Et cetera : AmeriCorps NCCC-FEMA Corps Team Training Hard as Public Assistants

By Jeffrey Beyerl

Having left the Vinton campus, FEMA Corps Spruce 4 has undergone many diverse trainings in order to help them in their FEMA role as public assistants. As public assistants, Spruce 4 assesses claimed damages in government-declared disaster areas, and write grants to those who request government funding to help them with disaster related damages. After going into the field and seeing the damages, taking appropriate measurements, photographs, and obtaining all the appropriate forms from the applicant (the one who applied for government funds) the team returns to the office.

Once settled in, the team goes to work, scanning in documents, entering in data, researching appropriate costs and trying their hardest to fill out all the appropriate forms in hopes that they will be able to write a grant in order for their applicant to get the government funds they need.

Currently Spruce 4 is located in Springfield, Mo., working on the declared disasters - whose damages stem from devastating floods and tornado damages. The team of 10 has been split up into pairs and is serving alongside FEMA reservists to learn as much as they can, in hopes that they will learn enough to assist applicants on their own in the future.