Press Release
Contact: Allison Hadley - Public Information Officer
Phone: (225) 925-3966
Fax: (225 925-7501

BATON ROUGE, La. – In response to a request for assistance, the Governor’s Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness will deploy a three-member team to Kansas to assist that state in training its personnel in the intricacies of FEMA disaster assistance protocols.

Kansas made the request through the Emergency Assistance Compact (EMAC), a formal agreement between the states that allows states in need to draw assistance from other states.

 “In the wake of (Hurricanes) Katrina and Rita, 48 states in the union and 3 territories answered our call for assistance,” said Jeff Smith, acting director of GOHSEP. “Now that we are out of the crisis mode, we are in a position to share some of our hard earned knowledge and experience with one of the many states that aided us when we were overwhelmed.”

Kansas received a Presidential Declared Disaster on July 2, 2007 after a wave of severe storms, tornados and flooding ripped through the Eastern Kansas plains in early May. The disaster declaration includes 17 Kansas counties for Public Assistance.

EMAC was established in 1996 to allow states outside of a declared disaster area to render assistance to the state in need. EMAC has been used in a number of disasters, but the EMAC response to Katrina and Rita was, by far, the largest utilization of EMAC in the history of the compact.  More than 65,000 individuals came from around the country to assist in response and recovery across the Gulf Coast States.

“Without inter-state cooperation of EMAC, no state would be able to handle a major disaster on its own,” Smith said. “It is a good feeling to be able to begin offering Louisiana’s assistance to those in need.”