CHAPTER 4

Labyrinth Bureaucracy

Well, we’re the forgotten residents of Brooklyn. Still waiting to get some help. You know, I’m still going back and forth trying to get all the paperwork done so I can reapply for FEMA and try to get assistance. You know, because the money I’ve received from FEMA is not enough to take care of the damage, not even half of the damage.

—Sherri, thirty-eight, high school teacher, Canarsie disaster survivor

The Canarsie disaster survivors I met and spoke with felt inaudible and invisible, so they were eager to share their experiences with me in the hopes that I would relay their hardships in this book. These disaster survivors had not been prepared for flooding and did not receive timely evacuation warnings. Canarsie had been zoned as Zone B (see figure 11), and New York City would only designate Canarsie as Zone A after Sandy (see figure 12). I relay some of the conversations I had with disaster survivors while standing on the street corner, climbing up their front steps, and sitting at their kitchen tables. Some conversations occurred while walking through the basements of those survivors who agreed to talk with me while I canvased the areas that I heard had experienced the highest levels of flooding.

Many of the Canarsie Sandy survivors conveyed that they wanted others to know about their experiences in the hopes that these revelations would lead to future changes in the execution of disaster response. These are the unheard voices and lived experiences of Canarsie’s Superstorm Sandy survivors. These exemplar dialogues present salient cleavages in the disaster experiences in this New York City Black immigrant enclave. These conversations with disaster survivors served as a form of catharsis for them, even while they were still in the throes of crisis. Together these dialogues help elucidate the various mechanisms and points of neglect, confusion, frustration, and inequity they felt and experienced during the process of awaiting, seeking, delivering, and receiving state and federal governmental FEMA disaster assistance.

The Forgotten Little Town

Twelve days after Sandy’s landfall, we arrived in Canarsie, where Sandy had flooded several basements and some first-floor apartments and homes. Within a few minutes of our arrival about sixty to eighty middle-aged to elderly Afro-Caribbean survivors, about three-quarters of them women, some with children, surrounded the open back of the truck. Almost two weeks had gone by since Sandy struck, and these Canarsie disaster survivors told us that they had never received this type of assistance. They partook in the food, baby formula, diapers, flashlights, batteries, blankets, winter jackets and coats, clothing for infants, children, and adults, and so much more that my family and I collected through our disaster response drive in North Carolina.

Debra, a fifty-five-year-old single working mother of two school-aged children, who had been displaced from her home, agreed to talk with me. She stepped away to retrieve donated items from the truck, but she was still within an earshot of her niece and me.. While I awaited her return, her niece, Alma, who accompanied her, could hardly contain her exasperation.

ALMA: Okay, I’m with my aunt. She lost everything in Canarsie. Her whole basement was flooded, and my cousins lost everything that they have. They don’t have light, no heat, and she’s, like, sleeping from house to house. They can’t—and she’s a working woman, and no help. Like, they still don’t have lights. And what today is? Like the eleventh day after the storm?

SM: And has she been trying to call?

ALMA: Yes, and she’s been getting like, you know, those automated message systems. Yeah. They tell her that the lights were coming on last night. It didn’t come on.

I began to ask Alma whether they had heard of any other communities that had received the types of assistance they were still lacking, but Debra, who had been listening from afar, quickly interjects, “I—I think in Red Hook, they were giving something. But in Canarsie, apparently, we are the forgotten little town. Nothing, nothing, nothing. I am still without light.”

Red Hook is a majority White urban area in South Brooklyn and Canarsie a majority Black immigrant enclave in Southeast Brooklyn. Debra further explains how the disaster led to displacement and splitting up her household as she navigates seeking health and educational resources for her daughter.

DEBRA: I have two asthmatic children who need to be—you know, get medication and stuff. I had to have one girl stay with someone else. Every day she’s crying. She doesn’t want to go to school because she’s so depressed. We saw the water. She was trying to help us with it. It is really, really unbelievable—tumultuous.

SM: And then you’ve been trying to call FEMA?

DEBRA: I’ve been calling and calling every day, and calling just now, they start hanging up on me.

SM: Oh wow! What would you attribute to this lack of response, or lack of help?

DEBRA: Apparently because we weren’t zoned as zone A, they cannot respond to us in time. I guess if we were in Zone A, then they may respond more urgently. Last night the NYPD [New York Police Department] came, and they put some light, because we still are out of lights on this avenue.

