If your municipality lacks resources to begin climate resilience planning and designing projects, you can apply by April 18, 2025, for free help from the Federal Emergency Management Agency's (FEMA).
What Assistance Does FEMA Provide?
Through its Building Resilient Infrastructure and Communities (BRIC) grant, FEMA provides Direct Technical Assistance for hazard mitigation planning and BRIC project support. The support is tailored to communities through a range of activities and from pre-application to grant closeout. FEMA will engage with each selected community for up to 36 months to further explore and better understand their specific requests for technical assistance.
Project types from past BRIC Direct Technical Assistance requests include:
- General support in the areas of grants management, project scoping, and hazard mitigation planning
- Technical assistance and evaluation for climate risk assessment and nature-based solutions projects
- Natural hazards project scoping activities such as for flooding, drought, fire, typhoon and erosion
How Does My Community Apply?
Interested communities must submit a BRIC Direct Technical Assistance Request Form online to be considered for this assistance cycle.
What Will Make Our Application Competitive?
FEMA will be selecting up to 80 communities and Tribal nations to receive direct technical assistance. FEMA is prioritizing:
- communities identified by the Climate and Economic Justice Screening Tool (Tool no longer available online);
- an Economically Disadvantaged Rural Community (contact VEM at );
- a Community Disaster Resilience Zone1 (as defined in 42 U.S.C. § 5136(a)(1)); and
- requests that focus on nature-based solutions and building code adoption and/or enforcement.
There is no requirement for a previous BRIC grant application or award, or for a FEMA-approved Hazard Mitigation Plan, to be considered for assistance.
How Can My Community Learn More?
To learn more about BRIC Direct Technical Assistance, visit FEMA.gov.
Pittsfield, Vermont was selected as a Direct Technical Assistance recipient in 2022. The Town and FEMA aim to build Pittsfield’s grant application abilities through training, to identify ways to mitigate future flooding, and to focus on mitigation project prioritization.
1Tract 50023955200, Washington County, Vermont (part of Barre City) was identified as a Community Disaster Resilience Zone (CDRZ) on September 6, 2023. Currently, it is Vermont's only CDRZ.