Facility & Work Eligibility

Primary use decides it. In FEMA’s examples, a nonprofit hospital’s medical office building leased 70 percent to for-profit doctors and labs is ineligible, because more than half the space serves an ineligible use. A hospital parking garage with 15 percent retail is eligible as a support facility, with funding prorated to the share used for hospital parking.

Emergency protective measures and stabilization for an immediate threat are eligible. Appendix I’s parks table mainly lists what is not eligible: federally constructed beaches and shoreline works, private nonprofit parks and recreation facilities, natural unimproved features, destroyed crops, and private or homeowners’ association beaches and dunes. Engineered beaches qualify only under specific criteria; general Category G eligibility is in Chapter 8.

Eligible: emergency protective measures and repairs, limited right-of-way clearing for access, and permanent repair or replacement of system components, including inspecting damaged parts and buried parts where there is evidence of damage. Not eligible: lost revenue, higher operating costs such as buying replacement power, and general surveys such as blanket sewer video inspection.

Eligible: moving and storing contents to prevent more damage, replacing destroyed contents with items of similar age, condition and capacity, treating irreplaceable items, recovering records, and re-shelving replacement library books. Not eligible: new items when used ones are available, new databases, data re-entry or scanning, and replacing rare books, collections or objects.

Eligible: mud and water removal, mold remediation, bracing and sandbagging, demolition for an immediate threat, safety placarding inspections, earthquake frame evaluations, and repair or replacement of buildings, equipment and vehicles to pre-disaster condition. Not eligible: mold from poor maintenance, unneeded slab removal, code and substantial-damage inspections, extra capacity for growth, and ADA fixes you were already cited for.

Eligible: debris removal for an immediate threat, flood fighting, emergency repairs to engineered and maintained facilities, silt removal to restore their capacity, and permanent repair or replacement. Not eligible: work only to protect farmland, raising levees, dewatering to dry land, natural channels and shorelines, and facilities under the Corps of Engineers’ permanent repair authority.

Eligible: debris removal for an immediate threat, emergency access and emergency repairs to keep roads passable, and permanent repair or replacement of roads, culverts and bridges. Not eligible: federal-aid highways (FHWA’s program), extra lanes, lost tolls, loss of useful life, routine maintenance, and private roads except in narrow emergency-access cases.

Every facility runs through the same core rules: facility and general work eligibility (Chapter 4), cost eligibility (Chapter 6), emergency work and debris rules (Chapter 7), EHP review for all work (Chapter 10), and, for permanent work, codes and standards, hazard mitigation, the 50 percent rule, relocation, floodplains and landslides (Chapter 8). Appendix I then lists facility-specific eligible and ineligible work.

A nonprofit facility is eligible if it provides a critical service (education, utilities, emergency services or emergency medical care) or a noncritical but essential social service that is open to the general public. Open to the public means use isn’t limited to a set group, access isn’t gated, and any fees are nominal and waived for those who can’t pay.

FEMA reads the agreement. For facilities under construction, it checks the contract for who handles disaster repairs, builder’s risk insurance, a force majeure clause, and when responsibility transfers back to the owner. For leased facilities, the lease decides; if it is silent, the owner is responsible. Facilities owned and maintained by federal agencies are ineligible.

For debris removal and emergency protective measures, FEMA asks whether you had jurisdiction over the area or legal authority to do the work at the time of the incident. For permanent work, it asks whether you were responsible for restoring the facility, based on ownership and any written agreements. Ownership is usually enough, unless the facility was leased out or under construction by a contractor.

All work must pass three tests: it is required because of the declared incident, it is in the designated area, and it is your legal responsibility. For the first, you must show the damage happened during the incident period and was caused directly by the incident, and separate it from anything else, such as earlier damage, wear and tear, deferred maintenance or another event.

Generally no. A facility must be in active use when the incident period starts. The exceptions: it was only temporarily closed for repairs or remodeling, its future use was set in an approved budget or plan, or you can clearly show you intended to put it back in use soon. A facility that was only partly in use is funded in proportion to the share that was active.

A facility that a state, local, tribal or territorial government owns or is legally responsible for maintaining. That includes systems such as water, sewer, power and flood control; buildings; non-federal-aid roads; airports; parks; and smaller assets such as signs, fences, lighting, equipment and vehicles. A natural feature qualifies only where it has been improved and is regularly maintained.

Large projects are paid on actual documented costs (except capped projects). You must provide cost documentation within 90 days of work completion, and the recipient must certify completion and submit the final claim within 180 days of completion or the project deadline, whichever comes first.

FEMA checks four building blocks in order: applicant, facility, work and cost. If any one can’t be shown, FEMA can’t fund it. Simplified procedures let small projects use summaries and self-certification, and FEMA can review a sample of large document sets instead of every page.

