REPORTS
This page features reports written by various members of the cohort.
But Next Time
Authors: Ayuda Legal, Centro Para La Reconstruccion Del Habitat, Fair Share Housing Center, Florida Rising, HousingNOLA, Houston Organizing Movement for Equity, Jobs with Justice, MariaFund, New Jersey Organizing Project, PolicyLink, Power Coalition for Equity & Justice, Taller Salud, Texas Appleseed, Unemployed Workers United, Workers Defense Project
Release Date: October 2022
But Next Time: Storm Survivors Demand Overhaul of the Disaster Recovery System is a report written by a group of leaders who have navigated multiple disasters for decades and are building tools and networks to strengthen our response to major storms and climate events. This paper describes the real challenges experienced by storm survivors across the country, shows how the federal disaster recovery system is broken, and calls for action from Congress and the federal government to build a functional recovery system. The country needs a system that can handle the increased severity and frequency of storms due to climate change and ensures all families and communities can recover and are better protected from the next disaster. We have united, not only across geography, but across race, ethnicity, and economic status, because the cost of inaction is too high for families, communities, and for the entire country. We urgently need a structural overhaul of the entire disaster recovery system that is led by disaster survivors, centers equity, includes mitigation, and addresses the systemic reasons that disaster recovery is not working. Next time, it needs to be different.
Natural Hazards and Federally Assisted Housing
Authors: Public and Affordable Housing Research Corporation (PAHRC) and the National Low Income Housing Corporation (NLIHC)
Release Date: November 2023
The Public and Affordable Housing Research Corporation (PAHRC) and the National Low Income Housing Corporation (NLIHC) used the National Risk Index in their report Taking Stock: Natural Hazards and Federally Assisted Housing to quantify how many federally assisted housing units were at risk from natural disasters. Among the findings were that more federally assisted units were vulnerable to tornadoes than any other hazard; that 43% of households of color in federally assisted housing were in census tracts with very high or relatively high risk, compared to only 28% of white households; 36% of households with a head of household older than 62 years were in very high or relatively high risk areas; and that households in federally assisted housing were more likely to be socially vulnerable than other low-income households. Policy recommendations include federal legislation that would streamline and accelerate federal disaster recovery funds (CDBG-DR) and evaluating and implementing mitigation strategies for at-risk housing units.
