Judge Blocks Federal Government From Diverting FEMA Disaster Preparedness Funds

The judge ruled that the states had shown ‘a realistic existence of irreparable harm’ should the injunction not be granted.

A person sits at a desk inside a mobile Federal Emergency Management Agency command center in downtown Dawson Springs, Ky., on Dec. 14, 2021. Jon Cherry/Reuters

A federal judge temporarily blocked the federal government on Aug. 5 from redirecting $4.5 billion in funds designated for a Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) disaster prevention program.

District Judge Richard Stearns of the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts issued a preliminary injunction sought by 20 states to prevent the federal government from spending funds allocated to the Building Resilient Infrastructure and Communities (BRIC) program for non-BRIC purposes while the litigation is ongoing.

In a 15-page ruling, Stearns found that the states had shown “a realistic existence of irreparable harm” if the injunction were not granted, and that the potential burden on the government is minimal given the role of the BRIC program—which FEMA terminated in April—in aiding states to prepare for and mitigate natural disasters.

“The requested relief is appropriately narrow—to merely prevent the government from spending the funds elsewhere, not to compel the payment of any sum—and even without the BRIC funds, the DRF [Disaster Relief Fund] is operating at a surplus well above the reserves the government itself estimated to be necessary to ‘maintain the ability to fund initial response operations for new significant events,’” he stated.

The judge said the government could also request the release of “any necessary funds on an emergency basis should a disaster of unprecedented proportions occur while the injunction remains in place.”

Washington state Attorney General Nick Brown, one of the plaintiffs in the lawsuit, welcomed the court’s decision. He said the states are also seeking to have the program reinstated.

According to his office, FEMA has approved about $4.5 billion in BRIC funding for nearly 2,000 mitigation projects nationwide over the past four years, including 27 open projects in Washington state totaling $182 million.

“FEMA’s termination of this bipartisan program defies both law and logic,” Brown said in an Aug. 5 statement. “Congress created this fund because America’s towns are already struggling with mounting challenges from climate change.”

FEMA did not respond to a request for comment by publication time.

The states filed the lawsuit against FEMA in July, alleging that the agency illegally terminated the BRIC program in violation of Congress’s decision to fund it. They argued that the termination breaches the separation of powers doctrine and the Administrative Procedure Act.

FEMA announced in April that it was ending the program.

In a now-deleted statement, FEMA said the program had been wasteful and ineffective and appeared to be “more concerned with political agendas” than with aiding those affected by natural disasters.

Federal Emergency Management Agency workers in Asheville, N.C., on Oct. 4, 2024. Mario Tama/Getty Images

The agency said it would cancel “all BRIC applications from fiscal years 2020-2023,” and any grant funds that “have not been distributed to states, tribes, territories and local communities ... will be immediately returned either to the Disaster Relief Fund or the U.S. Treasury.”

Aside from Washington state, the states that joined the lawsuit are Massachusetts, Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Wisconsin.