FEMA rejected requests for federal assistance, twice, after devastating floods in western Maryland, part of a larger pattern of making communities pay for their own disaster recovery.
By Campbell Robertson
¶ Campbell Robertson reported from Westernport, Md., on the fallout from spring floods.
The New York Times
Dec. 10, 2025
The morning after the flood, the volunteers showed up. The streets of Westernport, Md., had been buried in mud. The elementary school had been swamped, as had the firehouse, the town hall, the municipal garage and scores of homes. All of the city employees had lost their personal vehicles. Sewer and water lines were wrecked. Books from the library, also ruined, were scattered in the muck all over town.
With so much destruction from the flooding in May, Westernport, which lies along the Potomac about 120 miles upriver from Washington, D.C., needed government help. So in June, state officials submitted a request for about $16 million to the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
The response was blunt: denied.
Communities across the country are finding that FEMA has become much less willing to fund disaster repair and recovery under the Trump administration. Assistance has been delayed in some places; in others, aid has come in much smaller amounts than local officials had expected….
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/12/10/us/trump-maryland-floods-disaster-aid.html
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