Episode 6 – Disaster Recovery Challenges Faced by Financially Vulnerable People & Communities

This discussion focuses on how and why disasters disproportionately impact lower-income people and considers the factors that inhibit their recovery, as well as potential options and ideas for addressing them. Dr. Carlos Martín is the David M. Rubenstein Fellow at Brookings Metro and the Director of the Remodeling Futures Program at Harvard University’s Joint Center for Housing Studies. He has trained as an architect, construction engineer, and historian of technology, and for the past 20 years, he has been engaged in research and analysis of policy in the fields of disaster management, climate mitigation and adaptation, energy and environmental justice, energy efficiency, and housing construction and design. (Bio) Dr. Divya Chandrasekhar is an Associate Professor in the Department of City & Metropolitan Planning at the University of Utah. She researches post-disaster community participation and capacity building, networking and coordination among recovery institutions, and disaster recovery policy in South and Southeast Asia, the Caribbean, and the United States. She serves on Utah’s Seismic Safety Commission, the Utah State Hazard Mitigation Team, and the “Resilient America” Roundtable on Risk and Resilience of Extreme Events of the National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine. (Bio) This Ready to Recover podcast was produced by CREW at crew.org with funding from FEMA through the National Earthquake Hazards Reduction Program. Show Notes Insult to Injury: Natural Disasters and Residents’ Financial Health (April 2019). By Caroline Ratcliffe, William J. Congdon, Alexandra Stanczyk, Daniel Teles, Carlos Martín, Bapuchandra Kotapatil. Housing Recovery and CDBG-DR: A Review of the Timing and Factors Associated with Housing Activities in HUD’s Community Development Block Grant for Disaster Recovery Program (January 19, 2021). By Carlos Martín, et al. What drives household recovery after disasters? A case study of New York City after 2012 Hurricane Sandy. (2019). By Divya Chandrasekhar, Robin Rothfeder, Yu Xiao & Donovan Finn. Recovery Capacity of Small Nonprofits in Post-2017 Hurricane Puerto Rico. (2022). By Divya Chandrasekhar, Ivis García & Sayma Khajehei. Community Development Block Grant Disaster Recovery (CDBG-DR): Website (HUD Exchange) and Fact Sheet Small Business Administration (SBA) Disaster Assistance FEMA Disaster Assistance How Turkey’s hasty rebuild could set the nation up for another disaster. (2023). WBUR.org On Point Podcast CREW Ready-to-Recover podcast-Ep6_TranscriptDownload Transcript