DISABILITY RIGHTS & DISASTER RESPONSE
The Disaster Plan Included Everyone. The Training for Disability Access Disappeared.
FEMA removed disability-inclusion training for its state and local partners, did not consistently coordinate specialists before disasters, and had never asked people with disabilities to evaluate the overall assistance application process.
A disaster does not wait for government to remember who needs an accessible warning, a working elevator, a sign-language interpreter or a safe way to evacuate with a wheelchair.
The planning has to happen before the storm, fire or flood.
That is why a new report from the Government Accountability Office should make people stop and ask a simple question: Why did the Federal Emergency Management Agency remove disability-inclusion training for its state and local partners?
According to FEMA officials interviewed by GAO, the training was removed from the curriculum in 2025 to ensure compliance with various executive orders. By the time GAO published its report on September 30, 2026, the training had been unavailable for more than a year.
That explanation deserves careful language. GAO did not say FEMA removed the training because the agency wanted people with disabilities to suffer. The report did not conclude that every local emergency manager was unprepared or that every disabled applicant was denied help.
It found something more basic and still serious.
The federal agency responsible for helping communities prepare for disasters stopped offering its disability-inclusion training, did not consistently coordinate disability specialists with local partners before disasters and had not asked people with disabilities to evaluate the overall application process they were expected to use afterward.
The disaster plan may have said everyone. The system did not consistently prepare for everyone.
The missing training matters before the emergency
FEMA does not respond to disasters alone. State governments, counties, cities, nonprofit organizations and emergency managers make many of the decisions that determine whether a warning is understood, an evacuation route is usable and a shelter can safely serve the people who arrive.
FEMA has provided guidance, grants and specialized staff to support that work. GAO also noted that the agency publishes planning and recovery information for people with disabilities and caregivers. Those are real resources and should not be erased from the story.
But written guidance is not the same as trained practice.
A document sitting online cannot test whether a shelter entrance is actually accessible. It cannot make a local official remember that a person may need communication in American Sign Language, plain language or another accessible format. It cannot establish who is responsible for coordinating transportation when an ordinary evacuation bus cannot carry a wheelchair.
Training gives partners a place to work through those decisions before lives depend on them.
GAO recommended that FEMA reinstate the training. FEMA agreed with that recommendation. As of October 3, 2026, GAO listed it as open. Agreement is not implementation.
The specialist should not arrive after the plan is finished
FEMA has regional disability specialists who can work with state and local partners. Officials interviewed by GAO described that coordination as beneficial.
The problem was that it did not happen consistently across FEMA regions, and the responsibility was not standardized.
That creates a familiar government weakness. A good program may exist, but access depends on geography, personal relationships or whether one official decides to make it a priority.
Disability access should not change because one region has an active specialist and another does not. The role should be clear before disaster strikes: coordinate with local partners, identify the people and organizations that understand disability needs, review plans and help correct barriers while there is still time.
GAO recommended that FEMA formally make pre-disaster coordination part of the disability specialist role in every region. FEMA agreed. That recommendation also remained open when this article was completed.
Then comes the application
After a disaster, FEMA's Individual Assistance program can help replace assistive devices and medically required equipment. FEMA also offers services such as video sign-language interpretation and has staff who investigate disability-discrimination complaints.
Those supports matter. So does the front door to them.
Stakeholders told GAO that some applicants with disabilities encountered unclear questions and eligibility letters written at a twelfth-grade reading level. An application that is technically available may still be unusable for someone with an intellectual, cognitive, visual or communication disability.
GAO found that FEMA had not solicited feedback from people with different disabilities about the accessibility of its overall grant-application process.
That omission is especially difficult to defend because the people using the process know where it fails.
GAO's analysis of FEMA data from 2022 through 2025 found that applicants with disabilities were approved at a rate four percentage points lower than applicants without disabilities.
That number does not prove discrimination caused every part of the gap. Applicants may have had different losses, documentation or eligibility circumstances. GAO did not say every denial was improper.
But a measurable gap, combined with reported application barriers and the absence of structured user feedback, is enough to require a serious review.
FEMA agreed with GAO's recommendation to solicit and incorporate feedback from people with different types of disabilities. That recommendation remained open as of October 3.
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Receipts
1. U.S. Government Accountability Office, GAO-26-108057, September 30, 2026
https://www.gao.gov/products/gao-26-108057
Primary source for the removed training, inconsistent regional coordination, application barriers, approval-rate gap, agency agreement and three open recommendations.
2. Full accessible GAO report
https://files.gao.gov/reports/GAO-26-108057/index.html
Full methodology, evidence, limitations and FEMA response.
3. DisasterAssistance.gov
https://www.disasterassistance.gov/
Official federal portal for applying for FEMA disaster assistance and locating other recovery resources.
Verification and evidence notice
- Verified finding: FEMA removed disability-inclusion training for state and local partners from its curriculum in 2025, according to officials interviewed by GAO.
- Agency explanation: FEMA officials said the training was removed to ensure compliance with various executive orders. GAO did not find that disability-access training itself was unlawful.
- Verified finding: Coordination between FEMA regional disability specialists and state and local partners was inconsistent and not standardized.
- Verified finding: FEMA had not solicited feedback from people with different disabilities on the accessibility of its overall financial-assistance application process.
- Verified finding: GAO found a four-percentage-point approval gap between applicants with and without disabilities in FEMA data from 2022 through 2025.
- Limitation: The approval gap does not by itself prove discrimination or establish that any specific denial was improper.
- Agency response: FEMA concurred with all three recommendations.
- Open action: All three GAO recommendations remained open when checked on October 3, 2026.
- Inference: Removing training and leaving regional coordination inconsistent can increase the risk that disability needs will be overlooked. GAO identified the risk but did not conclude that every emergency response failed.
- Opinion: A disaster plan is not inclusive until disabled people have helped test whether it works.