A federal judge in Massachusetts ruled Thursday that the Trump administration could not unilaterally cancel a Federal Emergency Management Agency grant program that states used for disaster preparation, imposing a potential hurdle in the administration’s efforts to tighten FEMA’s purse strings.
Richard G. Stearns, a U.S. District Court judge appointed by President Bill Clinton, said the administration’s decision to cancel the Building Resilient Infrastructure and Communities (BRIC) program was unlawful, citing statutes concerning federal appropriations and FEMA’s legal responsibility to help reduce the damage from disasters.
A group of 22 states sued FEMA in July, three months after the administration canceled the grant program and called it “yet another example of a wasteful and ineffective FEMA program.” The agency said in April that it was canceling all applications to the program for fiscal years 2020-23 and that if grant funds had not been distributed, they would be returned to a larger fund used for FEMA’s disaster recovery work or to the U.S. Treasury.
In their lawsuit, the states argued that the roughly $4.5 billion the program had invested in extreme weather resiliency projects along with similar programs had prevented $150 billion in disaster damage over two decades. In the months since the program ended, emergency managers have expressed concern that state governments and philanthropic organizations cannot fill the void created by the federal pullback, especially as disasters become more frequent and destructive.
The grant program began in 2020 during President Trump’s first term as a way for state and local governments to take proactive steps such as building flood walls, elevating buildings or developing evacuation plans. The program was based on research that suggests that each dollar spent on disaster resiliency could save an average of $6 in recovery costs.
But under the second Trump administration, heightened scrutiny on FEMA spending has significantly slowed the flow of aid to communities.
In a November court filing, lawyers for FEMA said the program “has not been terminated. Nor has FEMA refused to spend funds directed to BRIC or spent the funds on other programs.” They said that Trump officials were re-evaluating the grant program, but that the states were seeking to prevent the program from ever ending.
Officials at FEMA and its parent agency, the Homeland Security Department, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The states that were part of the lawsuit were Washington, Massachusetts, Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Kentucky, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont and Wisconsin, along with the District of Columbia.
While the order prevents FEMA from terminating the program and repurposing its budget, it did not appear to compel the government to award any grants, said Joel Scata, a senior attorney with the Natural Resources Defense Council.
Regarding projects that had been approved but not funded, “I think we’ll have to wait and see,” Mr. Scata said.
Scott Dance is a Times reporter who covers how climate change and extreme weather are transforming society.
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