wipes out the majority of its infrastructure. fema is not trained on how to community how to generate sales tax revenue after they have lost a large part of their infrastructure. we are good at debris removal, saving lives, coordinating response to do those missions. when it comes to economic viability after going through disasters, and a short that is -- i am not sure that is fema's

goal or mission. that might be the expertise of other portions of that community i am talking about. >> i want to ask you on behalf of the folks here, continuing to talk to the governor's office. some of us are put in this type of situation. i'm not going to go into the second line of questions. i will ask this last texas has one. $10 billion in their rainy day fund, which i'm familiar because we were in the state legislature when we created that. it rained in texas. i think that texas should use, and i have said this publicly, i assume we all have -- whenever you have conversations, make sure you talk to texas and make sure they do their share. you can't just rely on the federal government because people have a tendency of attacking the federal government, but when they need cash, the federal government is the best friend. i want to make sure everyone has skin in the game. i would ask you when you have

conversations with the governor's office, you go over that. >> can i respond to that? let me be clear about the state of texas. regardless of the issues that may take place inside texas from disagreements on your view or the governor's view -- >> we are pretty much on the same view. >> what i'm saying is texas is a model. here is why. they are owning their disaster recovery. they are owning the recovery housing mission and asking fema to support it. we have to get all 50 states to start owning the recovery process. i do not know how to fix your state better than you do. my role should be one of the counselor, saying here is what you are entitled to and here is what you need to achieve those goals. when it comes to a rainy day fund, i think the congress should take a look at what states don't have, period. so when a federal disaster declaration is not coming

forward, what is the obligation of the state to serve their own citizens? are these rainy day funds actually designed to handle individual assistance and public assistance at the smaller scale until federal assistance can be turned on? it is one thing to have a rainy day fund, it is another to understand how it is set up. if i think we make a community improvement, all of these states need to have rainy day funds designed similar to the assistance we put forward. i am just one opinion. >> we appreciate it. thank you, mr. chairman. >> i guess you are up. >> thank you, mr. chairman, and thank you, mr. long, for coming before the committee. too share the enthusiasm fema

is taking under your guidance. i will be brief, i think. it looks like the lesson from puerto rico is that the kind of -- we kind of pulled the bandage off. what we discovered is that the infrastructure has been neglected far longer and to a far greater extent we imagined when we passed the promise act. we have to come to the policy decision of how much are we going to ask the rest of the country to pay for neglected infrastructure that i think is far greater than anything we see in the 50 states? that is an issue we will grapple with as part of the request. the two issues i have are, how wisely and efficiently we spend money on emergencies. the new york times wrote a story about the lineman who are fixing the grid, getting paid $63 an hour, the contractor getting reimbursed $319. from a contract we ultimately are going to pay for.

i assume -- is that right? is that a contract fema was going to pay for? >> the power grid rebuild is being handled by the army corps of engineers. they have to not a prime contractors doing the rebuilt -- two prime contractors doing the rebuilt and is contractors are bringing people underneath them. that would be a good question for them. >> i guess as part of the $44 billion package, but not your part. let me ask a specific question. interestingly enough, they could not answer at the agriculture subcommittee hearing yesterday. when you have for building projects, to repair infrastructure, davis-bacon applies? you use bacon rolls? rules.n -- >> absolutely. >> you think you could be more efficient if we carve out emergency spending and say we can get more infrastructure rebuild and far more disaster mitigation in the future if we actually didn't have to adhere

to davis-bacon rules? >> i don't know the answer to that question. i would be happy to come back with an opinion. i would be happy to work with the administration on that as well. >> do you not many states don't have prevailing wage? >> i do not. >> i know many states don't. we are asking citizens around the country to pay for disaster mitigation infrastructure. don't get me wrong, we need to do these projects. but projects done in their state by a private entity, they don't have to pay this premium that davis-bacon makes these contractors cost. but we are going to ask them to pay for repairs. for instance, in a state like texas, if a private entity repairs their building, they are not subject to davis-bacon, but if fema comes in and pays for it -- if i get your answer right, if fema comes in to build that

same building, that same infrastructure it costs -- they have to ascribe to davis-bacon rules. is that right? >> i can get back to you. >> i would appreciate that very much. think you very much, mr. chairman. i yield back. >> thank you. welcome, mr. administrator. i'm proud to note that you are born and reared in north carolina and you have done very well in including this latest assignment. we congratulate you on your appointment and on your handling of a very full plate. most notably, three hurricanes and disastrous wildfires in your early months of service. let me ask you about the white house's approach to this, this disaster supplemental request, which included the following sentence.