SM: “Mm-hmm.”

DEBRA: I don’t know. That’s the only thing that they did, so far.

SM: Okay, but it’s still cold?

DEBRA: My boiler’s gone. My, um, my water heater’s gone, so we have no hot water, no heat, nothing.

SM: And the children, how are your children?”

DEBRA: Well, I’ve—the school called, and the school is going to provide some comfort to one of my kids here, because she’s very stressed. She doesn’t want to hear the water. She doesn’t want to see the water. She’s traumatized.

SM: Sorry to hear that.

DEBRA: Yeah. That’s where we are right now.

SM: So, you think the town was forgotten because of how it was zoned?

DEBRA: It was zoned, exactly. Uh, we’re sitting in a basin because we have three bodies of water around us. So, how could it not have been zoned? Oh, yeah, we need blankets. [She runs off again]

As with Debra’s experiences of trying to mother while displaced, Megan Reid (2012), in her disaster study on Black economically deprived and single mothers, found that these already marginalized women experienced additional disaster-related hardships because displacement impacted not only them but also their ability to effectively mother their children. It is particularly difficult catering to the psychological needs of children traumatized by disaster.

In the face of institutional failures, racialized single parents, usually mothers who are burdened with expectations of child rearing, must rely on kin and friends to temporarily buffer the social support that is immediately lacking from the State. However, Alma’s statement at the beginning of our conversation that Debra was moving “from house to house” reflects the tenuous quality of support from social ties of the economically deprived and working classes (Smith 2005; Desmond 2012). This pattern of fleeting bursts of support from informal networks of the economically deprived and working classes is a recurrent theme both in Canarsie and in low socioeconomic status (SES) Eastville Rockaway. In other words, although the social networks of the economically deprived are available, their social capital, in the form of a steady supply of resources in this case, gets constrained.

FEMA, New York State, and New York City had collaborated to quickly deploy teams that walked the neighborhood blocks, spoke with disaster survivors, and cleared fallen trees and debris. However, although many of these disaster survivors had learned of FEMA assistance and had registered with FEMA early, many anxious disaster survivors experienced interruption in receiving assistance because of a breakdown in the follow-up mechanisms of FEMA’s application process.

No Response

A small-framed, soft-spoken Black woman, wearing a lilac floral-patterned dress and a snugly placed hijab framing her face, agreed to talk with me while she waits in line to receive items from the back of the truck. Natasha is sixty years old, a single working mother of five children plus one grandchild, all of whom live with her in an apartment down the block from where we were standing. Natasha shares with me her dire circumstances with food insecurity and discomfort, living with young children, in a home that is cold, damp, moldy, and filled with debris due to the flood. She explains that despite her efforts to reach FEMA while still having to go out to work, she has not received a clear response from FEMA as to what assistance she could receive.

NATASHA: We’re totally flooded out. We have no hot water or heat and I’ve been trying to get help from, like, FEMA, but they don’t respond back. I don’t know, some people might have interviews, some people don’t have interviews, and I’m still waiting.

SM: Okay.

NATASHA: Like, my backyard is filled up with a whole lot of garbage.

SM: Alright. [I nod and maintain eye contact, expressing my deep empathy]

NATASHA: I’m not sure if we can use that dump today. [She points to a dumpster]

SM: Alright.

NATASHA: It’s like hard getting out. I have six children in the house. And we’re just like cold.

SM: And how is it for them?

NATASHA: They are trying to help out, you know. It’s just a lot of crowd and mess everywhere. It’s very uncomfortable, and I still have to go to work.

SM: So, when you’ve sent them [FEMA] an email, they don’t respond to you?

NATASHA: They respond, but they don’t tell you—they say wait for an appointment for an inspector to come out. But if they don’t have an inspector coming out within seven days, make contact with them. [Sighs, pauses] Call the number back—oh, we’re busy.

SM: And what do you attribute to the lack of response to your neighborhood?

NATASHA: I think they forgot about us, but I see someone didn’t. [She smiles, referring to our presence in this impacted area]

SM: Well, we came out here because we were looking for neighborhoods that were thought to be neglected. We spoke with Bishop Fabian, and then he was like, ‘Yes, we’re out here. Come over here.’

