A longtime leader of the Federal Emergency Management Agency told senior Trump administration officials Tuesday that the agency has become increasingly bureaucratic and slow.
Robert Fenton, a nonpolitical appointee who runs FEMA’s Pacific regional office, said that since he started at FEMA in 1996, “I’ve watched the agency take on more and more responsibility. That’s come with greater and greater bureaucracy.
“Things that used to take me a month or two to do now take 18 months. That’s pulled me away from supporting disasters,” Fenton told other members of a panel created by President Donald Trump to overhaul FEMA.
Fenton’s remarks were the highlight of the inaugural meeting of Trump’s FEMA Review Council, which has until Nov. 16 to give Trump a report on how to change the agency. His comments could carry particular weight because he is widely respected, has twice served as FEMA acting administrator during presidential transitions and oversees agency operations in four states including California.
