Permanent Work Eligibility

• Eligible: permit and plan review, inspections, enforcement, elevation certificates, condemnation determinations, substantial damage determinations and appeals, monitoring unpermitted work, staff training, contracting and public outreach.
• Eligible regardless of whether the code meets PA’s facility-restoration criteria.
• Ineligible: work on non-disaster structures, and adopting or updating codes, ordinances, zoning or land use plans.
• Communities suspended or sanctioned by the NFIP are ineligible.
• Labor: budgeted staff overtime only; unbudgeted staff regular and overtime.
• Category I work can’t be the basis of an alternate project or carry a mitigation proposal.

Small projects: a list of activities and number of locations. Large projects: activity logs or sign-ins, locations with addresses or GPS, and rights-of-entry where needed. Source: PAPPG Table 30.

• The requirement is waived when eligible costs for the insurable facility are $5,000 or less.
• It applies to improved and alternate projects too, for the life of the work or the facility, whichever is shorter.
• FEMA can modify the requirement if coverage isn’t reasonably available and isn’t necessary; it won’t require more than the state insurance commissioner certifies as reasonable.
• Commercial policies, blanket policies, flood policies, pools or approved self-insurance can satisfy it.
• If you can’t insure yet (for example, during reconstruction), a letter of commitment holds the project until proof of coverage.

Proof of coverage by type and amount, or a letter of commitment. See FEMA Recovery Policy FP 206-086-1.

• The reduction applies when the area has been mapped as a special flood hazard area for more than one year.
• If you believe the map is wrong, request a Letter of Map Amendment or Revision within 6 months of the declaration. If approved, funding can be reinstated. Costs of pursuing it are ineligible.
• Nonprofit facilities in non-participating communities aren’t reduced, but the community must join the NFIP within 6 months and the nonprofit must buy flood insurance.

Flood insurance policies, flood maps, and any map amendment request and decision.

• Alternatives considered: no action, other locations, and other actions including natural features. Projects stay in the floodplain only if no viable alternative exists.
• Critical actions (such as hospitals, schools, nursing homes, hazardous materials, emergency services) use the 0.2 percent (500-year) floodplain; others use the 1 percent (100-year) floodplain.
• Substantially damaged or improved structures in coastal high hazard areas must be elevated on open foundations and anchored.
• Wetland work needs Corps permits; failing to get them can lead to denial or deobligation.
• Floodplain ordinance upgrades in NFIP communities are eligible if the ordinance meets the code criteria and the work is disaster-related; repair is capped at replacement cost except for historic facilities.
• Hydrologic and hydraulic studies are eligible when needed, such as for altered culverts or bridges in flood hazard areas.

Floodplain maps, permits, any H&H study by a licensed engineer, and the alternatives analysis.

• FEMA-directed: the Regional Administrator may require relocation if the facility faces repeated heavy damage, approval isn’t barred, and it is cost-effective. Relocation cheaper than rebuilding in place is cost-effective; otherwise FEMA runs a benefit-cost analysis.
• Applicant-driven: relocate through an improved project, capped at replacement cost if destroyed or repair cost if repairable.
• Code-driven: if a code requires relocation but relocation isn’t eligible, funding is capped at repair without relocation costs, as an improved project.
• Eligible relocation work: land acquisition (only as much as needed), support facilities such as roads, parking and utilities, and demolition of the original.
• After a required relocation, FEMA won’t fund future repairs at the original site except open-space uses. Buyers of the original site must be told.

Damage history, cost comparison or benefit-cost analysis, land needs, and environmental review before acting at the original site.

• Submit replacement requests within one year of the declaration, with both estimates.
• Replacement requests over $5 million get an independent third-party review.
• If you repair a facility eligible for replacement, FEMA pays the lesser of repair or replacement.
• The rule isn’t applied to building components (roofs, HVAC, windows). For systems with separable parts, it applies to each component, such as manhole-to-manhole pipe or a single clarifier.
• A floodplain manager’s substantial damage determination is separate from the 50 percent rule.
• Demolishing a facility eligible for replacement, and cost-effective mitigation, are eligible on the replacement project.

Repair and replacement estimates prepared to FEMA’s estimating requirements, with the calculation and any feasibility study.

