To improve individual assistance provided by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, and for other purposes.
Analysis under review: This bill has generated analysis that may be too generic or incomplete. Clause-level evidence remains available below.
Summary
What This Bill Does
The Disaster Survivors Fairness Act improves how FEMA helps individuals and families recover from major disasters. It expands financial assistance for home repairs, creates new funding for hazard mitigation measures to prevent future damage, and gives states more flexibility to manage housing assistance programs. The bill also requires FEMA to study disparities in assistance between renters and homeowners.
Who Benefits and How
Disaster survivors benefit from expanded financial assistance for home repairs and new hazard mitigation funding to protect against future disasters. State emergency management agencies gain more authority and funding to run housing assistance programs and create post-disaster resource websites. Emergency response personnel (firefighters, law enforcement, EMTs) can receive reimbursement for temporary housing during disaster response. Renters may benefit from improved assistance that accounts for post-disaster rent increases.
Who Bears the Burden and How
FEMA and federal agencies must implement new programs, produce annual reports on assistance denial rates, and make grant evaluation criteria public. The Government Accountability Office (GAO) must conduct multiple studies on preliminary damage assessments and public assistance challenges. These are administrative burdens rather than costs to private parties.
Key Provisions
- Creates new financial assistance for hazard mitigation measures to reduce future disaster damage
- Expands state-managed housing pilot programs with 75% federal cost share
- Requires FEMA to report annually on assistance denial rates by income level
- Mandates study on disparities between renter and homeowner disaster assistance
- Allows reimbursement for sheltering emergency response personnel during disasters
Evidence Chain:
This summary is generated from the full bill text using AI analysis. Expand "Detailed Analysis" below for identified beneficiaries/burden bearers.
At a Glance
What This Bill Does
Improves FEMA individual assistance programs for disaster survivors by expanding housing repair assistance, creating hazard mitigation funding, enhancing state-managed housing pilots, and addressing disparities faced by renters and low-income households
Key Policy Areas
Emergency Management, Housing, Government Administration
Primary Purpose
Improves FEMA individual assistance programs for disaster survivors by expanding housing repair assistance, creating hazard mitigation funding, enhancing state-managed housing pilots, and addressing disparities faced by renters and low-income households
Policy Domains
Main Bill - FEMA Individual Assistance Reforms
Identified Gains
Contextual inference, no direct clause citation- Disaster survivors (homeowners and renters)
- State emergency management agencies
- Emergency response personnel
- Low-income households affected by disasters
Contextual inference, no direct clause citation
Identified Costs
Contextual inference, no direct clause citation- FEMA
- Government Accountability Office
Contextual inference, no direct clause citation
Sponsors
Legislative Progress
ReportedReported by Mr. Peters, with amendments
Mr. Peters (for himself and Mr. Tillis) introduced the following …
Mr. Peters (for himself, Mr. Tillis, Mr. Lankford, and Mr. …
Stakeholder Effects
cui bono?How this legislation distributes effects. Mention counts reflect frequency, not effect magnitude.
Congressional oversight committees, FEMA, FEMA damage assessment personnel
Positive-direction: Congressional oversight committees, Indian tribal governments, Indian tribal governments administering housing grants
Negative-direction: FEMA, Government Accountability Office
Disaster survivors (homeowners), Disaster survivors seeking permanent housing, Disaster survivors seeking recovery resources
Rural communities affected by disasters, Small impoverished communities, State emergency management agencies
Home improvement and construction contractors, Home repair and construction contractors
Insurance companies providing disaster coverage
Emergency response personnel (law enforcement, firefighters, EMTs)
Bill Structure & Actor Mappings
Who is "The Secretary" in each section?
- "the_president"
- → President of the United States
- "the_administrator"
- → Administrator of FEMA
- "the_comptroller_general"
- → Comptroller General of the United States (GAO)
Key Definitions
Terms defined in this bill
Employees or contracted employees providing law enforcement, fire suppression, rescue, emergency medical, emergency management, or emergency communications services; and elected officials (except Members of Congress) responsible for overseeing or directing emergency response operations or recovery activities
We use a combination of our own taxonomy and classification in addition to large language models to assess meaning and potential beneficiaries. High confidence means strong textual evidence. Always verify with the original bill text.
Learn more about our methodology