We support our Publishers and Content Creators. You can view this story on their website by CLICKING HERE.

Anger against the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) continues to rise as new, disturbing stories of its incompetence emerge.

The latest story at least involves an apology from FEMA for failing to deliver dozens of trailers to Western North Carolina residents who lost their homes to Hurricane Helene.

According to Charlotte station WBTV, during Thanksgiving week FEMA vowed to deliver 103 trailer homes by the end of the week. Yet as of Dec. 4th, only 46 homes had been delivered.

“[M]ore than 500 families have been approved for a FEMA travel trailer or manufactured home in the wake of Helene,” the station notes. “The agency’s slow deployment of the homes means hundreds of families are weathering the snow and freezing temperatures currently hitting the North Carolina mountains.”

The story only continues to get weirder from here.

After WBTV continued pressing FEMA for answers, a spokesperson called to ostensibly apologize.

“The FEMA spokesperson said they had miscommunication within the agency and will caution against disseminating information with methods other than written communication in the future,” according to the station.

“The FEMA spokesperson also told WBTV that the agency will not be issuing timelines for the delivery of the homes anymore because it is too difficult to confirm a timeline,” the station’s reporting continues.

Why is it too difficult? Well, the spokesperson blamed everybody but FEMA.

“They said that was, in part, because of the necessary utilities not being confirmed at the planned site, the weather conditions, roads being open, and the recipient showing at the scheduled time,” according to WBTV.

During a separate statement made during some sort of press conference — it’s not clear when and where — a FEMA spokesperson also sought to blame mountains for the agency’s incompetence.

“There are a number of different complicating factors,” they began. “So for example, citing a mobile unit on a private property has a lot to do with, for example, topography. Here in Buncombe County, we’ve got a lot of mountains.”

“You’ve got a lot of considerations, not just with where is it to actually put the unit, but then also hooking up utilities, making sure the electrical lines, the plumbing lines, everything is good to go, and it’s safe for a family to stay in,” she added.

Listen:

All this comes following a report in late November about how FEMA was at the time refusing to deploy empty RV trailers to help Hurricane Helene victims.

According to an unnamed N.C. lawmaker, FEMA had multiple empty RV trailers sitting in the N.C. town of Hickory — trailers that critics said could have been used to provide housing to those who’d lost their homes.

“Don’t use my name, but a constituent called me yesterday asking about all the FEMA housing units and trailers that are staged in Hickory,” the lawmaker wrote in a private message to Cassie Clark, an N.C. influencer.

“They’ve been there for a few weeks. I asked FEMA what they were and confirmed they indeed are housing units staged for inspection waiting to be sent out to ‘qualifying counties.’ I asked for a timeline. Attached is the response. Very disappointing,” the lawmaker added.

The attached response from FEMA read as follows: “At the moment not specific time frame, this would be very depending on each individual survivor that are in the FEMA IA program and also in the process with the counties/cities to look for areas to stage them for the survivors.”

Vivek Saxena
Latest posts by Vivek Saxena (see all)

We have no tolerance for comments containing violence, racism, profanity, vulgarity, doxing, or discourteous behavior. If a comment is spam, instead of replying to it please click the ∨ icon below and to the right of that comment. Thank you for partnering with us to maintain fruitful conversation.