Climate Disasters

Food & Shelter
Written By Alysha Rashid

76% of Southerners live in counties that have experienced disasters in the last 3 years, compared to 64% of non-Southerners.

Number of FEMA disaster declarations by county

Mar 1, 2020 - Apr 11, 2023

Source: FEMA. Notes: Excludes COVID declarations. Includes all other county-level disaster declarations, for example: hurricanes, fires, floods, tornadoes, levee breaks, landslides, earthquakes, and severe ice storms.

Climate disasters have worsened the nation’s suffering over the last 3 years with an average of 20 “billion-dollar” climate disasters annually — up from an average of 7 annually in the two previous decades.1 Southerners have borne the brunt of these disasters, with 76% of Southerners living in a county that has had a disaster since March 2020, compared to 64% of non-Southerners. In 7 of 12 Southern states (AL, AR, FL, LA, MS, NC, and SC), 100% of the population live in a county that has experienced a disaster since March 2020. In Louisiana, every county (parish) has experienced 12 or more FEMA-declared disasters since March 2020. On April 13, more than 25 inches of rain inundated Fort Lauderdale in less than 24 hours — one example of the extreme rainfall events that are becoming increasingly common especially in Southern states.2,3

Federal spending on disaster relief more than doubled in 2020 and 2021 compared to 2018 or 2019.4 But the time- and document-intensive FEMA application process has been shown to increase inequity because it is too burdensome for smaller/rural municipalities and people with low-incomes.5 Moreover, the supply of available housing diminishes, and housing costs (including insurance) increase after disasters (Housing cost burden).6

  1. “Billion-Dollar Weather and Climate Disasters”. National Centers for Environmental Information. https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/access/billions/

  2. “How Fort Lauderdale’s Historic Rainfall Compares to Florida, United States 24-Hour Records”. Dolce. The Weather Channel. April, 2023. https://weather.com/news/weather/news/2023-04-13-fort-lauderdale-most-extreme-united-states-24-hour-rainfall-records

  3. “2021 Record Rain Days”. Climate Central. November, 2021. https://www.climatecentral.org/climate-matters/record-rain 

  4. “Disaster Relief Fund, Federal Emergency Management Agency, Homeland Security”. USA Spending. https://www.usaspending.gov/federal_account/070-0702

  5. “As Disaster Costs Rise, So Does Inequality”. Howell, Elliott. SOCIUS. December, 2018. https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/2378023118816795

  6. “Natural Disasters and Housing Markets. The Tenure Choice Channel”. Dillon-Merrill, Ge, and Gete. December, 2018. https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.aeaweb.org/conference/2019/preliminary/paper/YZ56fSb6&sa=D&source=docs&ust=1673914838206677&usg=AOvVaw2FR0pHH383oDHw5mOIK0OX

Alysha Rashid
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