NATASHA: That was nice, thank you. I’m just thinking that somebody—it’s over a week later. You know what I mean? Going through a whole lot more, like food spoils, and then when they said something about food stamps, they did not respond to that. They say they want to help you.

SM: What did they say?

NATASHA: I saw an email about anyone who’s in the area that was affected by the storm would get assistance, but I think that’s still on food stamps. Our whole freezer went out, and we lost all our food. We’re still waiting. And they still didn’t get us anything—so I don’t understand what they’re helping with.

SM: And you’ve been calling and nothing. And you have, you said, six children.

NATASHA: Right. An infant, my granddaughter. That’s six children plus myself.

These economically deprived, working women’s social vulnerability to disaster related to the challenges they experienced in carrying out their responsibilities as mothers while also trying to secure disaster resources (David and Enarson 2012). Natasha’s experience with food insecurity and her dilemma of who is responsible for replenishing spoiled food when Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits have run out foreshadows the next chapter’s question: What happens to the social safety net for the traditionally economically deprived during disaster? Similar to Natasha, Megan Reid (2012) found that economically deprived mothers had difficulty navigating the service bureaucracy of securing access to food stamp benefits. These women also had difficulty enrolling children in schools in their relocated neighborhoods. Economically deprived working mothers are breadwinners who are unable to take time off from work due to being primary caregivers to their families.

Economically deprived and working-class Black women are constantly and actively patching together support during disaster, as their networks transfer information, tangible assistance, and emotional support (Reid 2012). These kin networks help them and their children with evacuating to safety as well as processing trauma (Reid 2012). Single mothers rely on informal networks to alleviate transportation and childcare needs (Reid 2012). However, economically deprived women’s networks, because of insufficient resources and limited geographic span, can leave women’s recovery at the mercy of assistance from strangers and from disaster response organizations such as FEMA, large NGOs, and churches (Fussell 2012).

Black middle-class Caribbean American women similarly experienced communications issues with FEMA. However, they did not experience the kinds of hardships that economically deprived single women faced. Carol, a middle-class, second-generation married mother of one child who shared a home with her mother, who owns the home, stood with me outside on the driveway of a two-story, single-family home. It had been a couple of weeks since Sandy, and Carol was frustrated that she had not been able to fill out an application with FEMA due to loss of internet connectivity. She explained that she was only receiving automated messages that didn’t allow her to reach a live person or leave a message. She demonstrated what she calls the “vicious cycle of hearing everything,” the nonresponse that led to her immense frustrations with FEMA. Carol quickly whipped out her cell phone and pulled onto the screen a saved contact, an action she had performed several times before. Like a teacher, standing before a class, she held out her phone, “So this is the number that they give you.” We both listened to the prompt from the FEMA hotline:

You have reached the Federal Emergency Management Agency. FEMA’s individual [inaudible] program does not provide food assistance or a $300 food voucher. Other organizations around your area may be able to help you with your food needs. If you have a food-related need please hang up and dial 2-1-1 for referrals to organizations that can assist. If you have losses other than food, including damage to your home, personal property, or vehicle, we recommend that you complete an application. Please stay on the line if you would like to complete a FEMA application assistance—[Message abruptly cuts off]

Carol expressed her frustration:

CAROL: So, there you have it, they hung up. So, this is all I have been getting. And actually, when I went on Sunday, they told me I can register with my smartphone, because I didn’t have the internet. And they have the call centers there, but they won’t use the phone! So, I called, and it’s been like that, like the vicious cycle of hearing everything. It says to stay on the phone—so there’s nothing to press—you can’t press anything. She still talks, and that’s it.

SM: So, it doesn’t work?

CAROL: No.

SM: And the only way you could have accessed it is by having a smart phone where, if you are able, to fill out an application online?

CAROL: Exactly.

Tracing the reproduction of race and class inequality should consider the ways in which Black and economically deprived women experience challenges stemming from how they are situated to both the pre-disaster and disaster response economy, including housing, health care, employment, and related benefits (Luft 2016). The experiences of both Debra and Natasha illustrate how disaster compounds the women’s breadwinning, caregiving, and traditional domestic work responsibilities by adding the need to clean debris, navigate the loss of utilities and large home equipment, and seek assistance from their networks of family, neighbors, and friends, while trying to navigate the bureaucracies of service and disaster response organizations.