the administration believes it is prudent to offset new spending. in order to offset increases, the congress should also consider designating offsets for the base appropriations as an emergency. director maldini then provided a mulvaney then provided a supposedly helpful options for cuts that totaled $59 billion, a menu of poison pills, you might say, grants, animal and plant health inspection, highway construction, quite a list. supposedly helpful as we try to meet this urgent request. ironically, this request came one day after house republicans , with the backing of the president, past the package where the tax cuts exceeded the offsets by $1.5 trillion. which clearly would balloon our national debt. i am not going to ask you to

comment on omb's approach to this, but i want to confirm with you that every dollar of the $23.5 billion in federal funding for the disaster relief fund does qualify under the law. as emergency spending and thus requires no offset. i'm not asking what the administration's proposed, but i am simply asking the question does this request qualify as emergency spending? >> to my knowledge, i would say yes. >> the answer is yes, all right. let me move on to help we might -- how we might approach the housing needs, which you have stressed, others have stressed. we do have a vehicle for housing support which has been utilized in other situations. that would be the disaster housing assistance program, which fema and hud enter into. banter -- they enter into these agreements after disasters.

they did after hurricane katrina. we have seen a number of these agreements. as i understand it, there has not been such an agreement entered in as respect to the current disasters. what could you tell us about that? would a program be helpful in this situation? is it appropriate in this situation? have you discussed the possibility of an approach with texas, florida, the virgin islands, puerto rico, the affected jurisdictions? >> sure, absolutely. here again, each one of the initiatives is incredibly unique. a one-size-fits-all solution is not going to work. what works were texas will not work for california or puerto rico. we are in daily conversations with hud and hud is, on puerto rico, having discussions on where fema housing assistance begins and ends whereas hud except.

-- picks up. the discussion was occurring and will continue, and i will be meeting with hud as i go back to puerto rico sunday and monday of next week. when it comes to housing, i think there is a lot of room for improvement. when it comes to who is totally responsible, i will say this. you want to talk about cost? the estimates are all over the place, but we have run analysis where just to bring one manufactured home into a community cost the taxpayer $200,000. -- $202,000. think about it. i have to buy it, hold it, install it make sure it is , secure, watch over it for 18 months, then i have to dispose of it. how do we get more? had we do things better? manufactured housing is always going to be an option on the table because in some areas, there are no other options.

what we did in texas was something truly innovative. instead of bringing in a manufactured home, if your house was less than 50% damaged, we -- but you stained more than $70,000 worth of damage, we are trying to change the world by allowing granting the money down through the general land office to the local governments to do $60,000 worth of permanent construction to the household. $60,000 worth to the household to get people back in their homes. it is not going to move -- it moves at a swift glacial pace if you lost your house, but to the taxpaying public, we have to find better solutions for housing across the board. bringing in travel trailers, whether it is fema assistance or d cap programs, we have a lot of work. it is not a fun program to put forward.

it is truly necessary. but there is a lot of money that can be saved and efficiencies put in place. >> i appreciate your perspective on that. the d cap program in particular has been utilized, however. it has been utilized commonly and it is not being utilized at this moment, so you understand where i am coming from as to whether this is a vehicle or tool that perhaps we should consider in this instance. >> sure. we will get back to you, sir. >> i appreciate that. >> thank you, dr. price, and i appreciate you mentioning that , director long, because that is important to give people that possibility. we have tens of thousands of people living on the second floor of their home and want to make sure they are eligible for funding. they have been displaced, but they have no worlds to go -- nowhere else to go, and by the way, my brother bought that

trailer. he always wanted an rv, but not this way. >> thank you. >> thank you, chairman culberson, chairman carter. thank you for having this hearing. welcome, mr. administrator. we appreciate you being with us. i want to join my colleagues in expressing, i would love to hear the things you have said if you didn't come to preserve the status quo, and like to work on change and your words on resiliency are very good and in the spirit of improvement, we like to hear those kinds of things and we look forward to working with you on all of that. i am glad to hear there is progress being made in puerto rico. we have been learning about some of that what is happening. lots of work yet to do, but we are making some good progress. i wanted to focus, as you continue your work there i want to make sure we are focusing on rural areas as much as urban areas.

