Melanie Randels has often stood in the remains of North St. Louis homes blasted by the May 16 tornado.
Nearly seven months has passed since the historic storm and Randels, an organizer with The People’s Response at Action St. Louis, says FEMA and city officials have not fulfilled promises.
“The storm lasted minutes, the recovery has stretched into months,” she said.
“People were promised help. What they’ve actually received hasn’t matched what they were told.”
Randels said the first days following the storm “were defined by shock.”
The crisis is now “is bureaucratic.”
“Delays, denials, missing inspections, and the emotional weight of feeling forgotten,” she said. “Many survivors are navigating paperwork, navigating trauma, and navigating systems that weren’t built with them in mind.”
Rodney Wilson, a fellow with The People’s Response, is dealing with the fallout of losing his home and belongings.
“After losing everything, I’ve fallen behind on bills and dealt with disconnected services,” he said. “It’s been hardship after hardship since the tornado.”
Both Randels and Wilson describe the same pattern.
Frontline FEMA workers tried to help, but a slow-moving system leaves residents confused. Wilson said his in-person interactions were “respectable,” but described the larger federal response as lacking urgency.
He said weeks pass without answers and that documents are submitted with no response.
He said FEMA is acting as though the situation “[is not] an emergency.”
Randels said the process for housing assistance is difficult and slow, adding there is little mental-health support.
“Deploying and being effective are not the same thing,” she said.
The FEMA Review Council is expected to release its formal recommendations on Dec. 12. Early drafts reportedly suggest reforms aimed at streamlining aid, improving communication with survivors, and modernizing the appeals process.
However, DHS Secretary Kristi Noem may be pushing to change key recommendations, raising concerns among advocacy groups and survivors.
More than 80 disaster survivors from across the country, including St. Louisans, will travel to Washington, D.C., on Dec. 15 to urge Congress to prioritize communities still struggling to rebuild. The delegation includes tornado, hurricane, flood and wildfire survivors who say the federal system is outdated and increasingly overwhelmed.
“Disasters are getting stronger, so our federal response must get smarter, faster, and more equitable. Residents shouldn’t have to fight harder for relief than they fought to survive,” said Randels.
Wilson said he plans to emphasize that policymakers must listen to the people most directly affected by disaster.
“Helping real people should come before political positioning,” he said.
Randels said, “If we don’t fight for ourselves, we will be overlooked. The people who survived the May tornado deserve a system that survives scrutiny. Right now, FEMA does not.”
Wilson echoed that sentiment. Any attempt to weaken reforms, he said, “only encourages my push to make sure things really go as planned.”
Randels said the focus of the Washington trip is not charity, but fairness. For families in North St. Louis and beyond, she said, recovery shouldn’t depend on how well they can navigate a federal system in crisis.