Recovery After a Disaster: FEMA Appeals

Join the TDLH Podcast team as they talk with Christina Brown and Chase Porter about common oversights in the initial FEMA application and how to appeal a decision.

Visit our website  https://texasdisasterlegalhelp.org/

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Transcript

Recovery After a Disaster

Speakers:

Christina Brown (Lone Star Legal Aid)

Chase Brown (Lone Star Legal Aid)

(Recorded Oct. 2nd, 2020)

okay

welcome everyone my name is pablo

almaguer you all know me the director of

government…..

 government and private bar relations

there you go, it takes a while to say

that early in the morning here and i

haven't had enough coffee

but here together we're doing a the

joint project

that we're  putting together some

podcasts for pro bono attorneys and this

is our

second cle topic third podcast

this one is gonna be recovery after a

disaster before we begin though on

the topic and

head over to belinda who's going to

introduce  our two speakers i want to

just kind of remind you all what this is all

about

this project  is a coordinated project

between legal aid of northwest texas

Lone star legal aid and texas

Rio grande legal aid

its aim of improving access to justice

for those affected by disasters

our project allows both disaster

survivors and pro bono attorneys to

access critical resources in one place

while at the same time making it easier

to connect disaster survivors need an

evil help the volunteer attorney is

willing to provide it

if you haven't gone yet to the website

this is a bit of a long website but you

can hopefully write it down

or we want to take back here a bit to

listen to it it's texas

disaster legal health dot

simplejustice.org

that's

texasdisasterlegalhelp.simplejustice.org

check it out see the many resources we

have there and include this podcast and

many others

so having said that here let me go ahead

and turn over to my co-host belinda

Martinez

 thank you pablo

our guests today are christina brown and

chase porter,  christina is a

graduate of southern university law

center

and holds a bachelor's of arts from

university of texas at san antonio

she was an equal justice works fellow

serving in the disaster recover legal

corps

drlc for the past two years she is

currently a staff attorney in the

disaster relief unit at lone star legal

aid

she's dedicated to protecting and

advocating for the rights of vulnerable

communities and has experience

representing clients in various single

civil

legal matters including workers

compensation personal injury and

products

liability claims our second guest is

chase porter

he's a graduate of texas a& m has a

master's degree in public policy from ut

Austin's LBJ school of public affairs

and he went to law school at the

university of texas school of law

he's currently an equal justice works

fellow at lsla's houston office working

on

environmental challenges facing

communities on the texas gulf coast

including the consequences of climate

Change and the increased frequency of disasters

he just finished in august two years as

a member of the equal justice works

disaster recovery

legal corps at lone star legal aid where

he focused on a broad number of issues

facing survivors of hurricane harvey in

houston and harris county

including handling a number of fema

Appeals

 thank you guys for being with us

today

so good to be here okay so just get to

start it 

 big pictures disasters

what are we seeing in texas

yeah so i mean i'll go ahead and i'll

answer that i think

 you know specifically in texas

flooding right like that it kind of

seems like even if it's not necessarily

a hurricane right like a

just we all we're we seem to always get

a lot of that tropical moisture and so

you know holds over the city you know it

seems like every time it rains here

there's some sort of flood so i think

you know it's going to be for

you know specifically for houston

anyways i think it's probably more of

like a flooding situation

 you know but although obviously we

see our fair share of you know

hurricanes

but  i know that this is you know

maybe needs to be a little bit broader

so i know there's a lot of different

types of natural disasters and things

that occur

you know that would you know prompt you

know

fema you know assistance and help but

but yeah that's pretty much what you

know we see here

okay and i'm assuming with

climate change or whatever you believe

is causing it we are seeing

more disasters than in recent years  i

know austin's have fires

 dallas has tornadoes and lovely

houston gets

 hurricanes  just

have you seen the increase in  the

last couple years last decade

and how much of an increase

definitely and in houston it seems like

you know i came here to help

specifically with harvey

and while i was still trying to help

people recover from harvey

we had hurricane or tropical storm

 tropical storm rolled through we had

several

other flood events that that were

affecting people

so it's we're getting to a frequency

where it seems like

by the time we're just recovering from

the previous storm

we're being hit again which puts people

in this unfortunate

cycle of recovery and then

recovering again  and i think we're

in in west texas we've seen some

wildfires

 we all know that what's going on on

the west coast right now

as we're speaking that we're seeing a

huge uptick

in not just hurricanes but fires

other flood events and you know i

suspect they'll see

more tornadoes and severe storms that

that

rip through parts of texas and in the

southeast so

 we're certainly seeing more and more

events that bring

fema and other disaster assistance the

play

in fact let me just ask something here

real quick i'm sorry christina

i'll go ahead no and i mean i was just

going to piggyback on what chase said i

mean i can think that just in the last

five

years you know i think it was like

 2015 and 2016  where we had the memorial day

flood the tax day floods you know

then in  2017 there was hurricane harvey

then there was

you know imelda and then hannah

and you know so it's like even in the

last five years it feels like

every year something you know there's

some sort of disaster

is affecting you know the southeast you

know

coast of texas and so  it it really

had i mean fema's

you know doing a lot you know has been

helping out a lot you know for

those  southeastern counties here in

texas

yeah i was going to say when i you know

been practicing for 20 years which i

think is about the age of most of you

all here on the screen

 and about  10 years ago or so just

take it take it though yeah

 i'm actually have a screen here you

all can only listen to us but trust me

they sound and look young i'm the old

one here

but  i remember that ten years ago we

didn't even have a disaster assistance

or recovery team in legal aid so i want

our pro bono attorneys to know that we

actually have to

specialize in it because many of the

people who are affected have to come to

us for services so now we have

all three legal aids maybe around the

nation too and have specified

specific teams that focus just on

disastrous assistance and recovery

isn't that the case for lone star and

for  i'm sure also legal aid of 

northwest texas

yes  lone story does have a dedicated

disaster relief unit

and as you said it's become a hot button

