This lesson provides an overview of the disaster declaration process. Upon completion of this lesson, you will be able to:

• Describe the disaster declaration process.
• Differentiate between the different types of declarations and assistance provided by FEMA and other Federal agencies.
• Explain the relationships and responsibilities of Federal, State, local, tribal, and territorial partners in the disaster declaration process.
• Given an incident scenario, identify the appropriate sequence of declaration events and actions.

Remember you can access the glossary by selecting the Glossary button in the top right corner of each main content screen.

As you learned earlier in this course, the Stafford Act allows Federal assistance for major disasters and emergencies upon a declaration by the President. However, even when the President does not issue a declaration, FEMA may perform certain activities to support the State, tribal, and territorial planning and preparedness functions. FEMA may also be tasked for response activities that are not declared but require the agency’s expertise in disaster response, recovery, and mitigation.

• Select to learn more about the most frequently used types of declarations
• Select to learn more about the ways FEMA can provide assistance

Note that an emergency or major disaster declaration request may be denied or partially denied for a portion of the requested geographic area or specific recovery programs. If this is the case, the decision may be appealed. The appeal process is described in 44 CFR.

• Emergencies: Any occasion or instance for which, in the determination of the President, Federal assistance is needed to supplement State and local efforts and capabilities to save lives and to protect property, public health, and safety, or to lessen or avert the threat of a catastrophe in any part of the United States.
• Major Disasters: Any natural or manmade catastrophe—including those caused by hurricane, tornado, storm, high water, wind-driven water, tidal wave, tsunami, earthquake, volcanic eruption, landslide, mudslide, snowstorm, or drought—or, regardless of the cause, any fire, flood, or explosion in any part of the United States, for which the President determines Federal assistance is required to alleviate damage, loss, hardship, and suffering.
• Fire Management Assistance: Warranted when wildfire is threatening habitation.
• Pre-Declaration Activities: When a declaration is reasonably likely and imminent, FEMA has limited authority to assess the impact of an event through PDAs and prepare and pre-position Federal resources. An example is as preparing for a hurricane to make landfall.

• Federal to Federal: FEMA can provide assistance to other Federal agencies, upon request.
• National Special Security Events: FEMA may also provide assistance for non-emergency events, such as political conventions.

Surge activities are authorized activities undertaken when an incident is imminent, or has occurred but has not been declared, and resources and assets are required to prepare for, be positioned for, or assess the effects of such imminent incident or declaration. Select the links below to learn more.

• Primary authorized pre-declaration activities
• Other examples of pre-declaration activities
• A partial list of some FEMA assets that could be deployed pre-declaration

• Preliminary damage assessments (PDAs)
• Activating the NRCC and RRCC

• Deploying response teams to the impacted areas; for example, Urban Search and Rescue (USAR)
• Prepositioning assets or commodities to enable the more rapid engagement of those resources during or after the event
• Activating Federal operational support for pre-event deployment or readiness through the use of MAs
• Activating, preparing, or staging resources to respond to impending events

• FEMA Liaison Officers serve as a point of contact for representatives of assigned and cooperating agencies and organizations—usually to a State EOC.
• IMATs that respond to Level 1, 2, and 3 incidents. As you learned in previous lessons, the IMAT is a highly mobile, scalable, responsive force of qualified and experienced Federal emergency management personnel and resources that FEMA can immediately deploy to support any all-hazard incident response in the Nation. These teams make preliminary arrangements to set up Federal field facilities and initiate the establishment of JFO.
• FEMA will “push” resources and supplies regularly needed during a response—including food, water, medical supplies, and generators.