i will use my own experience is -- experience as an example. i am from the state of washington and you may or may not know, but you will next few years, i am sure, we have had historic wildfires in our state as well as the rest of the list. -- west. we have received major disaster declarations, certainly we've burned something like 200 acres, -- something like 2 million acres, something like 400 homes have been consumed. fema denied any individual assistance for these disasters and so what we have found in states like mine where we have large population centers and large rural areas, that for some reason the current formula as it comes to determining disaster aid leaves us out and so the words, concentration, come up in

conversations with officials from fema. and so i guess my question relates to how looking at how these determinations are made , any formula changes that fema may be considering, how we can work with you to consider some of these changes to make them more workable, make more clearly define those formulas so at least in my opinion that urban and rural are treated equitably. >> congressman, you raise an issue i'm very familiar with. having been the state director of alabama's emergency management agency, those areas are very rural and whether it's a wildfire or tornado in some cases the most rural communities can truly sustain a lot of damage that doesn't necessarily meet the public assistance numeric indicators and there are tremendous amounts of individual assistance needs that are there . but because the ruralnature

-- the rural nature versus the state numeric indicators that are there, they are in some cases somewhat penalized. now we have to find a balance and i'd be happy to work with you. the sandy recovery improvement act reset the thresholds or considerations for individual assistance. is it perfect? that's up for debate and discussion. but i do have a question. when it comes to the whole community and the responsibilities of all levels of government, if federal disaster assistance is not coming, what is the state's rainy day fund designed to do to help those rural communities as well? because we see this -- a majority of the disasters and emergencies that occur nationwide, fema is not involved in. there are hundreds of disasters that fema doesn't come to assist in. and what i'm afraid of is does that increase what's on my plate from the standpoint of trying to work a much smaller level of

disaster approval when it comes to individual assistance, republic assistance. it puts us in a tough spot. look, i didn't get into emergency management not to help people. i have the spirit to want to help people, that's why i'm in -- that's why i am where i am. but at some point, we have to figure out what the true capability of each state and local government should be to work with their own citizens. >> i would not disagree with that. in fact, i would agree that it in fact, i would agree that it should be a concerted effort to work together. all agencies, local, state, and federal and it seems to me we're not quite to the place we need to be in all those levels. >> sure, sure. >> but appreciate that and understand the sensitivity or the wisdom it's going to take to find that balance and look forward to working with you on that. >> look forward to working with you, sir. >> thank you, mr. chairman i yield back. thank you.

, this isstrator long your day. if you have received compliments from both sides of the aisle and i think their well deserved. unfortunately sometimes in the state ort, whether local, we have political ,ppointees, being your resume other than the fact that you didn't come from maryland, you came from north carolina and worked in alabama. that's ok i like my southerners, but appreciate your straightforward, your ability to look at problem and solve them and i think that's an important issue. i was a former county executive, baltimore county, close to 800,000 people, a lot of waterfront in that area. and during my tenure we had a lot of issues in waterfront properties and i agree on the the issue that local government has to change their zoning laws and their ability to rebuild so

they can be protected and i think that happened in florida after some of the storms that they withstood a lot of these storms because you can't rebuild and have it come over and over, so i really think it's important. i agree with you, focusing on that issue. it's extremely important. what i want to get into, because a lot of times they're not protected. i know the chairman likes them a lot but i want to get into the coast guard. the coast guard -- it's probably going to be more of a statement but i want to ask you a question? the coast guard, for their tremendous hurricane response, they rescued more than 11,500 americans in the last three months. per the commandment, the branch is facing a $914 million shortfall to tend to a backlog of ship and aircraft maintenance and repairs for hangars and other facilities damaged by storms. with that being said, the request in front of us turns its back on the coast guard, only