Specialty law sector

unfortunately i mean it was

like at one point

i mean chase how many attorneys did we i

mean  

 10 12 attorneys at one point and i was

about to say that

it the size of our unit has goes up and

down over time a little bit just

funding issues but there is definitely a

point

where we may have been the largest

individual group of attorneys at lone

star legal aid

we were our unit in houston was

certainly bigger than than

a number of our offices and that's

how much work there was to do yeah it

was like it's like a mid-sized firm

almost you know like of attorneys

just working on disaster assistance and

helping people recover

and things like that so i mean it's

definitely been an uptick i mean i think

that kind of shows just how

you know dire and kind of just how you

know repetitive

you know disaster disasters are becoming

at this point

that's right 

Okay so after disaster when does fema show up

and

how do they show up 

Well the big thing to keep out keep a lookout

for

after a disaster or potentially in the

days before

disaster if it's obvious that houston's

going to be hit by

a massive hurricane or new orleans or

whatever 

that the president has to declare a

federal disaster

and in that that federal declaration

will identify

counties or states and where the

the disaster has been declared and then

he will

identify what types of assistance are

available fema

as i think most people know is a massive

organization

with a number of of programs and types

of assistance

aimed at individuals on up to the local

government

state governments in that he will

identify individual assistance may be

available

and when that is in that declaration

that's when

legal aids client base individual

families

and individuals can get assistance from

fema

so that's really the starting point when

you see that

that's when fema will will open up their

phone lines they'll open up their

website

and they will come physically come to

the disaster affected area

and set up what are called disaster

recovery centers

usually called the drc and this is where

individuals can

physically go to apply for fema

assistance in person

okay so they can go to these centers and

someone will help them with the initial

application

right you know a lot of people now

have smartphones especially

during covid more and more people have

gotten access to the internet but we

after a disaster  it's quite possible

you won't have that ability or you maybe

you just don't have that technology

and so the drc's are set up where you

can physically go to

fema has staff available

sometimes they're legal aid or other

attorneys that are allowed in to

kind of help educate people  but

that's where you can go to

physically interact with a fema rep who

can help you with the application

and let me let me ask about that i think

it happens at all drc's around the state

or nation

it's actually the aba young lawyers

division i believe that has a station

agreement with the drc's to have a

station there and usually the legal aid

attorneys

manned those stations or one of those

many stations that people visited the

drc's is that correct

yes that's right yeah yeah and yeah

pablo and you and you say that and it's

like you know even

you know every time there's about an

impending you know 

hurricane or something that's coming i

mean we literally have like disaster

hits in our trunks right like we

literally

you're in the disaster relief unit like

you you have these these tools available

because

we're gonna have to then go out to those

centers right like if it does happen if

it does strike and so

you know we're prepared i mean that's

just the level of preparation that goes

into making sure that we can get out to

these

you know these centers and and you know

make sure that people

register and i also kind of just wanted

to note it that you know

people and this is for those you know

pro bono lawyers who have

no idea how to do this but you know

people only have 60  days to register

with fema right like so you only get

you know  60 days after the declaration

for you to be able to apply for fema you

know services and

sometimes it's extended but i don't even

like i don't even like to you know

rely on that because you know it's just

so important for people to know even if

even if you don't need the help even if

you have insurance like you know it's

just really important that people

if you were affected by the disaster you

just you definitely have to apply

you know within those days and so that's

like what chase was saying

if you don't have a smartphone if you

don't have access to those things

that's when those drc centers you know

become  very beneficial to a lot of

people who you know are just trying to

you know

make it through what's already you know

a difficult situation

so i think what you're saying is that

you all were doing remote advocacy

before it was fashionable like it is

nowadays so we're ready to go in that

old box like

we have two right with some files with

your wi-fi

with your cell phone your satellite

phone sometimes to get through so i want

folks to know that we have experts in

the field here and all legal aids they

can answer your questions but

also remember that  the largest number

of applicants of course go to the drc's

and we have somebody there so we get a

lot of applicants at legally because we

have somebody there

doing the intakes and that's why we need

the pro bono help

and also i guess the second phase of the

fema application is we do a lot of

appeals

for clients  so just a

general note on appeals because that's

generally what the pro bono

volunteers are going to be doing so just

basics

 client has been denied what's the

deadline to appeal for fema

yeah so i mean the deadline is you know

it's sixty days

usually it's generally  60 days from the

date of the denial letter right

but i do kind of want to just go back to

you know

i i think it's really great that there's

pro bono attorneys out there that really

want to help because

we really do get inundated and all the

help that we can get during those

disasters i mean is so beneficial and we

can help so many people

but you know you want to make sure that

you get you know an authorization for

release of information for fema right if

you're gonna

represent these people be filing

their appeals make sure that you have

that because fema

you know they're not you you want to get

a copy of their file like right and the

only way that you can do that is with

that authorization for release of

information right

so i'm sorry i just wanted to kind of go

back no

actually that's a good point let's back

up what's the general process of an

appeal

just in general like where would you

start

right so i mean you know you apply for

and i don't know we wanted to get into

specifics on all there's a bunch of

different types of   assistance that

you can you know that fema offers right

after a disaster has you know 

hit and so  you know when people start

applying for these different you know

programs

and different you know disaster

assistance that's whenever you know you

start getting the denials right it's

about

it takes them about  90 days to come up

with a decision on what

you know what you qualify for the amount

you know things like that and so then

you know

people start getting those denial