FEMA-to-SBA Labyrinth

My conversations with Ferdinand, the FEMA site manager at the Canarsie disaster response center, corroborated what I had been learning in Canarsie and The Rockaways. Our conversations provided insight into the on-the-ground implementation of FEMA’s grant application and appeals process from a different vantage point. While FEMA made some strides after Katrina, Black residents I spoke with were caught in what I describe as a bureaucratic labyrinth in the execution of FEMA’s disaster response programs.

After Superstorm Sandy, FEMA spent $25.5 billion in recovery funds in New York and New Jersey (FEMA 2017). By August 2014, FEMA had provided 183,000 applicants with $1.4 billion via the Individuals and Households Program (IHP), which I and Canarsie disaster survivors call the “FEMA grant.” These FEMA grants assist with home repairs and rental assistance (GAO 2015, 9). Canarsie disaster survivors whose FEMA applications were denied are routed to the Small Business Administration to apply for a loan. This step caused much confusion and frustration especially for retired and fixed-income homeowners. These disaster survivors saw SBA as an unwelcome barrier to obtaining a FEMA grant. This sentiment is in stark contrast to how FEMA views SBA. A December 15, 2018, press release by FEMA describes SBA as “the federal government’s primary source of money for the long-term rebuilding of disaster-damaged private property.”

Although Congress passed the Post-Katrina Emergency Management Reform Act of 2006 to avoid the delays and coordination pitfalls during Katrina, themes of neglect and inequality permeated the narratives of the Black immigrant population of Canarsie. The Canarsie Sandy survivors with whom I spoke were already navigating the shock, destruction, disruption, and dispossession that the disaster event produced. Then they had to simultaneously navigate the unclear path to securing adequate and timely governmental assistance. Upon coming to the disaster response center, Canarsie homeowners, many who were either retired or minimally employed, were often diverted to apply for an SBA loan. Some of these homeowners were of working-class backgrounds, retired, or near the end of their mortgage commitments, and they could not fathom taking on a loan that they would have to pay back. Many of these Sandy survivors reported feelings of abandonment, frustration, confusion, exhaustion, and even distress, which were quite palpable as I patiently and empathetically listened to their stories. These residents attributed their distress to having to deal with FEMA. Some residents even spoke about abandoning their idea of seeking government assistance altogether, deciding it was best to attend to their needs on their own or rely on a patchwork of private contractors, handymen, churches, and family.

In my conversation with FEMA site manager Ferdinand, I gained deeper insight into the FEMA grant appeals process, which opens up the possibility of either increasing a disaster survivor’s grant amount or changing a denial to an acceptance. One caveat was that the survivor who receives a denial or insufficient funding gets bounced over to their insurance company and the SBA before they can proceed with the FEMA appeal. The problem is that this method benefits those who are most adept at navigating the maze of such bureaucratic hurdles and those who are in the position to take a loan if it came to that. However, the Canarsie residents with whom I spoke at the disaster response center and out in the community were already quite frustrated with the delays they had experienced with FEMA. Therefore, receiving a denial or an amount that was significantly lower than their estimates for repairs and purchases caused them to give up prematurely. FEMA’s procedural process of elimination looked to many like an opportunity for the government to derail them from a path of getting a grant, which they would not have to pay back, in an effort to lock them into an SBA loan that they could not afford. Ferdinand explained the FEMA-to-SBA connection to me:

FERDINAND: Well, SBA is not really—don’t go by the name, because it says ‘small business,’ it’s a disaster-related loan. I thought the same thing when they said, ‘Well, we’ll refer you to SBA.’ I said, ‘What do you mean SBA?’ I don’t have a business, and I said, ‘I’m not self-employed,’ and they said, ‘No, it’s a low-interest loan, disaster-related.’ I said, ‘Oh, okay.’

SM: An attorney in The Rockaways, told me that a lot of people on the more economically deprived end of The Rockaways were denied assistance. Do you keep a tally of the percentage of denials per community?

FERDINAND: We don’t have the number, but sometime it will come out. They will put it out in the media, because, right now, they’re still gathering information. So yeah, it will come out sometime.

SM: It will? Okay.

