"National Hurricane Center staff would normally be working on forecast improvements: 'We can't do any research and development for the next hurricane season.'"
"Training has been halted for thousands of western firefighters. The U.S. Forest Service can’t award contracts for needed equipment. In forests across the West, no federal employees are doing work to reduce dry “fuel” that feeds catastrophic blazes."
"U.S. President Donald Trump cannot withhold disaster relief once an emergency has been declared, federal statutes show, despite the Republican’s tweet on Wednesday that he had ordered the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to cease helping victims of last year’s California wildfires."
"The House passed a bill to extend an expiring chemical facility security program, with Democrats and Republicans hoping to buy time for negotiations on its future."
"The Trump administration has delayed the release of $16 billion in storm protection funds, prompting complaints from officials in Puerto Rico and Texas, who say the money is vitally needed to protect coastal communities before the next hurricane season."
"The Trump administration is sitting on billions of dollars intended to help vulnerable cities and states prepare for extreme weather, prompting growing criticism from state officials worried about the next storm season."
"BOULDER, Colo. — A few months after Chris Cook and his family moved from California into a four-bedroom house nestled among ponderosa pines in the foothills here, they got a letter saying their home insurance policy had been canceled."
SEJournal looks ahead to key issues in the coming year with this "2019 Journalists’ Guide to Energy & Environment" special report. Stay tuned as we continue to add elements to the report up through and beyond its formal launch Jan. 25 at an annual roundtable, organized by the Society of Environmental Journalists with the Wilson Center in Washington, D.C.
"Disaster officials say they need to start removing millions of tons of rubble from Paradise – and soon – so the town can begin recovering from the Camp Fire. That much is certain. The question is where to put the rubble."
"Tens of thousands of U.S. residents were displaced by climate change-fueled disasters in 2018. California saw a string of massive wildfires — from the Mendocino Complex in July, which became the state’s largest wildfire on record, to the Camp fire in November, which was the deadliest. Meanwhile, Hurricane Florence, the second rainiest storm in 70 years of U.S. record-keeping, was quickly forgotten as Hurricane Michael slammed into the Gulf Coast, the third strongest ever to make landfall in the U.S."