letters and so when the denial letters

come you know usually it's

maybe they're missing some sort of

information from you know the file

or you know maybe a fema inspector

gone out there and says that they

believe that the home is

what they call habitable which means you

you can live in the home right we don't

think there was that much damage and so

 yeah which is a very you know we

fight with that a lot it's a very

very subjective  kind of

 evaluation i guess you would like to

say that

that that they perform but  you know

and so those appeals you know

you get a letter basically you're denied

whatever

whatever assistance that you've applied

for and you basically have 60  days right

60 days from the date of the denial letter

to either 

you know appeal or supplement your

information get whatever

you know whatever else they need 

there is 

a good cause exception and you know i

kind of use the example like sometimes

people get hurt in

a disaster right sometimes people are in

the hospital sometimes people get sick i

mean there are a lot of things that

happen

that would prevent you from being able

to you know file that appeal within that

 day deadline and so

if you have some sort of good cause

argument you know

 we would definitely try to do that a

lot for our clients

and and i'll hop in there and say that

there are a lot of reasons why

it's 60 days well first off it's  60 days

from the date of the letter

in fema people applicants our clients

can set up an online account where

they'll see the letter immediately

but a lot of times our clients are

receiving these letters through the mail

it's not 60 days from when they got it

it's  60 days from the date of the letter

and a big issue that i

i've seen is after a disaster if people

can't live

go back to their home their house it got

flooded

their apartment building is shut down

whatever it may be

a huge issue is that fema doesn't have a

current address

so when you do work with

the first time you talk to a client i

think it's always worth

asking them where are they living now

does fema have that address

how how are you receiving information

from fema

you can always make the argument that

you didn't receive the letter because

you moved but fema

potentially will tell you you know it's

on you to

inform us where you are and make sure

you're getting that information

another thing about the the deadline

i've found sometimes that

fema doesn't necessarily strictly follow

the  60 day rule

 so i recommend sometimes if you're

close

 you can go ahead and file the appeal

even if you don't clearly see that

there's good cause

you can go ahead and try it just make

sure

that you're you're setting the

expectation for

the client that we are past the 60 days

i've made my good cause argument but

i'm not sure it's it's a winning one or

you just decide to file the appeal

without highlighting the fact that

you're past the  60 days and just tell

them we're gonna try

but  i can't guarantee you that

they'll accept it

and as long as you set that expectation

up front i think you can go ahead and

try to get something in late

the worst case is you're told no best

cases they get help so keep that in mind

that

the  60 days depending

i guess on who's reviewing it i'm not

really sure how it happens it's a bit of

a

moving deadline you could say and i

think so just piggyback what you know

off of what chase said as far as like

managing your clients expectations

i think that's also important with like

you know when you're receiving that you

know

monetary you know assistance from fema

like you know

it's not meant to make you whole you

know and i think that's one of the

biggest misconceptions

is that you know  people expect that

you know

you know fema's gonna give me everything

that i need to make my house you know

just the way it was before and and

the truth is it just doesn't work that

way right and so i think that it's

really important

you know if you do decide to take on

these fema appeals which are which are

super easy

super you know once you get the template

once you get it down and so i really

want to encourage

anyone who's listening to this you know

that that they're it's really easy and

it's a it's a really great way to help

people but

  i agree with chase you definitely

have to manage you know

you have to manage their expectations

 let me say something real quick here

because i know our pro bono attorneys

might not be

maybe they have taken cases before maybe

they have not but it's a very important

point you all kind of made in passing

but it is happening in fema cases

that the status the poverty status of

our clients is used against them as a

reason for denial and it's just

not we don't want to kind of ignore that

issue because it really is because

i've seen it you know our clients have

been told yeah you wanted to have your

your house without a roof in leaking

water in here you've had it like this

forever you live like this

because you haven't repaired it no i

have a humble abode because you know i

don't have the money to

you know expand it but it wasn't leaking

like this and those are literally

actually i've never been fights and

fema appeals that my house is not this

bad in this repair just i don't have

money to repair

i wanted to make that point for pro bono

attorneys because you will see some of

those appeals and

chase you mentioned date of the letter

that's the denial letter right of the

of the benefits yes so fema

after you apply  fema will

look at your application and look at the

supporting documentation that was

submitted which could be

insurance policies receipts bills

i guess you could submit photos 

they may send an inspector out to your

house

i'm backing up a little bit here back

kind of to the application process but

 fema will send an inspector out to

the property to look at it

or they may do what's called a

geospatial inspection which is they

look at like a satellite image to see

damaged areas

and look at the documentation you

submitted they evaluate that and

identify what they

 what they believe that you're

entitled to receive from them

they'll send a letter  it may be an

award letter saying

you get all these things that

you you think you you might want or

they'll send a

what i call a partial denial letter

which says that you're receiving

 x amount of money for these reasons

but we're denying this and this and here

are the reasons

or they'll just send a letter denying

you outright

 that that's typically when

as attorneys we come in 

that through the application process

it's a lot of education

answering questions when that appeal

letter comes through

 typically that's when we step in and

we identify the

the type of assistance that they're

trying to to achieve

to to get and the reasons why fema has

denied them

 and then so the date of that letter

 starts that 60-day clock 

christina mentioned supplementing

letters that we send to fema

supplementing our appeal letters which

are in response to the

denial letter  as long as you get in

your initial

appeal within that  60 days or you have

good cause

or it's been accepted  i always would

recommend that

if you you do have

supplemental information to give to fema

say for example the client

needs to provide insurance information

but they weren't able to get that

document

