Chilkat Valley News - Serving Haines and Klukwan, Alaska since 1966

The federal government will make funding available for hazard mitigation and repairs to public infrastructure in Southeast communities including Haines, according to a Wednesday afternoon press release.

“FEMA announced federal disaster assistance has been made available to the state of Alaska to supplement state, tribal and local recovery efforts in areas affected by severe storms, flooding, landslides and mudslides during the period of Nov. 30 to Dec. 2, 2020,” the press release reads.

Federal disaster declarations are made in situations when the extent of the damage from a natural disaster is determined to be beyond local and state governments’ ability to respond.

For Haines, news that FEMA has activated its public assistance program doesn’t change much, according to Alaska Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Management public information officer Jeremy Zidek. It just marks a change in the funding source for the public infrastructure repairs.

In December, Gov. Mike Dunleavy activated the state’s public assistance program to help Southeast communities rebuild after the December landslides and flooding. Now that FEMA’s public assistance program is activated, the federal government will cover 75% of eligible rebuilding costs and the state will cover the rest.

The federal hazard mitigation funding marks a bigger change, Zidek said.

According to a FEMA document titled, “A Guide to the Disaster Declaration Process,” hazard mitigation funds can be used to support “sustained measures enacted to reduce or eliminate long-term risk to people and property from natural hazards and their effects.”

Zidek said this can range from increasing the size of culverts, so a road is better able to survive extreme storms, to buying property that falls in a disaster-prone area.

The hazard mitigation funds are given to the state and made available to communities statewide through an application process. The applications are reviewed by the state’s “hazard mitigation committee,” Zidek said. “They select projects that have the greatest cost-benefit ratio for Alaskans.”

The federal government declined to activate its individual assistance program to assist residents in rebuilding. The state has activated its individual assistance program. Applications for the program are due by Feb. 26.