FERDINAND: It will come out, but what happened is there was a misconception when they said, ‘Well, I’ve been denied assistance.’ Most of the time that’s what confused them. [Ferdinand, continues to explain quite expressively]

FERDINAND: No, no, no, no, no. It’s based on the primary contact. They will say ineligible because of insufficient damages. I don’t like it. It doesn’t sound right, but that’s the way to say that something is not right. So, what they do is, they send you a letter, ‘Right To Appeal.’ When you appeal, if the inspector said there is insufficient damage, there can be two or three things causing this. It can be insurance. You said you have insurance? So, we stop right there waiting to clarify that. If you have insurance, your insurance was supposed to cover it. So, now you need to prove that you had no insurance. It’s either you get a letter from your insurance saying, ‘Sorry, you didn’t have flood coverage,’ or if there is a settlement, it says, ‘Well, you are under-covered. You didn’t have enough coverage. This is what we give you.’ Now, you write back to FEMA. You appeal to say, ‘Yeah, my insurance gave me that, but this is how much damage I have.’ So, what they’ll do, we will ask you to provide an estimate from the contractor.

SM: Okay. So, you have to get a contractor.

FERDINAND: Yep. So, once you have that, then look at what the inspector says, and what you said, and what the insurance gave you. They review it with all [this] new information, and they will come up with that, okay?

SM: But some people will appeal, and some people won’t, and what I’ve been seeing is people who have more education, for one—higher income or whatever it is—they’ll yeah, they’ll go out and actually go and seek that information. Some people, when they get a denial, they don’t want to go through all that. That’s a psychological stress.

FERDINAND: Right, right. So that’s why when they come here, that’s why we said, ‘It’s not the end. Appeal. Appeal. Appeal.’ I think you can appeal up to three times.

SM: Three times. But there are a few people who appeal, right?

FERDINAND: Oh, yeah. They do appeal. They appeal. That’s what keeps us rolling right now, because we have a lot of people coming back who are unhappy about the result of the SBA. Because if you don’t do the SBA, sometimes you get a little bit, but you could get more, if you do the SBA. Because if you do an SBA, and are not qualified, they decline your loan. That’s a good thing in a way. That kicks you right back to the grant program. So, they will consider it. It is okay. Forget the loan. You can’t afford it. You have no insurance. Now, I’m going to take care of you.

SM: This favorable outcome depends on who comes in and whether they follow through with the appeal. Additionally, those who are qualified for the SBA loan will not be kicked back to the FEMA grant.

What Ferdinand describes is legible to those who have full understanding of how each part of the process connects to the other and are certain what the end will be. In reality, it is quite an arduous, time-consuming, uncertain process for people who are already under immense stress from having their lives so fundamentally disrupted. Additionally, during a disaster, time is of the essence, because people’s circumstances are constantly in flux. For example, untimely assistance resulted in much more complications such as the growth of mold spores in basements of disaster survivors as well as the accompanying stress of dealing with it while thinking about the health complications one might suffer.

Another compounding issue is that after a long time lapse, it is possible that disaster survivors realize they don’t qualify for any assistance from FEMA, SBA, or insurance providers. At the same time, the community assistance from local churches or community-based organizations may be stretched thin so survivors may be pushed further to the back of the line, despite beginning the process of seeking assistance early. Marlene’s case exemplifies this. I met Marlene, a seventy-three-year-old retired seamstress from Jamaica at the disaster response center. Marlene is a Canarsie homeowner. I approached her for an interview in early December, and I later worked to assist her in getting connected with some services. In a follow-up visit to her home in March 2013, I wanted to see and hear how she had been coping since we last spoke. We talked as we walked through her basement, where only some Sheetrock hung on the walls. I asked Marlene,

SM: Can you tell me a little bit more about your experience with FEMA? Because you said that they referred you to SBA.

MARLENE: FEMA referred me to SBA, and a gentleman came by. He told me he’s from the SBA. He didn’t tell me he was from FEMA. Now, I’m naive to all this. I think the SBA was something different from FEMA. I didn’t know that they were connected. So, when he told me he was from the SBA—he came, he measured, he did not ask any questions. He didn’t ask, ‘Did you lose anything?’ Or ‘What did you lose?’ He just measured, cracked a few jokes, and left. He did give me his business card and his number—I think that’s some number for his business. After that, I waited a long time, not hearing from SBA, so I called and was told that there are so many applications that they’re running behind.

SM: What dates was that—around what date?

MARLENE: I can’t remember.

SM: That’s okay.

