Anvaline “Annie” Cranston is currently acting as the Deputy Assistant Administrator of the Response Directorate at FEMA. She joined FEMA in 2006 during Hurricane Katrina as local hire in Mass Care. She was inspired to join the agency due to friends and family being impacted by the storm. She proudly served in multiple disaster roles and joined the Filed Based Operations Team in the OCFO in 2008. She led the effort to create the Disaster Spend Plan Program for five years and built the Spend Plan Team. In 2013 she made the jump from the field to HQ to work in Hazard Mitigation Grant Program. In 2016 she joined OPPA to lead the FEMA STAT team. During her tenure in OPPA she also worked several large incidents in the NRCC in Situational Awareness and deployed for Puerto Rico in 2017 to assist in the 428 Public Assistance Tiger Team. She returned to DC in 2018 to join the ORR front Office as Senior Advisor to Jeff Byard and training as a Deputy Chief in the NRCC. In 2020 she joined the FEMA Exercise Branch as Branch Chief and served as NRCC Chief for multiple incidents.