Disaster Assistance Registration is a
program used to provide financial assistance and, if necessary,
direct assistance to eligible individuals and households who, as a
direct result of a disaster, have uninsured or under-insured,
necessary expenses and serious needs and are unable to meet such
expenses or needs through other financial means.
The Federal Emergency
Management Agency (FEMA) seeks emergency approval for changes to
two interrelated existing approved collections of information. In
light of recently enacted laws and the arrival of hurricane season,
it is vital that these changes be implemented sooner than time
limits employed under normal Office of Management and Budget (OMB)
review and clearance procedures. In response to Super Storm Sandy
(October 2012), Congress added “child care” expenses as a category
of disaster assistance to FEMA’s Individuals and Households Program
(IHP) through the Sandy Recovery Improvement Act of 2013 (SRIA),
Pub. L. No. 113-2. Section 1108 of the SRIA amends section
408(e)(1) of the Stafford Act (42 U.S.C. § 5174(e)(1)), giving FEMA
the specific authority to pay for “child care” expenses as disaster
assistance under the Other Needs Assistance (ONA) provision of IHP
in addition to funeral, medical and dental expenses. Upon a
Presidentially declared disaster that grants funding for IHP, FEMA
begins collecting information from survivor/registrants in order to
determine eligibility for IHP. FEMA’s current registration
application script for IHP disaster assistance does not ask
questions regarding a survivor/registrant’s need to cover “child
care” expenses associated with a disaster and FEMA’s Administrative
Selection form for States does not yet include a selection option
for “child care” expenses. Thus, FEMA needs to change its
application and State Administrative Selection forms to include a
question about whether the survivor/registrant needs financial
assistance for child care expenses as a result of a disaster and
whether the State wants to administer this funding or not. FEMA
also needs to collect necessary paperwork from the
survivor/registrant to verify the expenses associated with child
care through correspondence with the survivor/registrant. FEMA’s
mission is “to support our citizens and first responders to ensure
that as a nation we work together to build, sustain, and improve
our capability to prepare for, protect against, respond to, recover
from, and mitigate all hazards.” The lynchpin is the relationship
among FEMA, the disaster survivor/registrants, and declared States.
If FEMA does not have the ability to ask survivor/registrants
whether they need disaster assistance for child care expenses, and
whether the State wishes to administer this funding, then FEMA will
not be able to properly identify those who would qualify for this
new line of ONA assistance and fail to properly carry out the
mandates of section 1108 of SRIA. If OMB were to employ the normal
clearance procedures for these changes, they would likely not go
into effect until after the current hurricane season has ended, a
period where FEMA usually has a high volume of Presidentially
declared disasters that necessitate IHP assistance. Thus, it is
imperative and crucial for OMB to approve emergency changes to OMB
ICRs 1660-0002 and 1660-0061 as prescribed under 44 U.S.C. §
3507(j)(1) and (2). Thank you for your consideration.
US Code:
42
USC 5174 Name of Law: Disaster Mitigation Act of 2000
US Code: 8 USC
1601 Name of Law: Personnel Responsibility and Work Opportunity
Reconciliation Act of 1996
PL:
Pub.L. 93 - 288 0000 Name of Law: Robert T. Stafford Disaster
Relief and Emergency Assistance Act
The burden has since increased.
In response to Super Storm Sandy (October 2012), Congress added
"child care" expenses as a category of disaster assistance to
FEMA's Individuals and Households Program (IHP) through the Sandy
Recovery Improvement Act of 2013 (SRIA), Pub. L. No. 113-2. Section
1108 of the SRIA amends section 408(e)(1) of the Stafford Act (42
U.S.C. § 5174(e)(1)), giving FEMA the specific authority to pay for
"child care" expenses as disaster assistance under the Other Needs
Assistance (ONA) provision of IHP in addition to funeral, medical
and dental expenses. Thus, FEMA needs to change its series of 009-0
set of registration forms to include a question about whether the
respondent needs financial assistance for child care expenses as a
result of a disaster and whether the State wants to administer this
funding or not. FEMA also needs to collect necessary paperwork from
the survivor/registrant through a "Request for Information" letter
(new) to verify the expenses associated with child care through
correspondence with the respondent. This poses some additional time
burden to respondents.
On behalf of this Federal agency, I certify that
the collection of information encompassed by this request complies
with 5 CFR 1320.9 and the related provisions of 5 CFR
1320.8(b)(3).
The following is a summary of the topics, regarding
the proposed collection of information, that the certification
covers:
(i) Why the information is being collected;
(ii) Use of information;
(iii) Burden estimate;
(iv) Nature of response (voluntary, required for a
benefit, or mandatory);
(v) Nature and extent of confidentiality; and
(vi) Need to display currently valid OMB control
number;
If you are unable to certify compliance with any of
these provisions, identify the item by leaving the box unchecked
and explain the reason in the Supporting Statement.
Form 009-0-1 Disaster Assistance Registration
Published Emergency FRN for OMB Collection 1660-0002, 10-22-2013.pdf
Supporting Statement OMB Collection 1660-0002.docx
Narrative of Changes for 1660-0002 (NPSC edits) .doc
Disaster Assistance Registration