FEMA cuts natural disaster grants; Portsmouth loses $24M, Virginia Beach spared
On the chopping block is a $24.2 million award slated for the Lake Meade Dam, a drinking water reservoir operated by Portsmouth.
FEMA announced this month it will cut the Building Resilient Infrastructure and Communities program, or BRIC. Under the Biden administration, $1 billion was made available for BRIC over five years through the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, and FEMA reports $133 million to date has been provided for about 450 project applications across the country.
FEMA announced all applications from 2020-2023 have been canceled, and any funds not distributed to cities will go back to the Disaster Relief Fund or the U.S. Treasury. But not every BRIC-funded Hampton Roads project will lose out. A $25 million grant for Virginia Beach's Eastern Shore Drive Drainage Project was already allocated and city officials said the project was spared.
Funding through the BRIC program was allocated to cities for hazard mitigation activities or projects that promoted climate adaptation and resilience, and the award required a funding match from the awarded communities. In the cancellation announcement, FEMA called the BRIC program 'wasteful and ineffective' and stated it was 'more concerned with political agendas than helping Americans affected by natural disasters.'
The defunded Portsmouth project is the biggest blow to the region. The funding was supposed to help enhance protection and stabilization of the Lake Meade Dam, located in Suffolk. Portsmouth maintains the dam, which serves as a critical reservoir for drinking water. The project would strengthen the dam, upgrade spillways and retrofit the reservoir to prevent overtopping during extreme precipitation, when water spills over the top of a dam. The project would help protect 80 residential properties and about 30 businesses within the dam break inundation zone.
A Portsmouth spokesperson did not respond by Tuesday afternoon to questions about the grant.
The Hampton Roads Planning District Commission, a regional organization representing 17 local governments in Hampton Roads, also had BRIC funding cut. Matt Klepeisz, communications administrator for the HRPDC, said about $200,000 had been dedicated to updating the Regional Hazard Mitigation Plan. The plan, updated every five years, recommends specific actions to protect residents, businesses and development from environmental hazards that pose the greatest risk. Those risks include hurricanes and flooding.
Klepeisz said the team has applied to other funding opportunities to support the updates.
U.S. Sens. Mark Warner and Tim Kaine joined Reps. Bobby Scott and Jennifer McClellan in writing a letter to Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem about the cuts to Virginia projects, specifically noting the loss of money for the Portsmouth project as well as a $12 million grant for improvements to the Richmond Water Treatment Facility.
'The potential revocation of existing BRIC awards is an unanticipated shock to Virginia localities that have budgeted, planned and in some cases begun work on these crucial projects,' the Democrats' letter reads.
In Virginia Beach, about $25.1 million was awarded in 2021 to help pay for improvements done through the Eastern Shore Drive Drainage Project, and the city will match the grant with about $10.7 million. In 2023, the City Council voted to approve the ordinance that would accept the funding.
The awarded funding in Virginia Beach is planned to be used in the first stage of the multiphase drainage project. The project will include drainage improvements, the addition of large stormwater pump stations, an automated tide gate and the deepening and widening of the Cape Henry Canal to help reduce flooding in the Shore Drive area of the city. According to the city, the improvements would protect neighborhoods of extreme rain events, including 614 properties and 'community lifeline' facilities.
Virginia Beach said in a statement officials were aware of the potential cuts, but funding for the Shore Drive improvements likely will not be affected. A FEMA dashboard for BRIC projects shows the money was already obligated.
'Our FEMA liaisons have communicated that they do not foresee the City being at risk of losing the grant funds for this flood protection project,' a city statement reads.
The BRIC cuts are the latest federal grant cancellation to hit a climate resiliency project in Hampton Roads. Hampton is expected to lose out on $20 million after Environmental Protection Agency grants to address flooding were targeted for cancellation.
In a time where flood infrastructure projects are increasingly expensive to execute, federal funding is an avenue that many cities take to fight against negative impacts of climate change. The total cost of the Flood Protection Program in Virginia Beach has increased to more than $1 billion as the result of hikes in material and labor. Meanwhile, Hampton Roads has several large-scale construction projects underway leading to a short supply of contractors and heftier contract prices.
Eliza Noe, eliza.noe@virginiamedia.com
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