EMD team helping flood recovery in Nebraska

A team from the Washington Emergency Management Division has been in Nebraska helping residents there recover from their worst flood event in years.

Employees are helping implement the state’s Individual Assistance strategy, including helping to establish mobile multi-agency resource centers, scheduling preliminary damage assessments for Individual Assistance and working on emergency declarations.

Nebraska Gov. Pete Ricketts recently invited the team into his governor’s mansion for dinner and to meet with them to thank them for their efforts.

Washington Emergency Management currently has a team of 10 staff and reservists deployed.  The team left for a month on March 25 and are expected to return on April 24. They are helping the Nebraska Emergency Management Agency with establishing volunteer resource centers for flooding victims, the state and local housing task force and disaster case management. They are also working with state emergency management on providing individual assistance, which helps flooding victims, individuals and business with funding and resources for recovery. 

The agency has four full-time employees and six reservists on site.

The Lincoln Journal-Star reports that the Federal Emergency Management Agency had approved more than $8 million in individual and household disaster assistance to those hit hardest by winter storm and flooding conditions in Nebraska.