$4.5 Billion in Climate Resiliency Grants Were Killed, Litigated, and Court-Ordered Back to Life. Now What?

A wastewater treatment plant in Hickory, North Carolina, sits in a floodplain. The engineering plans to protect it have been drawn. The federal funding to build the protection was awarded. And for nearly a year, the money has not moved.

Hickory is one of more than 2,000 communities across the country caught in a legal and bureaucratic standoff over the Building Resilient Infrastructure and Communities program — FEMA's flagship competitive grant for climate adaptation and disaster mitigation. The program distributed $4.5 billion before the Trump administration tried to kill it in April 2025. A federal judge ordered it restored in December. FEMA ignored the order for months. A coalition of 22 states and the District of Columbia went back to court. And on March 20, the agency finally announced it plans to reinstate the program. (Granted News)

The announcement matters. But the details behind it matter more — because what FEMA says and what FEMA does have been two different things throughout this saga.

How a $4.5 Billion Program Got Canceled

BRIC was created in 2020 under the Disaster Recovery Reform Act of 2018 and dramatically expanded through the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law. Unlike FEMA's post-disaster grants, which reimburse communities after catastrophes strike, BRIC funds proactive mitigation — the flood barriers, seismic retrofits, wildfire-resistant building upgrades, and stormwater infrastructure that prevent disasters from becoming catastrophes in the first place.

The program's track record was strong. BRIC funded safe rooms in Oklahoma tornado corridors, sewer system upgrades in Detroit, wildfire retrofit projects in Washington State, and a seismic retrofit for a rural California hospital. Cost-benefit analyses consistently showed that every dollar invested in pre-disaster mitigation saves six dollars in post-disaster response and recovery.

In April 2025, the administration issued a memo calling BRIC "wasteful and ineffective" and announcing intent to terminate it. The stated rationale was fiscal responsibility, but the timing raised questions — the cancellation came weeks after FEMA Administrator Kristi Noem implemented a de facto spending moratorium requiring her personal approval for any FEMA expenditure exceeding $100,000.

The freeze hit immediately. Not just new applications — the approximately $200 million in grants already awarded to North Carolina communities stopped processing. A flooding vulnerability study in Buncombe County stalled. Plans to relocate a water pump station out of a floodplain in Hillsborough went dormant. Across the country, projects that had cleared competitive review, received award notifications, and begun planning work found themselves in limbo.

The Legal Battle That Followed

The lawsuit was filed by a coalition of state attorneys general, with North Carolina Attorney General Jeff Jackson taking a lead role alongside New York, Massachusetts, and roughly 20 other states.

On December 11, 2025, U.S. District Court Judge Richard G. Stearns — a Clinton appointee in the District of Massachusetts — ruled that the administration had "unlawfully terminated" the BRIC program. He ordered FEMA to restore funding and reverse the termination.

FEMA did not comply. The February 9, 2026 deadline to appeal the ruling passed without the administration filing an appeal. But instead of releasing funds, the agency simply did nothing. Two FEMA officials told reporters they hadn't "heard a word internally, at all" about reinstating the program.

On February 18, nearly two dozen state attorneys general returned to court with documents accusing FEMA of non-compliance. The judge found that affected states faced "irreparable harm" from the continued suspension.

On March 6, Judge Stearns issued a more specific enforcement order. FEMA was given 14 days to identify all selected, phased, and pending BRIC projects and provide reversal steps with funding timelines. Within 21 days, the agency had to reopen the grant application portal for new submissions. FEMA was also ordered to publish both 2025 and 2026 notices of funding opportunity.

"FEMA tried to cancel $200 million for North Carolina," Attorney General Jackson said. "We won, and then they defied the court order and refused to pay."

What FEMA Is Actually Saying Now

On March 20, FEMA stated it would "fully resume programmatic support for BRIC awards and sub applications, such as award monitoring and closeout, and completing pre-award review activities once the lapse in appropriations has ended." The agency also committed to "reconstitute the BRIC program in a way that reflects good stewardship of taxpayer money — including by publishing a new funding opportunity."