in time to send it within the  60 days

to send what you can to fema within the

 60 days

and then up until you hear from fema

making a decision go ahead and

supplement that application

or that appeal with whatever

documentation whatever information you

can gather

up until that date  don't hold

back information just because you've

already sent an appeal in

and you're past that  60 days i just want

to make sure we highlight that and

people know that they can do that

if your client ends up taking a video of

the damages

after the appeal letter or has some

documentation go ahead and give it to

the attorney and so it can be sent in

absolutely and make it when you

you have that initial conversation with

a client  set that expectation

that they need to send you 

whatever may be relevant and they need

to communicate with you that if they

receive a letter from fema

to send it to you soon as possible if

they're able

as soon as they're able to gather

documents to make sure that they can get

that

to you as soon as they can

 and just a question  there is

flat-out denial and there is denial

because missing paperwork

 but let's say you do get some money

can you appeal

for additional money if you're like no i

had way more damages than what you're

saying i need a little bit more

absolutely yeah sure i mean you want to

take a chase

sure i i was just going to say that fema

they use a very specific system where

they identify

 specific

personal types of personal property or

elements of your house and they'll

they'll judge that

you know your kitchen needed so much

money and they may judge that your

bedroom

doesn't need to be repaired if they

grant you some money to

to fix your kitchen up but you still

feel like your bedroom is not habitable

you

can't reasonably live there you can

certainly

file an appeal asking for more money and

the same goes for personal property if

they

give you a certain amount of money to

replace

medication but it's not enough to

actually

cover all the medication you lost you

can certainly appeal for more money

and i think i just want to kind of just

backtrack you know pablo

you know something that you said and

then kind of you know 

similar to like what chase is saying is

that you know

those videos just like you said if you

you know it's so important that we do

that we're pro you know we're proactive

rather than reactive right

so i know we're talking about fema

appeals which is kind of after the

disaster has passed but

that's why it's so important even for

you know you pro bono attorneys out

there you know you guys have family on

you know gulf coasts or you know in

wildfires and things like that but that

you know you take a video of your home

take pictures of your home before

a disaster you know occurs and that way

you know

you know you have that and then and then

after it happens you know you also take

videos and photos right

it makes it a lot easier right when you

when you have a before and after to show

like hey this is the damage like

you know because just like you said some

people live very humbly

and you know and so you know an

inspector coming in may think that this

is already not like sorry we're not

going to help you because you want us to

fix your house up and it was never

you know whatever to begin with and so

that that's why it's really important to

kind of

just you know pictures videos you know

things like that are going to be really

really helpful

you know if you have them before and

then if you have them kind of like after

and so

you know it's always kind of good to you

know ask your clients that's why we do a

lot of like outreach

before the next disaster hits so that we

can make sure to get that kind of

information out

you know to people  and it just makes

our lives easier their lives easier it

helps us to be able to help them get the

disaster assistance

you know that they need in a timely you

know manner

and and keep important documents in a

very safe place

you'll you'll find that fema

assistance to our client base and

potentially us and our families and

friends

 there there's a bunch of different

programs but

most of them are very document based

fema wants to see your insurance policy

fema wants to know

 that you have a

prescription for this type of medication

fema

 needs to see your your bills for

whatever

 keep those important documents like

 a deed to your house something

showing the ownership of your house

if you're a renter a copy of your lease

make sure you have a copy of your lease

showing you occupy somewhere if you have

insurance on your car your house your

apartment

whatever it may be keep those documents

somewhere safe

identification right like you can't even

apply for fema

without an id you know so and it's like

even

if you don't have some sort of

waterproof container put it in a double

ziploc

bag you know what i'm saying like

something simple it doesn't cost

a lot but you know that will even

protect it from you know protect your

documents from

you know from the floodwaters and so 

yeah just like chase said it's that

that's that's really important

you know i actually i want to let pro

bono attorneys know not only is it

podcast available at the website that i

mentioned the top

of the recording here but some of these

forms are talking about some sample

stuff is also available there so if you

have a chance go to the website and

check that out

but if you want to contact your local

legal agency you want them some

you know sort of preventative training

to happen we do it for both clients

and attorneys how to prepare for a

disaster so you can prepare your office

or your clients can prepare for their

home

and the simple like a little advice

putting in a waterproof container for

example

that helps so much when you start doing

these appeals for your clients

a lot of a lot of fema denials are

are simply a paperwork issue

 if you were to look at

the the big document explaining all the

eligibility criteria it's overwhelming

it's huge

but so many of the appeals that we

take on for clients we take on some that

are real

they're monsters of you're arguing about

whether a house is habitable and you're

it can be quite the fight but a lot of

appeals

are simply because fema didn't get a

Document

 because your client didn't have it at

the time or

fema didn't process it correctly or fema

just doesn't understand what they're

looking

at  and so a lot of issues if you can

work with the client to locate a

specific document

or or contact the insurance company and

get them to send you a policy whatever

it may be you can solve a lot of these

appeals

by just narrowing down what what

document does fema need to see and once

i submit that document

the gate will be open and i

the floodgate will be open i hate to

make the flood reference but

 you know a lot of these appeals

really are one little discrete issue

and so if you can just see the denial

letter understand

what does fema need to see and if it's

not clear

call fema or reach out to a legal aid

attorney

 you can you can do a lot of good by

just

sending fema one document with a little

explanation of what it is

you know i don't think i've ever done a

training for disaster assistance without

using those words flooding

opening the gates or perfect storm and i

always have to be careful i don't know

why but it happens