• Stable site: facility and its integral ground are eligible.
• Unstable, no evidence of earlier instability: facility, integral ground and stabilization are eligible.
• Unstable with earlier instability: integral ground is ineligible; the facility is eligible only after you stabilize the site.
• Inspections and limited geotechnical work to determine stability and cause are eligible.
• Stabilizing natural ground that doesn’t support the facility is generally ineligible. Relocation may be approved for repeated heavy damage if cost-effective.

Geotechnical findings on stability and cause, and evidence of the slope’s pre-disaster condition.

• Grass and sod are eligible when integral to restoring a recreational facility; trees, shrubs and landscaping are not.
• Plantings required by a permit or code to offset environmental impacts can be eligible; long-term monitoring is not.
• Beaches: not built under Corps authority, built with imported sand to a design, and maintained with periodic renourishment. One-time, emergency, partial or dredge-spoil placements don’t count.
• Eligible sand is limited to the amount lost, shown with pre- and post-storm profiles to the depth of closure.
• Beach access crossovers are eligible facilities.

For beaches: original design and as-builts, the maintenance plan and funding, and every renourishment’s design and as-builts.

You define the line section: a single span, all spans between dead-end structures, a feeder, a tap or any contiguous group. Adjustments to accommodate #2 ACSR, such as span lengths and pole heights, are eligible without citing a code. If no threshold is met, only repair is eligible.

A signed, stamped letter from a licensed engineer with direct system experience certifying pre-disaster capacity and condition, with maintenance records, work plans, any RUS corrective action plans and staking sheets. Source: PAPPG Table 29.

• Claimed as Category B: regular hours of budgeted staff are not eligible, and no hazard mitigation is available.
• Claimed as Category F: mitigation is available.
• Maintaining your right-of-way is your responsibility. FEMA funds limited clearance of incident debris to reach the facility, and removal of damaged trees an arborist confirms threaten it. Further clearance is ineligible.

Records supporting the category choice, crew timesheets, arborist findings for tree removal, and maintenance records for the right-of-way.

• You may replace with different items for the same general purpose; FEMA caps the cost at comparable items.
• If a comparable used item isn’t reasonably available or doesn’t meet national consensus standards, a new item of similar capacity is eligible.
• Vehicles that can’t be repaired are valued with “blue book” or similar guides.

Equipment inventories, age and condition records, repair estimates, and replacement quotes.

• Reagents: the lower of the number lost or the number needed to restore basic research, at the lesser of commercial or institutional prices. Unique reagents produced by research are not eligible.
• Specimen collections: a representative portion, if purchasable and supporting an ongoing eligible educational or medical program.
• Animals: replacement when killed, injured beyond their purpose, or destroyed specimens, if comparable animals are available at reasonable cost; loaned animals if you were legally responsible.
• Lab animals: the genetically closest commercially available animal. Breeding programs, re-creating genetic lines and surgical alterations are ineligible.

Inventories of reagents, specimens and animals, purchase records, and expert input on genetic likeness for lab animals.

• Files: recovering, stabilizing (including freeze-drying), sanitizing, copying or scanning damaged hard copies, and recovering data from damaged drives. Not new databases, re-keying lost data, or digitizing re-established files.
• Library books: replacement based on the pre-disaster inventory, plus re-shelving and cataloging. Special collections (rare books, manuscripts) are eligible only for treatment.
• Collections and objects: stabilization and needed treatment by a qualified conservator, treatment plans, and display and storage equipment. Restoring to original condition (removing old varnish) and replacing destroyed irreplaceable items are not eligible.

Pre-disaster inventories, accession and catalog records, and conservator treatment plans.

• FEMA weighs maintenance evidence, signs of pre-existing problems such as old leaks, the severity of the incident, and whether you acted promptly to prevent more damage.
• Mold remediation and mud removal are permanent work when done with the facility’s restoration.
• Public housing authority buildings are eligible only if Congress doesn’t fund HUD for their emergency capital needs.
• Detailed studies of earthquake damage to welded steel moment frames need FEMA approval before the work starts.

Maintenance records, photos of pre- and post-disaster condition, and records of steps taken to prevent further damage.

