By: Kelly DeGraff, Senior Advisor for Disaster Services 

As we kick off a new year, and turn our attention to the severe storms and tornadoes in the Southeast, I want to extend my heartfelt greetings and appreciation to all of our disaster partners for our remarkable accomplishments and achievements in 2016. Through advancements in operations and training, the generation of millions of dollars, and the critical services provided during devastating disaster events, we witnessed the great strength and power of the AmeriCorps Disaster Response Teams (A-DRTs). 

In 2016, our agency received nearly $6 million to support FEMA response and recovery efforts. More than 1,329 A-DRTs deployed to seven nationally-declared disasters where more than 1,400 homes and structures were mucked and gutted. Mucking and gutting is essential to returning families and individuals back to their homes. Without these services, homes quickly become unsalvageable, contributing to the devastating loss of available, affordable, housing in communities most in need. In December, I attended a meeting at the White House where Craig Fugate, former FEMA Administrator, credited the A-DRTs with leading a criti+cal role in saving the housing stock. This was one of many occasions where the outstanding efforts of our disaster teams have been honored.

All A-DRT programs deployed to disasters in 2016!  With their unfailing commitment and dedication, we spent 11 months of 2016 deployed to disasters – a record for CNCS. The agency has been working under consecutive Mission Assignments since June 2015, deploying 12 months straight and picking up again in July 2016 in West Virginia and Texas simultaneously. This is nearly two years of back-to-back major disaster deployments.