every time we talk about these things

sorry

oh no no you're fine you're absolutely

right 

i'm just going to go back to you say

fema actually goes and inspects

the property either the apartment or

the home

does fema have set standards for those

inspections like

every inspector okay i getting a lot of head shaking 

Everyone’s face... right belinda can see

our reactions

you want to go you can take the camera i

you know i mentioned that

christina knows that i i will 

when i was still doing fema appeals up

until a couple weeks ago

 fight to the death with fema over

this

 the the standards are a little

squirrely

 basically this is important to know

we talked about managing expectations

and so

let me kind of go back to that 

fema will if you let's say you have two

people

in your household fema will only

offer to repair enough of your house

that they think

is needed for two people so they may not

repair your entire house i've had this

with a client who she had a two-bedroom

house and she

lived there alone or fema thought she

lived there alone

they refused to touch one of her

bedrooms

and the one bedroom that they were

willing to repair

they only offered to repair so much of

it

because the standard is it has to be

uninhabitable

and it's not always very obvious

where that standard is i've 

you know i it's subjective we have no

idea how they make the determination if

we're just going to be  100 we have no

idea how fema

determines whether this house is

habitable and this one is like

i have no we don't know right and so it

just

it's kind of one of those battles that i

think we're kind of kind of like legal

like legal aides across the country are

gonna you know slowly have to fight

together to get some sort of clarity on

but as it stands right now

we don't have that the standard

go ahead pablo i'm sorry no no

 i was just gonna say i you know make

it clear to clients and make sure that

you understand

that the standard for whether something

is habitable

or uninhabitable can be can appear

quite low and you have to be realistic

with the client that fema's

probably not going to fix your bedroom

all the way back up to where it was

before or your kitchen

 if they

understand that they may be a little

more understanding of why

fema is continuing to deny them for

habitability reasons even if

we strongly disagree with that decision

it's just important to relay to clients

to make sure they understand

fema's not looking to make you

completely whole

you know and something to add to that

several of us organizations of legal aid

organizations around the nation actually

have actually filed suits

against fema to just have a definition

clarified you know

and we identify many of these issues

because we see them when the fema

denials come back so if you're a pro

bono attorney and seeing the pattern

you let us know it could probably work

on something to better define it and

there

are some large firms out there if

they're listening here you're part of a

large firm

who've assisted us in those appeals i'm

all in

in the clarifications of the regulations

that are sometimes non-existent i think

we have them like a super secret or

super super secret you know

 sort of interpretations that we have

to kind of discover once in a while but

 this is a benefit having pro bono attorneys

Help us out to identify these

matters

yeah and then i just kind of wanted to

add to chase for the pro bono attorneys

that are listening to this you know

 one of the ways we try to get around

the whole habitability argument

is we get other inspectors  we we have other you

know people go out and

you know what's the word i'm looking for

contractors to go out and do estimates

like no

like they need at least fifty thousand

dollars based on you know the damages

that have occurred and so sometimes

getting those second opinions

 and then submitting those with the

fema appeal right like

you know like sometimes you know that's

kind of the way that we try to get

around the habitability

you know   kind of there well the

denial is the better word 

i don't we haven't quite gone through it

and i don't know if i'm i'm kind of

jumping

the gun but just kind of just like what

needs to be in a fema appeal

 you know we talked about the  60 days

you know you have to appeal

of course you know you're gonna have to

give a written explanation right include

the law and the facts you know stafford

act

you know things like that i think just

like you mentioned pablo you guys may

have some sort of resources 

available  some templates there

and then you know you're going to want

to make sure that you get copies of

Documents and photos from your clients

right

proof of the disaster losses like you

need that when you submit that appeal

like don't submit it

you absolutely need that information 

and then every

every disaster in case anyone didn't

know every disaster has a four-digit

disaster number right and and and every

fema application has a nine digit fema

number and so you want to make sure that

that four digit disaster number and that

nine digit fema

application number is on every single

piece of documentation that you submit to

fema

like i don't care if it's just a photo

of the front of that like

every in the i put it in the  the

footer

of of my appeals and i make sure i put

it because a lot of times stuff gets

lost and

you know they can't find they don't know

where it goes and then you you know so

it can become you know kind of

crazy to say the least in the whole you

know application and appeal process

and dealing with just fema in general

and then you know you got to make sure

that it's signed by the attorney and it

has to be signed by the applicant

under penalty of perjury right like the

applicant has to sign it under penalty

of perjury you know that

everything you know within here is

basically you know true and correct so i

just kind of wanted to just give just

kind of a really quick

like snapshot of what needs to be

included and you know what we do is we

make them exhibits right in the back of

the you know in the back of the appeal

give out you know you give out

everything you know the law the facts

you know how this pertains to that

particular client what you're asking

fema for

and then you know exhibit a b c d

 I think i mean i think i had

almost to L  one time like you know just

submitting

you know making sure that fema has

everything they need so

you know they can't say no you know and

so  that's kind of

just kind of where go ahead yeah chase

you can

i mean i think you make a good point 

first off there are

there are just some elements of an

appeal that need to be there

 the the client's name address

their fema registration number  the

disaster number

those can all be found on their denial

letter by the way

 or if you have a question you can

call the fema hotline

importantly though fema won't talk to us

as their advocates

unless  a fema authorization is on file

and i don't think fema has a standard

form but i think

all the legal aids have created a form

that they they send in

 i'm correct me for wrong i'm sure

that form is available

some type of form like that's available

absolutely pro bono attorneys

 texas disaster legal help website we

do have

sample appeals letter with citing the

stafford act and some examples of code