• Capacity restoration is eligible only for facilities not built by a federal agency, with documented pre-disaster capacity and a regular maintenance schedule. Complaint-driven clean-outs don’t prove regular maintenance.
• Removing material not deposited by the incident turns the project into an improved project.
• Flood control works under another federal agency’s authority are ineligible.
• Secondary levees on the river side of a primary levee are ineligible unless they protect human life.

Pre-disaster capacity data, such as recent or multi-year surveys, and a written maintenance plan or activity logs. Source: PAPPG Table 28.

• Closed basins: only routes critical to restoring traffic service, judged by functional class, essential services and detour availability. A permanent reroute may be funded if more cost-effective.
• Raising chronic low spots is not the intent of the program.
• Gravel: show actual loss with work logs and invoices for gravel placed in that section within 12 months before the incident, and photos of displaced gravel.
• Washboarding (corrugation) is ineligible; rutting is ineligible except from emergency vehicles or a required single-access reopening.

Closed basin: evidence the basin hit historic highs during the incident period, water level and rainfall records, and projected closure duration. Gravel: logs, invoices and photos. Source: PAPPG Tables 25–27.

• Testing sections without visible damage (ground-penetrating radar, cores, borings, deflection testing) is ineligible.
• Damage from reopening saturated roads too early is usually treated as negligence, except damage from vehicles doing eligible emergency work or on single-access roads that had to reopen.
• A road’s inclusion in the preliminary damage assessment doesn’t make it eligible.

Pre- and post-disaster photos or video for each section; maintenance records or a pavement management program; and records of any repairs. For early reopening: the justification, emergency call logs and route maps, or proof no detour existed. Source: PAPPG Tables 23–24.

• Road components include surfaces, bases, shoulders, ditches, culverts, swales, low-water crossings, lighting, sidewalks, guardrails and signs. Bridge components include decking, girders, abutments, piers, slope protection and approaches.
• Private roads (orphan roads, gated communities, homeowners’ association roads) are ineligible for permanent work.
• Tribal roads remain eligible even if BIA or FHWA funded their construction or maintenance, unless FHWA Emergency Relief funds the repair. Tribal roads are eligible even if not open to the public.
• Maintenance, potholes and fatigue cracking are generally ineligible; FEMA reviews maintenance records.
• Scour and erosion repair is eligible only to restore the ground supporting an eligible road, bridge, culvert or drainage structure.
• Replacing or upsizing culverts may need a hydrologic and hydraulic study, which is eligible.

Maintenance records or invoices and activity logs, photos, and damage measurements for each site.

• Allowed uses: repairing, expanding, mitigating or building other eligible facilities; demolition; capital equipment of $10,000 or more per unit; covering flood insurance reductions in flood hazard areas; supplementing an improved project; and cost-effective mitigation.
• Not allowed: budget shortfalls, community plans, landscaping, operating expenses, items under $10,000, the non-federal share of any PA project, buyouts, projects using other federal grants, or projects in a floodway.
• Construction needs FEMA approval before it starts, for environmental compliance.
• Mitigation included in the original scope is dropped from the alternate project cap.
• Temporary facility costs stop when you request an alternate project.

Your request explaining why restoration doesn’t serve the public, the alternate project scope and location, and FEMA approval.

• Examples: paving a gravel road, rebuilding a two-bay firehouse with three bays, meeting a code that fails FEMA’s criteria, or relocating a facility FEMA didn’t require you to move.
• Get recipient approval before proceeding; FEMA reviews environmental compliance if the configuration changes significantly.
• The cap increases only for errors or omissions in the original restoration scope or estimate.
• Mitigation is limited to what the original design would have received, and is deobligated if not completed or if the facility is replaced or relocated.
• You can combine PA with other federal funds, but not for the same work, and generally not for the PA cost share (CDBG-DR is a possible exception).

Recipient approval, the capped restoration estimate, and the improved project scope and actual costs.

• For a facility listed in or eligible for the National Register, costs to meet a code that requires repair in a specific way are eligible even above replacement cost.
• State historic building codes usually allow alternatives rather than require specific work, so they rarely meet the code eligibility criteria.
• Changes to design or materials must not change capacity or function, and must be reasonable and consistent with your normal practice and legal requirements.
• If unrepaired pre-existing conditions would compromise the repair, such as rotting timbers under a damaged bridge deck, FEMA funds the disaster repair only after you repair the pre-existing damage yourself.

