Attorney General Neronha suing Trump Administration for unlawfully cutting billions in disaster mitigation funding

“The President understands that he and his Administration do not have the power to unilaterally withhold Congressionally allocated funding to the states, and yet here we are again..."

From a press release:

Rhode Island Attorney General Peter Neronha today joined a coalition of 20 states in suing the Trump Administration over its decision to illegally shut down the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s (FEMA) bipartisan Building Resilient Infrastructure and Communities (BRIC) program, designed to protect communities from natural disasters before they strike.

For the past 30 years, the BRIC program has provided communities across the nation with resources to proactively fortify their infrastructure against natural disasters. By focusing on preparation, the program has protected property, saved money that would have otherwise been spent on post-disaster costs, reduced injuries, and saved lives.

“There’s no denying that Rhode Island is particularly susceptible to the ever-increasing effects of climate change, which is why we need to stay ahead of the curve on mitigating risk,” said Attorney General Neronha. “The President understands that he and his Administration do not have the power to unilaterally withhold Congressionally allocated funding to the states, and yet here we are again. Over the past six months, Democratic attorneys general from across the nation have sued to claw back rightfully allocated funds for everything from education and infrastructure to public health and emergency management. It’s high time we seriously ask ourselves if this is a federal government for the people, or for itself. Anyone who’s paying attention already knows the answer.”

Responding to the catastrophic losses resulting from Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath, Congress passed a law stating FEMA must protect communities through four interrelated functions—mitigation, preparation, response, and recovery. The BRIC program is the core of FEMA’s pre-disaster mitigation efforts. A recent study concluded that every dollar FEMA spends on mitigation saves an average of six dollars in post-disaster costs.

The BRIC program often supports difficult-to-fund projects, such as constructing evacuation shelters and flood walls, safeguarding utility grids against wildfires, protecting wastewater and drinking water infrastructure, and fortifying bridges, roadways, and culverts.

The impact of the BRIC program’s termination has been devastating, with communities across the country being forced to delay, scale back, or cancel hundreds of mitigation projects depending on this funding. Projects that have been in development for years, and in which communities have invested millions of dollars, are now threatened. And now, Americans from coast to coast face a higher risk of harm from natural disasters.

Over the past four years, FEMA has selected nearly 2,000 projects to receive roughly $4.5 billion in BRIC funding nationwide. The University of Rhode Island is currently using BRIC funding to develop new and enhanced tools to map flood risk in Rhode Island for coastal and inland waters.

The coalition argues that FEMA’s decision to abruptly terminate the BRIC program is in direct violation of Congress’s decision to fund it. The Executive Branch has no lawful authority to unilaterally refuse to spend funds appropriated by Congress. The attorneys general also assert that shutting down the BRIC program violates the Separation of Powers and the Administrative Procedures Act, and violates the Appointments Clause because Cameron Hamilton, who acted as FEMA Administrator and gave the directive to terminate the BRIC program, was never appointed by the President or confirmed by the Senate and therefore was acting as Administrator unlawfully.

With this lawsuit, the coalition is seeking a preliminary injunction to prevent the Trump Administration from spending BRIC funds on other purposes and a permanent injunction to reverse the termination of the BRIC program and require the restoration of these critical funds to the communities relying on them.

Joining Attorney General Neronha in filing this lawsuit are attorneys general of Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, Vermont, Washington, Wisconsin, and the governor of Pennsylvania.