The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) would be a Cabinet-level agency that reports directly to the president under a new bipartisan bill.
The proposal comes as the Trump administration weighs changes at or even abolishing the emergency management agency.
The new legislation from Reps. Sam Graves (R-Mo.), Rick Larsen (D-Wash.), Daniel Webster (R-Fla.) and Greg Stanton (D-Ariz.) would make FEMA directly answer to the president rather than keeping it under the Department of Homeland Security.
While the bipartisan legislation rejects calls to eliminate the agency, it does allow some responsibilities to be delegated to states, as the Trump administration has called for.
For example, states would be allowed in handling small disasters to request a lump-sum payment for estimated damages rather than going through a separate supplemental grant program.
The bill also has various other provisions including the creation of a single assistance application that lawmakers say will streamline the process and cut down on paperwork.
“This bill does more than any recent reforms to cut through the bureaucracy, streamline programs, provide flexibility, and return FEMA to its core purpose of empowering the states to lead and coordinating the federal response when it’s needed,” Graves said in a written statement.
“The solution is not to tear FEMA down — it’s to work across the aisle to build FEMA up,” said Stanton. “This bipartisan bill takes common-sense steps to streamline the agency and make sure communities get disaster assistance quickly, efficiently and fairly.”
The bill’s formal announcement comes one day after FEMA’s acting head testified before Congress and did not say whether the administration wants to get rid of the agency.
It’s not entirely clear whether the bill will ultimately be taken up by the House’s GOP leadership or whether it would receive Senate support.
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