offering $500 million less than the admirals request. the coast guard has always doing more with less. i didn't realize that until i came to congress that they were the stepchild of the army, navy, air force, marines. the good news is they're homeland security where they need to be and they're getting acknowledged for what they need to do. they consistently get the job done and taken for granted. for this reason we rarely increase their funding. it's something that the better they do and they do it with less and less. sooner or later that is going to backfire. now, the president has requested that this cut be done, i know that you don't have authority there. i understand that it comes through you and omb to you and you delegate that or pay that out. and if we don't take care of the coast guard, they won't be able to produce like they have. what can you do, if anything, recommendation, to make sure

that they get -- they request -- close to the request they ask for. the other thing and the elephant in the room, every time, is sequestration. it's up to republicans and democrats in a bipartisan way to do away with this terrible law that makes us weaker military and a in whatever we do. i want to raise that as an issue, you don't have to answer that but i want to get on how we can do more and what your recommendation would be. i realize you don't have the authority, you're more of a prowse pass-through that gives it to coast guard. >> by and large we always mission assign for large events. the army corps of engineers -- excuse me, the u.s. coast guard to be able to do the life-saving mission and they provide tremendous capabilities. i have the deepest respect for the members of the coast guard. and in regards to your specific question about -- i'm a coast guard advocate based on what i've seen. i would be happy to go back to the department of homeland security to address the issues and understand them, but i don't

want to speak for the commandant and coast guard directly here. >> isn't my understanding -- >> we mission assign them and through the disaster relief fund, we can provide reimbursement for the usage of the equipment and disaster cost. as far as fixing equipment, i don't believe we have the authority to do that. >> ok. i yield back. >> thank you. i believe it's back to me and we have had a series of really good questions. appreciate the questions. my colleague, a current cardinal and friend of all of us on this committee, wanted me to ask this question. california requested an increase to the 75/25 cost share for debris removal related to the fires in santa rosa.

the state requested the waiver on october 8, has not received a response. can you tell us what the status of this request is and do you foresee any issue with this request that would prevent it from being approved? >> you know what? i'll have to come back to you on the exact status or where it is. it is probably under consideration right now. i'd be happy to come back and work with you, sir on that. >> well, you know, they do have the ability to have a waiver up to 90%. >> yes, sir. >> i'd like to speak about the federal cost share for fema public assistance. i understand this is largely formula driven but that fema also makes assessments on disaster by disaster basis when it is appropriate to increase the federal cost share of a disaster. how does fema work with the affected areas to insure that

cost shares are determined fairly and accurately and what other factors does fema consider outside of the per capita cost of the disaster? >> mr. chairman, this is another area where congress needs to look at the whole concept of the numeric indicators that we use in general. so typically, what we look at is, it's a formula of, i think it's at $1.43 per person based on the state population which, determines whether or not we believe federal disaster assistance should be made available or public assistance should be available to a state after a disaster and uninsured losses. for 10 years that numeric indicator did not change according to inflation and honestly, if it had that numeric indicator today would be $2.27 per person, which would shock the system and be a tremendous amount of money that state and local governments would be responsible for.

i often question whether or not the numeric indicator measures a state and locals capability to handle disasters in its entirety, but that's the way business has been done since 1986. it's time to look at that entire formula and how we determine assistance. now when it comes from being 75/25 to 90/10 or even 100%, there was a formula laid out, a numeric indicator that we typically follow to go to two -- to go to 90/10% cost share. so that's what we're following currently. >> i want to shift gears to something you and i talked about on the phone. the state of texas has taken the lead in the housing mission for survivors of hurricane harvey, which as i understand is the first time the state has assumed this role.

while i'm confident texas is well equipped to handle such a task, implementing a new process while responding to a disaster of this magnitude inevitably comes with problems. can you tell me about how this process has been working? have you seen any efficiencies with the state in the lead role? how is fema making sure the need of disaster survivors are addressed and that no requests slip through the cracks under this new process? >> well, first of all, governor abbot made a very boldand courageous decision to lead it. and not only lead it but to be innovative in the way that we try to address the housing issues. for example, hundreds of thousands of homes have been impacted. there aren't enough trailers. and in some cases, hotels to be able to service this one disaster, much less irma and everything else. so what's being done right now