that may be helpful and then we also do

have a

a template for the authorization of

release

so yeah so always make sure that you

send that

in even if you're just sending in an

appeal that is signed by the

the client go ahead and send that

authorization into

if you're you're getting the client to

sign the appeal they can sign the

authorization

 that way it's in if you need to call

the fema hotline to get clarification

about something

if you don't quite understand an appeal

letter or a denial letter excuse me

you can call and get a little bit more

information 

and as far as you know all the evidence

and stuff

you can make a fema appeal as long as

involved as you want it i don't think it

does any harm

 sometimes if they're asking for a

very discreet document

 just write in your appeal letter on

october 1st 2020  you sent

client a letter stating that they're

denied for

assistance repairing their vehicle

because they

did not show that they didn’t have

insurance covering the damage

attached to this letter is the insurance

policy

with the car and a letter from their

insurance company

saying that they are not covering the

damage and you can potentially just

leave it at that if you want to 

or you can like christina was talking

about you can

add photos whatever you think is

appropriate just put in

more than what you think fema may want

to know if if you have the time and

ability to do so

and i want to point out something out

too that we talk about appeals here we

hear appeals and

we want to make sure as you hear from

the representers here they're not table

of contents

briefs you know code of appeals appeals

they're appealing

to administrative agencies so  there

might be the stafford act  some other

citations to the law

but you can be licensed anywhere in the

nation to help with fema appeals

in texas you can even be law students

supervised by a law professor for that

so  don't feel intimidated by the word

appeal

you can advocate if you can advocate you

can make you can draft one of these

letters

yeah i think most of the time fema

i think a lot of appeals are hand

written by a client that doesn't have

a legal advocate helping them so

 yeah don't feel like it's not

you're not going to to miss a rule about

margins or

or font it's whatever form you want to

want to submit you can submit it just

make sure that you have that crucial bit

of information that the name address

registration number disaster number and

make sure that your client signs it with

the statement saying that i'm

signing this under penalty of perjury

fema

will throw your appeal out if that's not

there

as long as you have that you're good to

go and the rest of it can be whatever

form you think makes the most sense

and then i kind of wanted to just give

like a little i don't know if it's a tip

or trick or

just you know you wouldn't know it if

this was your first time

helping with fema appeals and so you

know we generally

don't get the cases right off the bat

right like

help but let us because if if i was to

be able to send it the first time

we might have better luck right we

generally get them after they've been

denied

once twice three times and now they're

coming like hey i need help

you know i keep getting a denial from

fema and so that's why that whole

authorization is really important to get

as soon as possible because

i'm gonna tell you i can't there's been

a lot of times where i requested the

entire file from

fema and i find the documents that they

claimed

that they never received you know

and so it's like you know

and sometimes you know our clients

aren't able to articulate

why they were denied sometimes fema

isn't very clear on why you know they

were denied and so

a copy of the file from fema can be 

extremely extremely helpful and just you

as a lawyer kind of picking through

going through

okay let me understand kind of like

what's happened and where you are in the

process

of this appeal you know so that's kind

of a

you know depending on when you get it

right i mean if you're catching it

you know three months out the gate you

probably there's not gonna be a lot but

i mean we were getting cases

too i mean just like chase said like he

just finished a few weeks ago so

you know you have time to request that

file go through it

and like you know no you did have that

information so

what's you know what's the problem and

so i just kind of think that's

something that you know

would be kind of just a just a little

tidbit to help you out if it's

the first time you're having a deal you

know with with fema

okay so i just want to point out so even

though the appeal may be denied that

might not be the end of the road there

might be

other things you can still do to help

that client 

so

maybe the most frustrating thing about

fema is in a denial letter

you'll often see a statement at the end

of it that says this decision is final

 it's not you can keep appealing every

letter

every denial letter  never let that

statement

stop you from continuing with the appeal

yeah i mean i think even for me i think

i my i had

where i think it was the fourth time

right she had already done it three

times by the time it got to me we were

on like the fourth appeal and i mean

every letter says this is the final this

decision is final

and you know once i did it submitted the

correct documentation i mean we were

able to get her an extra like four grand

so

i mean it don't just like chase said

like do not be discouraged don't it's

not

final like you know it it

again this is where those guidelines and

those things that we

you know need from fema would would come

and help but but yeah so i

just like that it's not final and and i

had one thing that that came to mind

that i wanted to make sure

sometimes we've talked a lot about a

denial letter

sometimes fema will send the client a

letter

it's not a denial letter per se but it's

just asking for more information

it's saying that we need this document

that may not have that may have a

shorter timeline on it than

 60 days fema the letter may

state that fema needs to document sent

to them within  20 days

 i think maybe sometimes it's 10 days

although that

that seems a little quick to me but 

this goes back to once you start that

representation

making sure that the client understands

that that you need to get

the correspondence they receive from

fema as soon as they can get it to you

understanding that they may have

challenges and communication

 following a disaster and just

just due to their ...pablo brought up the

poverty

issue that a lot of our clients don't

have great community access to

communication  so keeping that in mind

but setting that expectation that they

need to send you these documents as soon

as they get them

because the you know if a client is as

frustrated and his

as christina said trying to appeal a

couple of times on their own they get

another letter

 they kind of assume it's probably if

it doesn't award them something they

kind of assume

it's just another denial  but on the

chance that

it's just asking for more information

make sure you don't miss that  20-day

deadline thinking you have  60 days to

send it in

so look at the letter  take

the day seriously if you're if you're

going to be late you can try it anyways

 but don't take the decision as final

part all that seriously

