Two Years After Biden Personally Promised Aid, Grizzly Flats Wildfire Victims Are Still Struggling
Lillian Tweten | August 27, 2023Victims of the Caldor Fire in Grizzly Flats, California, are still waiting for assistance from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) almost two years after Biden promised aid to the devastated small town.
The wildfire, which began on August 14, 2021 and burned for more than two months, destroyed more than 600 homes in Grizzly Flats — . . .
. . . “I went through the whole process of applying to FEMA. . . and there was no help whatsoever,” Edwina Grefsheim, a resident who lost her home to the fire, told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “[FEMA Individual Assistance] would’ve helped us, if not to rebuild, then at least to survive a little bit easier. We were already living paycheck to paycheck before the fire. Essentially, we started back at zero with nothing.” . . .
. . . Grizzly Flats residents hoped that President Biden would reverse FEMA’s decision after he visited California and took an aerial tour of the town in September 2021, according to ABC News. Biden promised at a briefing on the Caldor Fire on September 13, 2021 that he would help the affected area, according to the White House transcript.
“We’re going to take care of them,” Biden had said.
“They turned their back on us,” Mary Lower, a resident who had to permanently move out of the area after the wildfire, told the DCNF. “Biden flew over where the fire was but he never authorized FEMA. We didn’t get chainsaws, or water, we got nothing.”
Local politicians, including Republican Rep. Kevin Kiley and Democrat Sen. Diane Feinstein, attempted to appeal Biden’s decision multiple times with letters, but received no response from the president or FEMA, Kiley told the DCNF. He requested more relief on Aug. 18 and invited Biden to visit Grizzly Flats to assess the situation during the president’s recent vacation in the area, but received no response. . . .
https://dailycallernewsfoundation.org/2023/08/27/two-years-after-biden-personally-promised-aid-grizzly-flats-wildfire-victims-are-still-struggling/