1. Incident
2. State or tribal government collects initial damage estimates
3. Governor or Tribal Chief Executive requests Joint Preliminary Damage Assessments from FEMA ’s Regional Office
4. Joint Federal/State/local/tribal PDAs are conducted in the areas requested by the State or tribal government
5. Governor or Tribal Chief Executive submits a request to the President through FEMA’ s Regional Administrator for a major disaster or emergency declaration the request is based on PDA findings and specifies programs and areas for designation
6. The Regional Office reviews the declaration request and sends its recommendations to FEMA Headquarters
7. FEMA Headquarters reviews the State or tribal governments request and the Regional Office ’s recommendations the Declarations Unit prepares a White House package containing FEMA ’s recommendation to the President for the Administrator ’s signature
8. A draft White House package is emailed to the Department of Homeland Security Secretary for review and approval for transmission to the White House
9. FEMA forwards the White House package to the President for decision.

When disasters are clearly catastrophic, there may be an expedited request from the Governor or Tribal Chief Executive. This request follows the same process; however, the request may be submitted before formal joint PDAs are conducted. Limited forms of assistance are usually provided until the joint PDAs can be completed. Accelerated Federal assistance and support may be provided to save lives, prevent human suffering, or mitigate severe damage.

FEMA leads and coordinates the Federal response for disasters in support of States, tribes, and territories. Response to disasters is always a tiered process and involves the whole community—the people and the commercial, economic, governmental, infrastructural, and social systems that make up a jurisdiction. The response starts at the local level with citizens and businesses. FEMA sponsors programs for these elements as part of the preparedness and mitigation process of emergency management. There is then a tiered response from the various levels of government.

Select the first three elements in the diagram below to learn more.

Click this link to access all information presented.

As you learned earlier in this course, tribal groups were previously treated as local governments and thus not permitted to directly request disaster declarations from the Federal Government. However, SRIA amends the Stafford Act to authorize tribal governments to request a declaration of an emergency or major disaster.

This policy helps eliminate or diminish procedural impediments to working directly and effectively with tribal governments and reinforces that tribal governments are sovereign nations. The SRIA also authorizes the President to establish criteria to adjust the non-Federal cost share for a tribal government to the extent allowed by current authorities.

Under this change, FEMA is required to consider the unique circumstances of tribes when it develops regulations to implement the provision. The SRIA also amends the Stafford Act to include federally recognized tribal governments in numerous references to State and local governments within the Stafford Act.

• Select this link to review the Stafford Act (https://www.fema.gov/disasters/stafford-act)
• Select this link to review the SRIA Fact Sheet (www.fema.gov/media-library-data/1394805512529-69dda27af3e128a1406387d288fd162c/SRIA+Overview+Fact+Sheet+and+Status+Updated+03042014_508.pdf)
• Select this link to review a list of Federally Recognized Tribes and Territories (www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/FR-2013-05-06/pdf/2013-10649.pdf)

Remember that key operational components that may be activated to respond to an incident include the NRCC, RRCC, and JFO, representing the national, regional, and incident levels of Federal incident response.

When a State, tribe, or territory requests Federal assistance from the FEMA Regional Office, that office will:

• Activate the RRCC.
• Notify national leadership.
• Deploy an IMAT in support of disaster response operations and to lay the foundation for establishing a JFO.
• Operate under the direction of the FEMA Regional Administrator.
• Direct the RRCC to coordinate Federal regional response efforts until the JFO is established.

When the JFO is established, its primary function is coordinating the resource needs of the State, tribe, territory, and local community through the Federal response and recovery system. However, FEMA also has a control and coordinating role in managing Federal resources using an ICS structure and practicing the ICS principles at the incident level. You learned about this in Lesson 4.

Let-s summarize what you have learned in this lesson:

• Response to disasters is always a tiered response process. The response starts at the local level, with the citizens and businesses. Then the response moves to the various levels of government.
• FEMA can provide assistance to other Federal agencies, and for non-emergency events.
• Federal, State, tribal, territorial, and local governments and the private sector work together to support disaster response and share resources and capabilities.

Now that you have learned about the disaster declaration process, you will learn more about key FEMA programs in the next lesson.