you can always appeal and just like

chase said like with the communication

and just like the lack of

understanding of just how the whole

process works for people

you know when you first get a client if

they don't understand it

get fema on the phone with your client

right before you i mean before you get

the authorization for release of

information if you call fema with your

client on the line

they will talk to you right like they'll

get permission from your clients

with them about it and then you can kind

of get a better understanding like hey

what happened why are you denying them

what do they need while you're waiting

for

the physical fema file to be sent to you

you know what i'm saying like

you don't have to wait because sometimes

that can take a month to get you know

you take a month to get a fema file

especially in the middle of a disaster

you know and so

you know call fema up now it's not

i didn't say it was going to be a quick

call but it makes you may be on the

phone for two hours with fema but

at least you then you are able to get a

better understanding as the lawyer

of like what's needed what we need to

start collecting what the client

needs because i'm gonna tell you eight

times out of ten the client doesn't know

and so they can't even articulate to you

all they know is they've gotten this

letter that says they're denied and so

 that that would that is very i think

a really kind of helpful thing

for people to know i guess the best

practical advice you can probably

multitask because you're trying to call

fema because you're going to be on hold

you're being transferred over and over

many times let me just warn you right

now

yeah yeah and know that when you call

fema

whoever you're talking to is a

representative that

is looking at the file for the first

time so understand that they've not seen

this particular file before and so

have that expectation yourself that it

may take a little while for them to find

the information you need

and be prepared to

try to be as specific as possible 

in what you're asking and be prepared to

ask things a couple of different ways

or ask them to double check something

if something doesn't make sense ask them

to look at it again

because it is the first time they're

looking at that file they've not seen it

before

and there may be a lot of things going

on in it there may be

notes for different types of assistance

and you want to make sure that they're

looking at the the type that you

need information about so it can be a

bit frustrating but you'll get there

with them

it'll be alright okay thank you guys

and

i guess our final question is

you said most of the denial is for

missing paperwork missing documents

 what are the other common types of

reason for denial i know when i was

doing fema appeals

it seemed proof of ownership was a big

thing i would see over and over again

have you had the same issues with proof

of ownerships of homes

etc 

yeah so

that's a really that's a really big you

know 

the whole proof of ownership and i mean

what we call

you know a clear title right not having

clear title to your home

 a lot of our clients you know 

have inherited their homes right so this

was grandma's home and

then my mom lived here and my mom is now

deceased and now i live here but the

problem is is that

that home is still in grandma's name and

so

you know fema's not going to give you

that repair assistance or give you money

because

you don't own the home on paper and so

that's a really

really big thing and and the thing is

people you don't know

they don't know until the disaster hits

until they try to get the help and

they're like

well of course this is my house like

this was my you know this was my

mother's house it's my house now but

and so we definitely help and work with

them to make sure we get those

 there's affidavits of heirships that

you can just different types of legal

documents to ensure

that they have you know homeowner rights

to that particular property and that

speeds up

you know the  you know disaster

you know assistance recovery if you have

that

and and on the the title issue

fema sometimes will allow you

to file almost like an affidavit or a

statement from

your client explaining you know

have it notarized or have the perjury

statement on it saying that this is

why i own the home this is how i came

about ownership

you can always do that and send it in

and fema may honor that

even if  you don't have

all the deeds and the affidavits of

heirship or

if you need to probate a will if you

don't have that done

especially because a lot of that can

take a while to do

you can always have the client explain

how they came about

ownership have that signed by them with

a notary or under

penalty of perjury send that to fema and

fema may honor that they don't always

have

 title requirements that are as strict

or as high as

a title company may have if you're

trying to sell a house or

some of the other disaster programs

state and local programs

often have very strict title

requirements so one thing to do

and then that reminds me of a good point

is one thing to do

is as you work through a fema appeal and

if you do see that there are ownership

problems  do what you can as a pro

bono attorney or

 you know see if there is another

attorney at your firm that wants to do

some title clearing or go back to the

legal aid that you you spoke to

and see if one of their attorneys can do

it     do your best to clear title

it will help them it may help them

recover from this disaster but it will

also put them

in a much better position in the future

when that other disaster

 comes and hits we started this with

the discussion about how

frequently these are coming through so

get them ready for the future while also

helping them cover

to make a finer point but it's an

obvious point to some people that we

don't have large estates here i think

you can probably take care of any of

these title clearing quote-unquote

issues when there's somebody who's

passed away

affidavit of heirship small estates affidavit

Transfer on death deed and

those documents mean a lot to many of

our clients

you will not necessarily be in a full

probate if you do take on one of those

cases and find a title issue i guess

it's the big point

right and like our clients don't probate

right like that

like that's i mean you know so it's yeah

i mean just like pablo exactly like our

clients what

it's so  those affidavits of heirship

and those transfer on death deeds are

like gold

like that's that gold standard for for

our clients right and so

 but yeah yeah and you know and to pro

bono attorneys

if you have an issue and you can't

communicate with a client you can't get

certain documents

remember to always come back to us

Legal aid and give us a call we'll help

you

contact them we we have experts in the

fields we'll find a way

to locate them somewhere the other so

don't spin your wheels they're trying to

deal with this too much come back to us

for an issue

yeah and i mean i don't know i don't

mind like i'm but you know belinda and

pablo

if y'all get i don't mind answering any

pro bono questions helping out whatever

whatever y'all i mean y'all know how to

contact me so if you guys get that i

Am 100%

for that     christina you're from the valley

i think earlier you told me and i'm from