MARLENE: I have everything written down. But they said that they passed some of the applications—including mine—over to another gentleman who would review it and give me a call. But before all of this, I did get a call from—I think it was Mr. Howard. He wanted to know why he was just hearing about my situation, because since I had called them somewhere around the 3rd of November, he wanted to know why my files were just reaching his desk when it was, like, late. Anyway, we talked, and he told me that somebody would get back to me. The person who got back to me was from the Small Business Loan about a month ago. This gentleman called me. He told me that ‘Your loan application looks very good. Your credit is good. The only thing I see on it is a student loan.’ They say you’re not to give information when you’re not asked. And I—my foolish self—said ‘A student loan—it’s not really my loan, it’s my granddaughter’s loan.’ The gentleman, after his conversation with me, hung up the phone and called me back immediately, and he said, ‘Ms. Marlene, I’m sorry the loan is denied because of the student loan. It’s like ninety days late and it’s a federal loan. I’m sorry I can’t help you.’ Then another gentleman called, and he now told me that he wanted me—he wanted to come by and inspect the place because they’ll give me a grant.

SM: That’s from FEMA?

MARLENE: From FEMA.

Consistent with Mr. Ferdinand’s explanation, this funneling to SBA after a rejection of one’s FEMA application was just procedure. Those who went through the process, only to get a denial from SBA, could then return to FEMA with their denial confirmation and use this as a basis for their appeal. Marlene’s FEMA application eventually received a denial for other reasons, but only after she had expended considerable time, emotional energy, and effort. She had hoped that if she had gone through the process of going to FEMA, her insurance company, SBA, and finally back to FEMA, there would be a positive result.

The financial reality of many homeowners I met and spoke to in Canarsie reflected that the income of more than one working adult secured the mortgage payments. Homeowners either worked multiple jobs or had adult children living on the same floor with parents or renting out rooms or their basements. Those who had the most security before Sandy were those who had owned their homes for almost thirty years. However, these most settled immigrants, who tended to be first-generation immigrants approaching retirement, also feared that Sandy could plummet their equity or force them into losing their homes to mold if they were not able to obtain a FEMA grant.

Some disaster survivors I spoke to who had received a denial and diverted to SBA were adamant that they would not apply for a loan, completely unaware of this FEMA-to-SBA-to-FEMA labyrinth. This meant that this practice only served as a deterrent to completing a successful FEMA application for these Black homeowners. We see this in the case of Joseph, a sixty-four-year-old, Canarsie disaster survivor who migrated from Haiti and was approaching retirement. When he did receive a FEMA grant, which fell below his contracting cost plus his cost of replacing his car, he was rerouted to SBA. His SBA application was successful as he was offered a $46,000.00 loan. Joseph refused. However, Joseph did not accept this offer. Joseph and I discuss his experience and the considerations that went into his decision-making as he navigated the grant application process:

JOSEPH: I did the application from the phone, and they sent me a letter, and after that—I don’t remember exactly how many days, or week, I got help from FEMA.

SM: Was that enough to take care of your house?

JOSEPH: No, not really because the contractor I see for the house—they estimate about $12,000 to take care of inside for me. The car, FEMA is not responsible for that. They said I have to take a loan, and I don’t want to take a loan. The reason I don’t want to take a loan, when I was in school I took out a loan, but I struggled to pay that. I don’t want to come back to loan again to pay for it. I don’t want to do that. They send me a package. SBA sent me a package to take a loan out about $46,000. I won’t take it because I’m close to my retirement, so I don’t want after my retirement I have to pay a loan in my retirement. I don’t want to do that. After the storm I called FEMA for an appeal over the phone. I did the application for that. They sent me a letter, and after that they sent me help for that. But it’s not enough. The help they give me is not enough to take care of everything, because I got my car that was flooded, that’s underwater. I have to take care of inside, and the contractor asked me about $12,000 to do that. The help I get from FEMA is not enough, but they say that I can get a loan from SBA. SBA is a small business administration. SBA sent me a package for a loan of $46,000, but I don’t want to take this loan because I’m close to my retirement. I don’t want to, after my retirement, to have a loan to pay for my retirement. That’s why I don’t think I will take it.

SM: How much did FEMA give you? What percentage of your cost did they give you for the basement?

JOSEPH: How much did FEMA give me?