is that fema is basically traditionally running the housing mission as we normally would on behalf of the state. but we're in the transition point of making sure that the general land office has its feet underneath them to be able to administer the grant dollars down, to run all aspects of the housing program. i'm not going to allow the state of texas to fail. will it move quickly? housing never does because of the sheer complexities we often run into when it comes to the different types of damages that people have seen, whether their house is totally destroyed or can be repaired or what it requires. but we are working everyday. i was in texas two weeks ago right before the thanksgiving holiday. making sure we met with george p. bush as well as governor abbot on a transition and making sure that this becomes a successful program and that because they were willing to bite off this that we're going to be with them every step of the way. we're not going to hand this off and then back out. i'm not going to allow my staff

to do that. so we will be with them through the completion of the housing mission. >> well, i have a lot of confidence in land office and i think they'll do you a really good job and i'm glad y'all are partnering up on this. i think anytime you try a new concept, i think it's thinking outside the box which government should do more of and doesn't do very well. so i congratulate you on doing that. next question is one that i know that we've been talking to miss granger about, so i'm asking this on behalf of them i've heard about -- of delays and other issues in some of the smaller communities, the communities with fewer resources along the coastline. what is fema doing to ensure these communities get the assistance they need to successfully access federal funding available to them? and i'm talking -- this is really the lower coast, down

towards corpus christi, rockport, all that devastated area. >> so i'm not sure of the exact issues that he's referring to, but i do know my staff is on the ground and i do know that the manufactured housing units that have been requested, they are mobilizing to the coast and many of them are in place. do we have a long way to go? of course we do. but there is movement down there. here again we're trying to move as fast as we can based on the material and the personnel that we have and i'd be happy to check back in and directly contact the congressman as a result of this hearing. i'd be happy to hear him out. >> ok. i'll tell him that. thank you. ms. roybal-allard? >> i want to go back to one of my original questions at this had to do with the proposal to give you discretion to waive the pre-disaster condition limitation on public assistance grants.

you answered the part with regards to puerto rico but i also would like to know if you considered extending that authority to the u.s. virgin islands and if not why not? >> i'll have to get back to you on that one as well. the deferred maintenance issues and just the antiquated infrastructure of puerto rico is vastly different than even in the virgin islands. but i will definitely go back and take a look. i don't know the answer to that question right now. >> ok, thank you. i understand that general buchanan and a large part of the military presence have left the island and prior to this general buchanan was charged with coordination with federal agencies and the puerto rican government. now my understanding is that fema has that role. i have three parts to my

question. has this transition gone smoothly? and the coronation, how is it going generally? also, will fema be in charge of coordinating the long-term recovery effort and if so does fema have the resources in terms of staffing to manage a project of this size while maintaining the operational ability to respond to new disasters? >> sure, so the incident command structure in puerto rico has always been we've had a federal coordinating officer, a fema federal coordinating officer who is the lead authority in charge. technically a federal coordinating officer is an arm of the president of the united states. that person is mike byrne. general buchanan technically would report to the federal coordinating officer since inception of him being in puerto rico and so obviously as we transition out ofresponse to more recovery, start to demobilize some of the staff but also increase staffing with the expertise to run into the long-term recovery, releasing general buchanan is not something we do haphazardly. it would be a very methodical -- it was a very methodical

decision to not only deploy -- to demobilize him. but there should not have been any -- it should have been a seamless transition and as i'm aware it was, or is. in regards to the long-term disaster recovery, what we try to follow is what's called the national disaster recovery framework. so what it does is it points out six different recovery support functions. it could be economic viability to housing. and so the goal of that is is to -- and we've already been working with our federal government agency partners to make sure that if they are the primary agency in charge of a specific recovery support function, that they are sending staff to puerto rico to have the authority to make decisions there on the ground rather than here in washington, d.c., because i believe that all incident command decisions should be made closest to the event rather than all the way back up here. and that is the framework that we're following and that's how we're staffing the long-term recovery going forward. >> the supplemental request from

the administration includes request language that would require puerto rico to submit a recovery plan to the president and to congress. now this plan would be developed in consultation with fema, the department of treasury, and other federal agencies identified in the national disaster recovery framework. it's important that puerto rico has ownership of the plan but they are going to need technical assistance. so in what ways will fema and the other federal partners help support the creation of such a plan and can you explain how this process will work and the importance of the national disaster recovery framework? >> right. so here again we'll use the framework and if i remember the language correctly in the supplemental, it doesn't just say a puerto rico recovery plan, it's a plan infused with fema and our additional stakeholders as i recall. we recognize that this is the first time that puerto rico has run through a long-term recovery

