Opinion | Malka Older: 'The U.S. often requires standards be in place when it funds international disaster relief — but doesn’t apply them domestically.' - NBCNewsTHINK
, consider whether you want assistance to your community determined in part based on your state’s political importance.
Consider whether you want assistance to your community determined in part based on your state’s political importance. While researching 2005’s Hurricane Katrina for my doctoral dissertation, I found that this lack of established guidelines and federal presence meant local officials or even volunteers in the midst of an intense emergency, under pressure and often without experience or training, had to make crucial decisions on their own because they had no guidance in principle or practice doing so.
As I know from my work with nongovernmental organizations in the international humanitarian sector, it is possible to create useful standards and indicators that take into account the variety of potential disasters. Indeed, the U.S. often requires such standards to fund international disaster responses — but doesn’t apply them domestically.
Until we accept that disasters are inevitable and come to some consensus about what the federal government owes us in managing them, it is all too easy for the process to be held hostage, leaving communities in need and the agencies that are supposed to help them too cash-strapped to do their jobs.Malka Older, Ph.D.
South Africa Latest News, South Africa Headlines
Similar News:You can also read news stories similar to this one that we have collected from other news sources.
Farms, military, day cares: Who waited on disaster aid amid Trump-Congress brawlSurvivors of an extraordinary string of disasters throughout the country have hung in limbo for months as Washington politicians sparred over the specifics of a multibillion-dollar plan to send extra aid their way
Read more »
Disaster aid bill worth $19.1 billion blocked again in HouseThe U.S. House of Representatives on Tuesday failed again to pass a $19.1 billion disaster aid bill supported by President Donald Trump after a Republican lawmaker objected to the measure. Following Senate passage of the legislation last Thursday by a vote of 85-8, House Democratic leaders had hoped
Read more »
House fails to pass disaster aid bill after second GOP lawmaker objectsFor the second time in less than a week, the House on Tuesday failed to pass the Senate-passed $19 billion disaster aid bill after a lone Republican objected to the measure.
Read more »
Disaster aid bill worth $19.1 billion blocked again in HouseThe U.S. House of Representatives on Tuesday failed again to pass a $19.1 billio...
Read more »
Another Republican blocked billions in disaster aid in what a top Democrat described as a 'tantrum'GOP Congressman Thomas Massie says he objected in order to 'stop legislative malpractice.'
Read more »
Disaster aid bill again blocked in House by GOP conservativeWASHINGTON (AP) — A second conservative Republican on Tuesday blocked another attempt to pass a long-overdue $19 billion disaster aid bill, delaying again a top priority for some of President Donald Trump's most loyal allies on Capitol Hill.
Read more »
Third Republican blocks attempt to pass disaster aid in HouseDemocrats are now expected to hold a roll-call vote on the bill once lawmakers return to Washington next week from their Memorial Day recess.
Read more »
House Passes $19.1 Billion Disaster-Aid PackageThe House passed a $19.1 billion disaster-aid package with a bipartisan majority, sending the legislation to the president’s desk after months of wrangling delayed the typically noncontroversial funding.
Read more »