SM: Mm-hmm.

JOSEPH: It’s about close to $9,000.

SM: So, you still need another around $3,000 for home repair?

JOSEPH: Yeah. I feel like this amount they said I take too long to do that. Sixty days past, and when I appealed that FEMA decision to give me this amount, they said that I have to contact the SBA for a loan to do that.

SM: Did you know that you had to appeal right away, or not?

JOSEPH: No, didn’t know. I didn’t know.

SM: Who told you that you could appeal?

JOSEPH: Nobody tell me, I just sent a letter to tell FEMA that I have to spend more.

Those disaster survivors I talked to in Canarsie who did receive grant money on the initial application, found that the grant money was insufficient to complete their repairs. When this occurred disaster survivors had to borrow from friends, rely on adult children, and use credit cards. This was the case with Greg, a 52-year-old homeowner disaster survivor. He says that he initially received $585.00 when he first applied. Then once he discovered that his floor was collapsing, he appealed, but only received about $2000.00. He explained that the reason he received this low amount was because his repairs were urgent, and he had gutted and hauled off the evidence of his damage before the FEMA adjuster was able to come back out. Greg estimated that he spent a total of $9000.00 for repairs and materials, beyond the gutting and replacement of the water heater and boiler installed by Rapid Repairs. We discuss his experience navigating seeking disaster assistance and repairing the damage to his basement. I ask Greg:

SM: How long after the storm did you hear about FEMA, and how did you hear about them?

GREG: I think it was right after the storm. Then I would say that somebody was telling us about FEMA.

SM: One of your neighbors?

GREG: Yeah. First of all, we called them. Then they came over to visit and they visited the house and then they must have given us $585, for all the damage.

SM: Really?

GREG: Yeah, But then we take it, we don’t say anything.

SM: Did you all have insurance?

GREG: No, we didn’t have insurance and we saw that, as a matter of fact, at the bottom of the floor, there was wood and then now on top of the wood with the pipe, after then the side of the window, and then we were talking, and we were walking on the floor now and then we hear the sinking down.

SM: Wow. That’s after the FEMA guy left?

GREG: They left. Then we find out after. “What do we have to do now?

SM: Did you appeal?

GREG: No, because it was urgent, immediately what we had to do was call three guys that we saw in the street and we have to remove all the wood and all the tiles, everything, and then it was piled up outside. Then we moved cabinets and everything like that. Door, clothes, everything like that, we have to remove everything and put them on the sidewalk. Then we saw two sanitation guys and they come in and they say if we want to remove those things. We say, “Yes, we want to remove them.” They move them for us, which was very nice.

SM: Did you take any pictures of the damage?

GREG: No, no, they will never take any picture. My wife was there too, and my wife asked them to remove part of the wall for us, all over, all over.

GREG: Because there was a--

SM: The mold.

GREG: Yeah, the wall was damaged. After that, then the FEMA guy came in and then he checked and checked again. After that one day then they send us about $2000 something and then we take it for the floor.

SM: Was that enough to cover the floor, or was it much more?

GREG: We had to spend some money to lift the floor. If you were to see the money that we spent at the Home Depot. That was a lot more money to spend there.

SM: About how much would you say that your material cost was?

GREG: I would say $5,000. So, the money that FEMA gave was not enough.

Another issue was that the majority of homes of the survivors I spoke to did not have flood insurance policies. There was also the surprise and confusion among many disaster survivors I spoke to who were in utter disbelief that home insurance providers could simply decide not to cover their damages on the basis that the damage was due to flooding. Not being clear about the distinction between home insurance and flood insurance also meant that many Canarsie disaster survivors inadvertently indicated on their FEMA application that they have flood insurance. Providing this incorrect information also triggered being rerouted to their home insurance providers.

Naquita, a Canarsie disaster survivor with a master’s degree in organizational psychology, agreed to talk with me once she finished talking to the FEMA disaster responder who was looking into where she was with her appeal. She was quite frustrated with the process, which she began the day after Sandy’s landfall, including the fact that the FEMA grant-seeking process directed her to her insurance company. She was also dissatisfied that the grant she had received was inadequate and did not consider her family situation. I asked her about her insurance coverage.

