What a federal disaster declaration means

Under the Stafford Act a governor (or tribal chief executive) asks the President for federal help when an incident exceeds state and local capacity. The declaration that follows is what FEMA's Disaster Declarations Summaries file records, one row per designated area.

Three types

• DR, major disaster: the broadest declaration, which can open individual assistance, public assistance and hazard mitigation funding.
• EM, emergency: narrower help, often before or during an incident, capped in scope; many hurricane and winter-storm responses begin as EM declarations.
• FM, fire management assistance: reimbursement of firefighting costs for a fire that threatens to become a major disaster; declared quickly, usually for a county or a few counties.

Designated areas

A declaration names the counties (or tribal lands or the whole state) eligible for each program. A county appears in this site's county table only when FEMA designated it; a statewide designation (county code 000) appears on the state page. Being designated means help was made available, not that damage in the county was worse than in an undesignated neighbour.

Programs

Individual assistance (including the Individuals and Households Program) helps residents with housing and other needs. Public assistance reimburses governments and some non-profits for debris removal, emergency measures and repair of public infrastructure. The county tables show which of the two was declared.

Counting

State pages count each disaster number once, however many counties it designated. A biological declaration in 2020 (COVID-19) designated every county in the country and appears in most county tables.