FEMA is not the team, we're part of the team.

And that team is you folks.

Disaster response and recovery is a team effort.  

FEMA and HUD have developed a strong 

partnership that has worked to get Tennessee 

survivors on the road to recovery quickly. 

At the DRC the partnership with HUD 

is important to us because as soon as we 

have an applicant that mentions a housing issue 

that is not a financial issue that perhaps 

our FEMA rental assistance might cover 

we know that HUD is the place 

we need to send them.  Water did get 

up to my home but didn’t get in my home 

through the doors we had a straight line wind 

that came in earlier that evening along with 

the heavy rain and wind and a lot of 

my damages came in through the ceiling 

the windows the walls and the floors.

Well we’ve been meeting with the flood 

survivors in the DRC’s they have gone 

to our partners FEMA and SBA and they 

make their way to HUD when they have 

housing needs.  I got on to HUD because 

I knew I had to come out of the house.  

I knew it was to the point that I got to find 

some where to live and after talking to FEMA 

the lady and man that was there they told me to 

go down to the main office they got 

HUD people there.  And we went down 

the list and she pulled out 

two or three and this was one of them.  

Oh their doing great.  Crystal Goodman 

she was my case worker from HUD.  

She said we’re going to find you a 

place to live that’s what she told me you know.  

I called and I came out here basically 

explained to the lady what had happened 

and everything she said you just come up front 

and let them know you need a place to live 

and she said just bring me the deposit and 

you can move in and we’ll kind of wave 

with you a little bit, ‘cause you do need to get 

moved out of your house.  It was a blessing it 

was a blessing going through people like 

FEMA and Crystal and HUD 

you brought me through.  

Words can’t express how I appreciate 

the things they done.  I think it’s important 

that we emphasize the true partnership 

that seems to have formed between 

FEMA and Housing and Urban Development.  

The thing I think is really important is for 

people to understand how very important it is 

to have the human contact.  And it’s 

very satisfying when you know that you’ve 

helped someone who may not have a 

place to stay, you’ve helped someone who’s 

lost everything in terms of their possessions 

and you’re able to really give them some 

hope about returning to some degree of normalcy.