the valley i have a lot of friends out

here i grew up here i have a bunch of

pro bono questions beyond disaster 

so be careful what you wish for

i just wanted to real quickly make a

point about the help and support

on the texas disaster legal help website

we do have a knowledge resource library

with a bunch of templates and some basic

information

fema numbers there is

attorney mentors that you can speak with

and in the coming months we're actually

starting a live chat so if you have a

quick question

you can type it in real fast and maybe

get a real-time answer

 so just we do support and help you

for the our volunteers who are willing

to help out our disaster survivors

though but thank you guys so much for

talking to us today

 we really appreciate it having two

knowledgeable experts

help out on this podcast and give some

great information to our volunteers

so thank you thanks sir thanks for

having us belinda and pablo it's been

it's been great

i just want to tell the pro bono

attorneys y'all it's not hard it's so

easy

like it seems like it's like it's hard

because it's foreign and you don't know

but it is fema appeals is the best way

that you can help

like your local community your family

your friends who've been affected by a

disaster so

that's that's my i'll end it

there but yeah  i 

it sounds

overwhelming but when you see

a specific reason for denial you'll

realize that

here's a discrete issue i can do this i

can get the right documents i can

get the right photos and you can take

care of it you can do it

as frustrating as it can feel at times

once you understand what the problem is

there's usually a pretty

straightforward way to address it

yeah i like the way you all kind of said

like for example it says final but it's

not final

there are regulations but they're not

regular that's such a legal kind of

thing to say but that's what you need

attorneys in this in advocates because

you uncover all that

you'll say when it's final you'll know

what the regulation is if you have an

attorney involved

yeah yeah

 you just want to go ahead and walk us

out pablo

sure i think unless there's like we have

to give up five minutes here

if you want to give a quick story 

maybe belinda is that okay

one each a good fema appeal that you

did 

a quick one two minutes long 

Go ahead

chase has the best one sure so you know

a theme of what i tell other legal aid

attorneys

or pro bono attorneys is and what pablo

just talked about you know it'll be

final when we say it's final don't give

up

don't let don't let this final

this decision is final or the  60 days

necessarily 

lead you and the client to say we can't

take this any forward keep with

it i i had a client who 

he leased a bedroom from his family so

he lived with family members and fema

 gave him assistance and then gave his

family assistance they later

wanted to take his assistance back

because they thought they had given

they'd a family had double dipped 

and he he came to legal aid after a year

of trying to fight it on his own

and he had missed all sorts of deadlines

i think he was past the deadline when he

came to me 

i i ended up writing two appeal letters

explaining

that yes he's related to these people

but here's why he he was

leasing a room from them  he should be

treated like any other person renting a

room

 i sent a couple letters and there are

some other issues that we had to cover

as well but

 i ended up writing a letter to the

regional office for this part of the

country

and i i got a phone call

and i had to write a second letter

saying hey it's been three months y'all

haven't contacted me

and i finally got a phone call from a

supervisor saying

we did a complete review of this we 

we agree with 95% of what you said

 we're completely past the deadlines

and they

gave him more assistance than we asked

for

 and so that just hammered into me

that

keep going keep keep as long as you have

the time and ability to do it

 keep fighting  keep making the

argument because you may get there

even if it feels discouraging 

you know i

think that issue you're talking about is

that a recoupment issue that's what they

Term it

 that there is a recoupment issue so

fema if they feel that they have

overpaid somebody given too much

assistance for one reason or another

they may be able to recoup it

 there are ways to argue that

you know if it was fema's fault you can

tell fema well that was your fault we

already spent the money so you can't get

it back but

 if the client knows that they got

paid too much make sure they don't go

and spend it

and i ask about that because at tulane

university in louisiana who's seen their

share of disasters i passed through

there

i think they had a class action suit

about this issue a few years ago because

a year

after like the disaster you got you got

these letters from fema

yeah the regulation another another

thing that you may as a pro bono

attorney run into it it may be

two years from the last big disaster in

your area but that's when fema starts

going through the recoupment process and

so there may be an opportunity to take

one of those cases

and and make the argument of why fema

didn't overpay your client

or that if or that your client doesn't

have the ability to repay

yeah and i even have i have a few of

those recoupment cases now right like

from hurricane harvey so now fema’s 

going back they're auditing you

know so that

and i know we're kind of getting a

little bit there's just so much within

fema but

 you know that's why it's important

when people get that fema money you have

to use it specifically

for what they're giving it to you for

if you get home repair money it has to be used

on home repairs

you can't go put a down payment on a car

like that's not how this

would have well how about you buy your

rims for the car though

i mean you said this is not well i mean

well i mean you're just gonna you're not

gonna get a tax return you know to your

tax money for the next  years if

that's the heck

you know so that's just kind of another

thing it just you gotta when you get

that money whatever they say it's that's

what you have to use it for i don't care

about because

they're gonna come back and they're

gonna ask for receipts and they're gonna

ask for proof

how did you spend the money that we gave

you and if you cannot

provide that to them you're gonna have

to pay the government back and so

you know that's we're dealing with a lot

of that right now but you know that

that's

way past it the fema appeal part

well thank you yeah thank

you so there's a bit of social work

aspect that we have to do for our

clients once in a while that happens

that way but listen

christina chase thank you all so much

honestly not only for being part of this

discussion  providing some great

information

but for taking part in such important

work you know at your local legal at

your own legal organization

 belinda i don't know if anything else

you want to add here but i think we're

ready to wind up here

and give it an hour yeah i think it's

been a great

i think it's been a great podcast it has

been thank you so much folks really

appreciate it and i hope those listening

 got a few ideas here and we'll go to

our website and pick up a few cases of

pro bono because even a year down the

line we'll be needing you

take it easy all okay bye