like this and so we do not ever want to set up governor rossello for failure to say write your plan, execute it and we backout. we'll be there for many years to come executing this disaster recovery framework and the governor knows that, i'll be seeing him next week, i talked to him earlier this week. but i'll be seeing him next week to make sure that i put boots on the ground on a regular basis to say where are we versus where we need to be and what do you need? but you're right in your statement. the thing that's right is the governor is willing to step up and start owning the long-term recovery and i think he's beginning to look at this as an opportunity to rebuild puerto rico in a more resilient fashion. mr. culberson? >> thank you, mr. chairman. administrator long, i want to -- i just can't thank you enough for your innovative thinking and your willingness to trust the

good hearts and instincts of individual americans and as you said, to put command decisions for response to these disasters as close as possible to the disaster itself. and more importantly, your willingness to put it into the hands of ordinary americans. more importantly, the program is designed to mitigate future risk of flooding and minimize the cost of the federal government. to an individual homeowner for example, one of the bed rocks of the american system is private property rights. i want to work through this in more detail. let me bounce this off you. i have met with a lot of people who have come up with good ideas. the hud program comes at the tail and.

the housing money comes at the tail end of the process. the focus of the money is up front. if we would, as you have said, push the money out early and get it in the hands of individual homeowners right away, to mitigate the damage and repair the damage to their home and mitigate flood risk, the federal government would save a vast amount of money. if a homeowner qualifies for fema disaster assistance today, the only option available is to raise in existing structure or participate in a buyout. then the federal government owns the land. in this case, the deed is in the hands of the county, which makes no sense. i have neighborhoods with beautiful homes in a row and then there is an empty vacant lot with weeds five feet hard -- -- with weeds about five feet high. the homeowner has to go in and mow it and it is taken off the

tax rolls and it is a burden to everybody. what if we change the way the fema program works so that if , yourices home flooded would be able to apply for assistance and the money would go to you upfront and you have the option to mitigate the property -- right now you have to sell it portrays an existing structure. when a limit the amount of funding the government can give you? you hire a contractor to tear down your existing home or build a new structure, but it has to be mitigated so that you are ready for the next flood. you will build a home that suits you and your family and the neighborhood and you will save taxpayers a ton of money and it is not going to be taken off the tax rolls of local government. again, simply by trusting dr. price's good heart and instincts to take care of his own property and his own neighborhood. if we gave -- if we created a program like that, wouldn't that fit what you are recommending?

that we get the money up front? >> i'm all for innovation and what we would be happy to do is discuss the pros and cons of what you are putting forward. i'm all for bettering any situation because i believe mitigation is the key to future resiliency. we also have to tackle systemic problems that we have in this country. insurance is the first line of defense. i don't just say that to say it. those insured recover quicker than those that don't when they are hit. in california, what was interesting is that it was not just a flood insurance problem, but it is allowing a homeowner to let their insurance lapse. in some cases, what we saw is that the insurance lapse, the house was paid off, the insurance lapses and we had --

we have a huge portions that are uninsured now. that becomes my problem to fix and i can never make them whole. we have to go back and prepare this concept to teach people about the insurance not only of their dwelling and mitigation tactics. it is not just mitigation tactics at the home, but mitigation tactics for schools, businesses, and homes and offering that money up front. i'm all for offering money up front. lowoad a no-cost options -- to no-cost options. >> to do the greatest good down the road. i want to thank one of my constituents who spent a lot of time working on this. they are devoted to the neighborhood, devoted to keep thriving vibrant neighborhood. it is where a lot of the largest synagogues in the state of texas are located. if you are orthodox, you have to

live within walking distance to the synagogue because you can't drive a car on saturday. so these folks, if you qualify for mitigation money, there are two options. buyout or raise an existing structure. i want to work with you to find a way to get the money out front and in the hands of the homeowner who is going to do the best job, the quickest, fastest, and most effective and saving money for everyone in the process in a way that suits them and the family much quicker. i think we are on the right path. thank you remarks, mr. chairman. >> mr. price. >> thank you, mr. chairman. let me turn to a troubling that wef most disasters have had in recent years. and that is reports of individuals being increasingly vulnerable to sexual assaults. during the chaos of the disaster and directly afterwards.