Two caveats jump out. First, the phrase "once the lapse in appropriations has ended" ties the restart to the resolution of the DHS partial shutdown — a separate political fight with no guaranteed timeline. Second, the commitment to publish "a new funding opportunity" suggests the agency may restructure program priorities, eligibility criteria, or scoring factors rather than simply restarting the program as it existed.

Communities that had awarded grants should be cautious about assuming funds will flow immediately. The pattern over the past year — announce compliance, delay implementation — has eroded trust across the emergency management community.

The Collateral Damage Is Already Done

Even if FEMA distributes every dollar tomorrow, the year-long freeze has inflicted real damage that cannot be fully reversed.

In Chelsea and Everett, Massachusetts, a $50 million flood barrier and storm surge control project designed to protect a high school, a rail line, and a produce distribution center lost its matching state funding when the federal pause dragged on. State budgets operate on their own timelines, and when federal partners go dark, state agencies redirect money to projects that can actually move forward.

"This project needs to happen, but we don't have the information we need," said Emily Granoff, Chelsea's deputy director, capturing the frustration of municipal officials who spent months unable to get basic updates from their federal counterparts.

The problem extends beyond individual projects. BRIC funding requires a non-federal cost share — typically 25 percent for most communities, reduced to as little as 10 percent for economically disadvantaged areas. Many municipalities had secured that match through state appropriations, local bond measures, or philanthropic commitments that carried their own expiration dates. A year of federal inaction means some of those matching commitments have expired or been redirected.

Staff capacity is another casualty. Emergency managers, floodplain administrators, and resilience officers who were hired specifically to manage BRIC-funded projects have been reassigned, furloughed, or left for positions where the work could actually get done. Rebuilding that institutional knowledge takes time.

What Municipalities and Nonprofits Should Do Now

The BRIC program is coming back — the court orders make that unavoidable. But the form it takes and the timeline on which it operates remain uncertain. Organizations that position themselves now will have a significant advantage when the funding opportunity officially reopens.

Reactivate stalled applications. If you had a BRIC application in progress when the freeze hit, do not assume it is dead. The court order requires FEMA to process all pending and selected applications. Contact your state hazard mitigation officer to confirm your project's status and ensure your application materials are current.

Secure or re-secure matching funds. The non-federal cost share is where applications succeed or fail. If your matching commitment has lapsed, begin conversations with state agencies, local government partners, or private foundations immediately. Many community foundations and corporate giving programs fund climate resilience work, and their timelines are more flexible than state budget cycles.

Update benefit-cost analyses. BRIC is scored heavily on benefit-cost ratios. If your project's BCA was prepared in 2024 or early 2025, the underlying data may be stale. Recent disaster events, updated FEMA flood maps, and new construction cost estimates should all be incorporated. A strong BCA has always been the single most important factor in BRIC scoring, and that is unlikely to change.

Watch for restructured priorities. FEMA's language about "reconstituting" the program suggests the new funding opportunity may emphasize different project types or scoring criteria. Programs that align with the administration's infrastructure priorities — hardening energy systems, protecting transportation corridors, and reducing wildfire risk in the wildland-urban interface — may score better than those framed primarily around climate adaptation.

Build the narrative now. The strongest BRIC applications have always told a compelling story about community vulnerability. If your community experienced a disaster event during the year the program was frozen — and many did, given the record-setting wildfire, hurricane, and flood seasons — document it. That evidence of need will be central to any competitive application.

The BRIC program's resurrection is a victory for the legal system and for communities that refused to let $4.5 billion in approved mitigation funding disappear. But a court order is not a check. The hard work of turning legal victories into funded projects starts now — and tools like Granted can help you build the application that turns your community's resilience plan into reality.