NAQUITA: Nothing. We have home insurance, but we live in Brooklyn, and who knew we needed to have flood insurance, and we didn’t have flood insurance, not to mention my insurance company is based in Manhattan, and they were closed for a really long time, and when you call them it’s like, ‘Don’t leave a claim on this phone.’ Since then, we have switched to another insurance company. However, they came out—maybe two weeks ago and that inspector basically went ‘I can’t believe that’—because we also had sewer backup which we had to get sewer cleaned also. ‘I can’t believe that the sewer backed up that high’ because he sees the watermarks on the wall. And I’m like, ‘You have to be empathetic. If you’re in that line of work, it’s not for you to judge and tell me what you believe and what you don’t believe. Write it up if that’s what you think, then write it up and send it in. I don’t know what to tell you.’ He didn’t check the roof. Um, nothing was really done. He just kept saying, ‘I can’t believe that there’s all this damage.’ Well, I wish he was here from the beginning. I have a video. I have pictures—FEMA didn’t want to see it. The insurance adjuster didn’t want to see it either.

SM: Right.

NAQUITA: So, I’m just saving it on my phone until somebody wants to see what it really looks like.

SM: Yeah, I’d like to.

NAQUITA: And, honestly, I feel that us cleaning it out took away from the real devastation because we had to. It was mold, it’s disgusting. The sewer water that was in there, the salt water. I’m like, ‘You can’t live like that.’

Naquita expresses her and her mother’s frustrations about the arbitrariness of the assessments of adjusters that led to differences in grant awards to survivors:

NAQUITA: I think she’s frustrated. Everyone is just frustrated at this point because you figure that it’s almost two months or so after the storm, and you’re still trying to get things back together.

SM: So, when it just happened, whose responsibility did you think it was to get things going again?

NAQUITA: I guess partially ours. This is our home; we want to be comfortable. We still have to live here. So as far as the initial cleanup and so forth—but, I mean, there’s only so much we can do, and we don’t have the finances to get things back together down there either, so to know that you can apply for FEMA and get a grant, that was so—I was happy. It was just like ‘Oh, this is a good thing. Wow.’ But now that I see—I feel like, okay, I have to go through all this extra stuff to get the help, which drives me—I’m upset.

SM: Right.

NAQUITA: I’m trying not to be mad with the representatives that’s here, that’s just doing their job to help me, but at the same time, I’m annoyed.

SM: Right.

NAQUITA: Because I know people that didn’t have to do this, and off the top, they got all of this money, and I’m like . . .

SM: It can’t be that one inspector is seeing it this way, and another inspector is seeing it some way else. That’s incredible to me.

The Canarsie Sandy survivors to whom I spoke evaluate their FEMA adjusters’ appraisals and interactions as arbitrary, lacking empathy, and working with little oversight. A recurrent theme was the concern that their damages were undervalued when compared to neighbors and also based on estimates from contractors. Naquita points to a surprising level of scrutiny and disregard for losses, respectively.

These adjusters are subcontractors hired by FEMA after a brief training and certification, which leaves little room for oversight. They are also carrying out a different role than my research participants were aware of. A 2015 Government Accountability Office (GAO) report acknowledges that FEMA hired these adjusters “to verify the identity and residency of applicants and that reported damage was a result of Hurricane Sandy” (GAO 2015, 9).

Beyond the goal of more efficient coordination, FEMA’s post-Sandy reform had also involved a focus on reducing fraud. FEMA achieved this goal with precision. A 2015 GAO report commends FEMA for reducing disaster relief fraud to “2.7 percent of that total that was at risk of being improper or fraudulent compared to 10 to 22 percent of similar assistance provided for Hurricanes Katrina and Rita” (GAO 2015, 9). The report also cautions that FEMA lacked efficiency in detecting fraud by not effectively verifying Social Security numbers with the Social Security Administration. The Canarsie disaster survivors were not assessing the performance of these adjusters through this lens.

In the above sections, I use adjectives such as “FEMA-run” or “NYS-run,” and later “NGO-run” centers, to remind the reader of the de facto relative, operational dominance of managers of various types of organizations at a particular center. It is important to note, however, that FEMA was present only on invitation to assist with the local efforts of disaster response. My use of “disaster response center” also encompasses “relief” “recovery” or “restoration” centers. Furthermore, the centers themselves are non-permanent assemblages of relief organizations, governmental and nongovernmental, responding to the needs of disaster survivors inside of local venues such as churches.