part of the problem seems to be overcrowded and understaffed shelters that put people at greater risk of domestic violence and sexual assault. it was reported that one third of the sexual assaults that occurred during hurricane katrina and hurricane rita took place at shelters. i'm wondering what account did fema take this. it would be practical for fema shelters to have safety plans and processes in place. to respond to sexual assault. for individual shelters to have education information available detailing sexual assault services in the area. i have a couple questions. are you aware whether this pattern has continued during this most recent spate of disasters?

has there been the same kind of problem reported, sexual assaults occurring in this immediate post-disaster period? does fema track such assaults? done to anything being prevent this from taking place in shelters? and secondly, what about pre-existing domestic violence shelters that are damaged? as of october 1, we have reports that 23 domestic violence shelters have been significantly damaged. 19 have been moderately damaged. they need to be either repaired or rebuilt. after hurricane sandy, congress provided $2 million to repair domestic violence shelters post disaster. i'm wondering if you have any plans to help domestic violence shelters in particular and might we expect a specific proposal along these lines?

>> first of all, anything we can do to provide a safe shelter environment for the whole community is in all of our best interest. i definitely would like to be able to do that. i think it is important to point out shelter operations are not run by fema. a lot of the shelter mission is run at the local level in conjunction with the american red cross. we would be happy to reach out to the red cross to understand what the trends are. i cannot answer for the most recent events. i have not been made aware of disturbing trends of this taking place in shelters. but i will be happy to look into it to see what changes we can make on that. i want to make sure i understand, you are referencing domestic violence shelters. is that what i understand? ok. if they are registered 501

compliant, nonprofit organizations, and they sustained damage and they provide those critical facilities, they should be eligible under public assistance. if they are not, that my feet where the discrepancy is, if they are not registered. i would be happy to look into that, as well. >> let's check on both things if you will. the last one first. there was a specific appropriation after sandy. that is what caught my eye. i'm not sure why that was deemed necessary, but it certainly was helpful. it may or may not be indicated in our present situation. as regards to the reporting, we do have earlier reporting on katrina and rita and the level of assaults that followed those disasters. somebody somewhere should be monitoring this.

i understand you have shared responsibility. i would appreciate you getting back to the committee as to what kind of monitoring you or anybody else is doing and what the indications are as to the level of this problem with these current disasters. >> we would be happy to get back to you on that and i can tell you with the oversight of the grant funding, regardless of the mission, particularly i am taking a proactive stance in making sure we are monitoring taxpaying dollars carefully. for example, we have mobilized assistance teams to be embedded with great recipients. i have also deployed the office of inspector general to be in the field with us to uncover any issues or mistakes we are making up front. we also provide quarterly reports and we have public assistance managers with people who receive our funds. i am trying to put a multilayer

approach down to make sure we are expanding funding according to rules and regulations and policies. i am always open to improvement. i believe any money management that comes from the federal government is a responsibly of not only fema, but the whole community. we have a lot of training to do to offset expectations of the state and local level. whether it is nonprofit or government entity. >> thank you. thank you, mr. chairman. >> thank you, mr. price. we are not going to do another round, but i think we have another question. i'm going to yield to her right now. >> one quick question with regards to california. october, the president issued a disaster declaration for areas of california damaged by the wildfires on the heels of the management assistance declaration for california in the preceding days. the supplemental request does

not address the western wildfires. my question is, is there funding to provide the eligible aid to individuals and communities? and what is fema assuming for the overall cost of the fires in terms of the disaster relief fund? >> with california, as i said, one of the most disturbing events i have ever seen. the sensitivities around that and the deaths that were there, it is something we have to look into. in regards to the cost and our appropriations, if we look through some of the numbers, as i looked through for harvey -- excuse me, for maria, we allotted $7.2 billion. for harvey, we allotted $4.6 billion. for the wildfires, it is $1.1 billion. it is something we are taking into account for the normal disaster relief fund appropriation and the formula set up. if we can't get through, if we

need additional funding, we obviously would come back for supplemental or before if the needed. right now we think we can absorb the cost is on the trends we are seeing from california and the normal appropriation route. >> i just want to say i am equally encouraged and excited about your testimony and your response to the questions that this committee has had and it really look forward to working with you and the committee to make fema more efficient and more effective in terms of our response to these disasters. think you for being here. >> thank you, ma'am. >> one more question i want to ask you. as all the newspapers said no power in puerto rico, i happened to be meeting in my office with people from the power business on a totally different matter.

