Buried within the newly enacted 21st Century Road to Housing Act is a landmark measure that could reshape disaster recovery nationwide. Section 504—dubbed the Reforming Disaster Recovery Act—emerges from years of advocacy by survivors and organizations pushing to overhaul the HUD-administered Community Development Block Grant Disaster Recovery (CDBG-DR) program, which has long lacked permanent legislative backing.
This program is the only source of federal long-term recovery funds, providing flexible grants to states, tribal governments, territories, and municipalities to help rebuild after disasters. Since 1992, Congress has provided over $100 billion to disaster-impacted states and communities through the program.
What is CDBG-DR?
CDBG-DR is designed to cover the gap between funding supplied by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and other federal agencies in the aftermath of a disaster and communities’ long-term post-disaster needs. While FEMA programs provide enough funding for a community to survive a disaster, CDBG-DR provides the funds for post-disaster recovery, and to build back to a better standard, one that will be more resilient to future disasters.
A recent study found that areas receiving CDBG-DR funds experienced slower rent increases and higher rates of multifamily housing permit approvals than disaster-impacted areas that did not receive these funds. The program has been used to build new affordable housing and infrastructure systems, distribute rental assistance, carry out mitigation and resilience activities, aid in economic development, and more.
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Why Authorization Matters
Until now, the CDBG-DR program was not authorized, which meant that disaster survivors and affected communities faced frequent delays in receiving assistance. With each disaster, program rules had to be redrafted and emergency funding approved, causing shifting rules and requirements that prevented state and local officials from being prepared in advance to meet federal requirements.
In fact, between 2003 and 2020 the program issued 149 individual CDBG-DR grants, each requiring a fresh set of rules and supplemental appropriations, which contributed to the chronic lag in delivering aid.
The lack of permanent authorization also meant that the sole source of program funding came from occasional emergency disaster supplemental spending bills. This led to inconsistent funding and long wait times for some disaster-impacted communities. For example, after Hurricane Maria hit Puerto Rico in 2017, it took until 2018 for a federal law to approve funding, and the allocation methodology was not published by the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) until August 2018.
The storm, a Category 4 hurricane, caused an estimated death toll of nearly 3,000 people and made landfall on September 20, 2017, overwhelming the island’s infrastructure. Although Congress passed a law authorizing the needed funds on February 9, 2018, HUD did not release the allocation methodology until August 14, 2018, extending the wait for communities.
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As a result, the recovery process was slow, and a significant portion of Puerto Rico’s CDBG-DR allocation remains unspent as of 2025. An Urban Institute study found that completion of CDBG-DR-funded housing activities takes almost four years on average from the date of the disaster.
The Reforming Disaster Recovery Act authorizes the CDBG-DR program for three years, putting in place regulatory fixes and new requirements that will streamline the program and ensure the most affected disaster survivors receive the assistance they need to recover. The bill also creates concrete timing requirements for HUD to notify grant recipients of incoming funds and provides up-front administrative funds so communities can begin program planning.
The bill allows Congress to fund the program via the annual appropriations process, in addition to disaster supplemental bills, providing a more consistent and reliable source of funding for disaster recovery efforts. With the program now authorized, advocates are pushing federal lawmakers to fund CDBG-DR and ensure that vital assistance reaches communities more quickly, efficiently, and effectively.
The legislation also raises existing equity safeguards to statutory authority, requiring that at least 70 percent of all CDBG-DR dollars be directed to low- and moderate-income households and that 80 percent be spent within the most severely impacted zones of a disaster area.
