Sponsors (2)
The bill lets utilities add resilience work to disaster restorations—cutting future outages and long‑term taxpayer costs—but raises near‑term federal spending, adds administrative complexity that could slow restorations, and leaves earlier disaster victims unable to benefit retroactively.
Utilities and their customers (rural and urban communities) can carry out cost‑effective hazard mitigation while crews restore power, reducing future outage risk and lowering long‑term repair costs and taxpayer disaster costs.
Utilities (energy companies) remain eligible for FEMA §406 hazard mitigation grants even if they received §403 restoration funds, enabling access to additional federal funding for resilience projects.
Taxpayers could face higher near‑term federal disaster spending obligations because combining mitigation with restorations may expand what future appropriations must cover.
Utilities, government contractors, and customers could experience slower restorations because planning and administering combined restoration/mitigation projects adds complexity and may delay work.
Utilities affected by disasters before enactment may be unable to retroactively receive joint mitigation funding, creating unequal treatment and fairness concerns for those companies and their customers.
Based on analysis of 2 sections of legislative text.
Explicitly allows electric utilities to perform cost‑effective hazard mitigation during FEMA §403 restoration and preserves §406 mitigation eligibility for those facilities for funds appropriated after enactment.
Allows electric utilities to carry out cost‑effective hazard mitigation work at the same time they perform FEMA Stafford Act §403 emergency power restoration activities, and clarifies that receiving §403 restoration assistance does not disqualify a facility from later receiving §406 mitigation assistance if otherwise eligible. The change applies only to funds appropriated on or after enactment. The amendment is narrow and procedural: it removes an ambiguity that could discourage simultaneous mitigation during restoration and preserves eligibility for separate mitigation grants tied to disaster recovery funding.
Official title: To amend the Robert T. Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act to authorize Federal agencies to provide certain essential assistance for hazard mitigation for electric utilities, and for other purposes.
Introduced January 3, 2025 by Val Hoyle · Last progress January 16, 2025