i asked them, why don't you guys be good citizens and pack up your gear and go over and fix that to where they can get some power? their response to me, is that it is the most antiquated system in existence, definitely in north america. we don't even have parts to fix a lot of what they've got there and if we went over there and did it, we would have to rewire the whole island. >> i'm sure there are plenty of media interviews of me before maria hit saying, prepare for the power to be off for many months. we knew that before maria hit. the governor of puerto rico knew it and it is unfortunate. it doesn't alleviate the pain and suffering. we are moving as fast as we can.

the problem we have is, because it is an island, you can only shove -- you are trying to shove the food and water in. you are trying to fix emergency power issues with hospitals, to sustain a hospital system. you have to focus on the priorities of life safety before you can rebuild a grid. you can only shove so much into an island at initial stages. the entire air traffic control system was wiped out. right after the storm, you are having to carefully bring aircraft in on a manual basis. there are 30 minutes between flights because you don't want to wreck c5 galaxies and exacerbate the problem. the other thing is, we quickly mission assigned the army corps of engineers and recognize the problem. they are on the island doing the emergency power, let's go ahead, mission assigned them.

i worked with the governor proactively to say, let's take the initial power grid rebuild in mind and get it back up. we knew it would be a long time. when it comes to traditional emergency management, what would work in florida or texas, and i don't mean to sound sarcastic, you can't drive trucks and mutual aid assistance to puerto rico like we do in florida or texas. in many cases, the private sector handles the entire rebuild in texas or florida, not fema. this is a unique situation where the army is the primary builder of the re-grid because they had to be and it was the only option we really had. the other thing is, in some cases, when you do these requests, traditional mutual aid assistance request, it is a contract between governors. not between fema and the

governor, between governors. with liquidity issues, people are reluctant to go to puerto rico until there is 100% reimbursement to make sure they get paid for their services and reimbursed for their time and materials. that was the issues we were facing because of the situation puerto rico was in. this is not a traditional response. if anybody wants to rebuild puerto rico to a standard to where we don't walk through this again, it is me. >> i understand that this is a government owned system, monopoly type system. and it is very clear they haven't kept up on their maintenance system, but they described it to me as you are dealing with a radio. radio.ing with a tube >> you are exactly right. the average age of that power system is 44 years old. fema can't control that.

i don't know who can. but it is a problem i'm facing with working with the governor to fix. >> if we are able to figure out a way for the corps to build a more modern, up-to-date system, which will be extremely expensive i'm sure, what are the issues you would have to say if they had a hard time maintaining a 44 year old system, is there going to be money available or is it going to be the state's problem to train technicians to keep the new system up to date? if you don't know how, there is a lot of differences between a 44-year-old system and systems today. >> that is a great question for the army corps of engineers. i do not want to speak on their behalf. just by rebuilding the power grid, you are already making tremendous improvements. >> i assumed that.

>> and we are going to learn a lot as a result of going through this process. it is not an ideal situation. there is nothing easy about puerto rico. >> we all have compassion for those american citizens in puerto rico. >> i do, too. >> thank you very much. this has been enlightning and pleasing to know that folks are creative in government. we like your creativity and i look forward to working with you. this committee is going to be pledging to get the job done and we will get it done. >> thank you. >> at this time, we will recess. thank you. >> thank you.

[captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2017] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] >> sunday night on afterwords, jeanette conan on her book "man of the hour. she is interviewed by james darling of the national research council. of hisink because wartime experience he became convinced that the only way for democracy to survive, the best way to defeat our enemies was to have a great school system where we showed that democracy was better than a dictatorship and that we would have sufficiently brilliant people, talented people in government and science and be ready to do