“Yes, we have the resources that we need, both for the Helene response and for Hurricane Milton,” Keith Turi, FEMA’s acting associate administrator, said this week.
Staffing at the federal disaster response agency has drawn criticism in recent years from the Government Accountability Office, a federal watchdog.
In that same report, the GAO found that as of July 2022, FEMA was involved in responding to 500 open disasters.
NBC News reported last week that FEMA put out a call for volunteers for a “surge force” in mid-September, citing a “severe shortfall” in some of its disaster response teams.
In an interview, FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell said the numbers cited fail to take into account other full-time staff members who are deployed as needed.
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Organizations:
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Locations:
Florida, ”