Two prominent figures in the fields of climate resilience and emergency management spoke in a forum at App State Tuesday, both agreeing that assumptions and political affiliation should take a backseat in the conversation about climate change response.
“I’m not a politician. I’m a public servant,” Brock Long said. “And the thing about it is that we got to get away from these polarizing conversations if we want to do the greatest good.”
Long was the administrator for the Federal Emergency Management Agency from 2017-19, during President Donald Trump’s previous term.
Alongside Long was Ashley Ward, the director for the Heat Policy Innovation Hub at Duke University.
The event ran from 12:30-1:45 p.m. in the Parkway Ballroom of the Plemmons Student Union, with attendees ranging from other FEMA officials, faculty and staff members, students and local community members. The event was live streamed and recorded and can be accessed on the Mountaineer Audio Video YouTube page.
The forum was held as part of App State’s Quality Enhancement Plan, which focuses on increasing climate literacy in students.
Laura England, associate director for the QEP, said the group wanted to bring in experts in community resiliency to follow-up the community forum held last month discussing Hurricane Helene recovery.
As FEMA administrator, Long oversaw over 144 presidentially declared disasters and 12 wildfires. Based on his experience with FEMA and in other emergency management positions, Long said he feels the scrutiny the agency often faces for its role in natural disaster recovery efforts is misplaced and may be prompted by political polarization, rather than fact.
“I don’t think that FEMA was ever set up to make anybody whole after a community’s completely wiped out, which is where we’ve kind of transformed, and the expectations are largely unrealistic on what we expect out of FEMA,” Long said.
The highest costs to the government from disasters comes from damage to uninsured public infrastructure, Long said. However, there are few incentives given to local governments for installing and maintaining sustainable infrastructure that would help mitigate the impact of natural disasters.
Long said things like adhering to the International Code Council building codes or utilizing proper land use should be incentivized for local governments to reduce costs and impact of disasters.
Through the analogy of the four legs of a stable chair, Long illustrated how the efficacy of emergency response is dependent on several factors. The first leg is a culture of preparedness among the citizenry, the second is strong state and local government, the third is cooperation from the private sector and the fourth is the firepower of FEMA. Long said when one of the legs is not strong in a community, it is exposed to the risk of poor emergency preparedness and response.
“Anytime FEMA goes in and there’s only one leg of the chair, that’s called Hurricane Katrina,” Long said.
Long feels FEMA and emergency management response does need improvement and reformation. However, he said people need to better learn the structure of emergency response from an economic and governmental processes view and not shift their blame to one entity or party.
Duke University researcher Ward researches the health impacts of climate change and community resiliency, specifically focusing on heat.
“We often think of hazards in the terms of things like hurricanes and wildfires and floods,” Ward said. “But heat is the deadliest climate hazard that we face and in fact remains still one of the least visible and least understood.”
Ward previously worked for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and spent time working with rural communities in North and South Carolina. Expecting to talk about climate change impact on hurricanes, Ward was surprised when the community focused on another impact.
“We showed up, and the community group said, ‘You know, we actually know a lot about hurricanes and we deal with that a lot. What we don’t know about is heat. Do you all know anything about heat?’” Ward said. “And that was the first time I had ever really thought about it.”
She was also surprised by the communities being willing to engage with her on the topic, as she was afraid the primarily Republican-affiliated counties would not be receptive.
Ward continues to work with rural communities to implement climate change mitigation infrastructure and systems that meet the needs and limitations of the area. She said political affiliation is rarely a part of the conversation.
“But I’m here to tell you that we almost never talk about politics in these rooms,” Ward said. “Like every time I go into a community, nobody cares about who you voted for. Right? We’re there to come up with some solutions to what’s happening.”
