On the Media: American Emergency

About this episode

The episode discusses the investigation into FEMA's trust issues and mismanagement as reported by On the Media.

A little while back, our friends over at On the Media released a gripping and immersive reporting series about FEMA, the agency that is supposed to be there for all of us in the wake of disaster. In American Emergency (https://zpr.io/MtrUmJU3yEMW), OTM investigates how the agency tasked with saving America became distrusted, despised… and defunded.Today we talk to On the Media co-host Micah Loewinger about how this project came out, what reporting went into making it happen, and play a couple of fun and truly surprising bits of the story that the OTM team uncovered. And it’s a story that highlights the ideal and promise of good government, right alongside the frustration with bureaucracy and mismanagement, and of course the undercurrent of profound mistrust in governmental power. As natural disasters are getting more extreme and less predictable, this series makes sense of that tangle, and provides a prescient peek into FEMA’s future. Special thanks to On the Media. To hear Micah in person, talking more about the complex history of FEMA, join him on June 24th at WNYC's The Greene Space (https://wnyc.org/events/otm-fema). Signup for our newsletter!! It includes short essays…

People in this episode

Host: Radiolab

Guest: Micah Loewinger

Topics covered

• FEMA
• disaster response
• government trust
• bureaucracy
• reporting
• natural disasters

Keywords

• FEMA
• On the Media
• Micah Loewinger
• disaster
• government
• bureaucracy
• trust
• reporting

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: On the Media, FEMA, WNYC

Places: The Greene Space

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