Historic facilities can be restored as a code requires even if repair costs more than replacement. Changes in construction method or materials are approved when access, site conditions or tie-ins require them. Pre-existing damage must be fixed at your own cost before FEMA funds the repair.

Upgrades based on guidelines, recommended practices or other non-mandatory provisions are ineligible, as is added capacity for population growth. Extra work a permitting agency requires is eligible only if it meets four narrow conditions.

Election-related work is eligible when the disaster damages polling facilities or voting equipment. Repairing public property, supplies or equipment damaged during eligible emergency work is eligible when the damage was caused by severe conditions, unavoidable, and not from misuse.

Yes, as an emergency protective measure, when the mold resulted from the incident and not poor maintenance or a failure to act promptly. If you couldn’t act quickly, document why.

For infectious disease declarations, FEMA works with the CDC and issues disaster-specific guidance on which measures are eligible. Mosquito abatement is eligible when a public health official validates a specific threat in writing, and only for the increase over normal spending.

Yes. Separating, handling, stabilizing, pumping, cleaning up and disposing of hazardous materials are eligible, along with short-term testing to eliminate the immediate threat. Testing for long-term cleanup is not.

FEMA funds efficient, cost-effective disposal, including reducing vegetative debris by mulching, grinding or burning, staging sites, and landfill tipping fees limited to costs of operating the landfill.

Emergency work is work that must be done immediately to save lives, protect public health and safety, protect improved property, or eliminate or lessen an immediate threat of more damage. It covers debris removal (Category A) and emergency protective measures (Category B), and is due within six months of the declaration.

It depends on what the money was for. Funds for the same purpose as FEMA-eligible work must go to your cost share or FEMA reduces funding. Unrestricted donations don’t duplicate. Funds from another federal agency for the same purpose always do.

Prison labor is eligible at the rate you normally pay prisoners, plus transport and extraordinary security, food and lodging. National Guard on State Active Duty is eligible for regular time, overtime, benefits and per diem; Guard under federal (Title 32 or Title 10) status is not.

Yes, based on the terms of the rental agreement, provided you compared renting with buying and the rental didn’t cost more than buying and maintaining the equipment over the project.

44 CFR 206.224

44 CFR 206.224

44 CFR 206.223

Permanent Work transitions from 'restoring to yesterday' to 'building for tomorrow.' The 50% Rule (44 C.F.R. § 206.226(f)) precisely determines replacement eligibility. Key compliance areas include pre-disaster design and function limitations, mandatory consensus-based codes under Section 1235(b), and Section 406 Mitigation tests: 15% Rule, 100% Rule, and BCA ≥ 1.0. Category-specific rules require 12-month gravel invoices and conductor thresholds, with a 180-day window for Category I code administration. The 'Obtain and Maintain' insurance requirement is a lifelong commitment. Click to master permanent work.

Securing federal disaster funding through the FEMA Public Assistance (PA) Program necessitates a mastery of the eligibility "pyramid"—a sequential hierarchy comprising the Applicant, Facility, Work, and Cost. This framework serves as the strategic gatekeeper for all federal obligations; failure to validate a lower tier, such as the jurisdictional nexus of a facility, immediately precludes the eligibility of subsequent work and costs. For State, Local, Tribal, and Territorial (SLTT) governments, understanding this pyramid is essential for protecting treasury resources and ensuring that restoration efforts meet stringent federal standards.This regulatory analysis provides a comprehensive roadmap for navigating these requirements. It defines the scope of eligible public facilities, including specialized criteria for natural features and the financial implications of proration for partially inactive structures.

This briefing document provides a comprehensive analysis of the policies and regulations governing Permanent Work (Categories C–G) and administrative enforcement (Category I) under the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) Public Assistance (PA) Program, as authorized by the Stafford Act.

Master the eligibility pyramid: Applicant ? Facility ? Work ? Cost for FEMA PA funding success.

Policies and regulations for Permanent Work (Categories C�G) and Category I administrative enforcement.

FEMA grant funding for debris removal, emergency measures, permanent restoration, and code enforcement.

Appendix H mold cleanup methods, disposal packaging rules, and material-specific restoration actions.

Post-disaster mosquito spraying thresholds, CDC surveillance parameters, and eligible habitat alterations.

Rules for SLTT and PNP facility eligibility, emergency vs permanent work categories, and legal responsibility requirements.

Criteria for SLTT and private nonprofit eligibility, critical services definitions, and SBA disaster loan matching rules.

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Confirm who can apply for FEMA Public Assistance, which facilities may qualify, and how ownership, legal responsibility, public use, and facility function affect eligibility after a declared disaster.