FEMA to reinstate $200M grants
Following multiple court orders in North Carolina, FEMA agreed to reinstate $200 million in climate-resilience grants that had been held up—highlighting how even awarded resilience funding can be vulnerable to administrative reversals. The episode is a cautionary precedent for groups defending resilience investments. (bpr.org)
North Carolina Attorney General Jeff Jackson sued FEMA in July 2025, and U.S. District Judge Richard G. Stearns ruled on Dec. 11, 2025 that the agency had unlawfully terminated the Building Resilient Infrastructure and Communities (BRIC) program. (wral.com) After finding FEMA noncompliant, Judge Stearns on March 6, 2026 granted a motion to enforce his December order and gave FEMA 21 days to reopen new BRIC grant applications while ordering the agency to provide a timeline for existing projects. (coastalreview.org) The earlier ruling covered roughly $4.5 billion and nearly 2,000 BRIC projects nationwide that had been selected before FEMA’s April 2025 cancellation of the program. (courthousenews.com) State filings and local coverage show more than 60 North Carolina municipal and county projects were paused when FEMA halted BRIC awards, prompting the state’s motions to compel the agency to release previously approved grants. (wlos.com) Following the enforcement orders, FEMA publicly said it plans to relaunch the BRIC grant program and resume processing awards and applications. (nytimes.com) The court’s enforcement directives required FEMA to file status reports and produce a schedule for distributing FY2025 and FY2026 BRIC funds within two weeks of the March orders, setting concrete administrative deadlines for project teams and state officials. (waterprogramportal.org)