Historic status documentation, the code requiring specific treatment, and engineering justification for any change in method or materials.

• Measures must directly reduce future damage to the damaged portion of the facility, be technically feasible, comply with environmental and historic requirements, and not create new hazards.
• Separate measures, such as floodwalls, new drainage along a damaged road, defensible space, or dry floodproofing of interdependent buildings, can qualify if they protect the damaged portion.
• Code-required upgrades are not mitigation; mitigation is the work above code.
• Engineering and design to develop a mitigation proposal are eligible if included in the approved scope.
• If you don’t complete approved mitigation, FEMA deobligates it. PA and HMGP funds can be used on the same facility, but not for the same work.
• Mitigation done after a quick repair, or before FEMA could review it, can still be eligible if cost-effective and environmentally compliant.

A hazard mitigation proposal with scope, cost, cost-effectiveness basis and environmental information.

• Path-of-travel work can include accessible entrances, routes, parking, restrooms, water fountains and emergency routes serving a damaged primary function area.
• Alterations must have a reasonable, technically supportable relationship to the damaged elements, such as grab bars, larger stalls or accessible faucets.
• Above the 20 percent cap, prioritize the elements that provide the most access.
• Requirements triggered by ineligible repairs are ineligible.
• Historic buildings may have exceptions, worked out with the historic preservation officer.

The accessibility requirements triggered, the primary function area repair cost, and the path-of-travel cost calculation.

• Ineligible: upgrades recommended by design standards, guidelines, policies or industry practices that don’t meet the code criteria.
• Ineligible: added capacity needed because of growth or increased use, even if a code requires it.
• Upgrades that improve resistance to future damage may still qualify as Section 406 mitigation or through the Hazard Mitigation Grant Program.
• Permit-required work under a code that fails the criteria is eligible only if it doesn’t change size, capacity or function; applies to the type of repair; is reasonable for the damage; and is an established, enforced, uniform practice for all similar facilities.

The permit and the permitting agency’s written requirement, plus evidence it is applied uniformly to similar projects.

• Applies to the restoration: repair codes and new-construction codes differ. Replacement facilities get new-construction codes; repairs get only repair-triggered upgrades.
• Appropriate to pre-disaster use: the least costly of the designed use or the actual use at the time.
• Reasonable: FEMA weighs the trigger, the extent of damage, engineering defensibility and cost. A huge upgrade on a tiny trigger can be unreasonable.
• Written, adopted and implemented: approved by the authority having jurisdiction and part of the public record. Codes adopted by a nonprofit for its own facilities, or by agencies without code authority, don’t count.
• Uniform: applies to all similar facilities, public or private, regardless of cause of damage or funding source, and not at officials’ discretion.
• Enforced: applied while in effect; if not, related upgrades are ineligible.

The code text and adoption record, evidence it is applied uniformly, and enforcement history, such as permits for similar non-disaster work.

• You must identify which codes apply to each damaged element, describe the work with drawings, quantities and damage-inventory line numbers, and explain any upgrade to undamaged elements.
• Upgrades to a whole structural system are eligible only if directly related to eligible damage.
• Where a code allows design choices, FEMA funds the least expensive option unless your engineer shows another gives greater risk reduction.
• The Regional Administrator can waive the requirement when local codes are equivalent, compliance is technically infeasible, it would be an extraordinary burden, or it would harm a historic property.
• At completion, provide proof of compliance, such as an engineer’s certification. Failing to include required codes leads to denial or deobligation.
• Technical help with design and a one-time purchase of a code per disaster are eligible; ongoing operations and maintenance costs are not.

A code identification for each element, design documents showing compliance, and a final certification from a registered engineer or other qualified professional.

• Pre-disaster design is the size or capacity as built or later modified, not how much you were using it. A school designed for 100 students is restored for 100, even if more attended.
• Pre-disaster function is the use it was designed or formally altered for. If it served a different use without being altered, FEMA funds whichever restoration costs less.
• Work must comply with environmental and historic preservation requirements.
• Categories: C roads and bridges; D water control; E buildings and equipment; F utilities; G parks, recreational and other.

Design documents or records of later modifications showing the facility’s capacity and function.