Recently, violent storms tore through Arkansas. Tornadoes and flooding rains damaged or destroyed hundreds of homes and businesses, demolished the community of Scotland, and took the lives of three Arkansans while injuring many others.
I declared a State of Emergency to help with the immediate response, including the clearing of debris, restoring of utilities, and evaluating public safety needs. National Guard troops were dispatched to the communities hardest hit, Arkansas Forestry crews helped clear debris, and the Arkansas Department of Emergency Management was on site in short order helping coordinate response. Within a few days, I had declared state disasters in Conway, Crittenden, Jackson, Lonoke, Mississippi, Poinsett, Pulaski, Saline, Stone, and Van Buren Counties.
The day after my declarations, the Federal Emergency Management Agency had teams on the ground working alongside state and county emergency managers, speaking with storm victims, and assessing the damage. When I first took office in 2007, we experienced a slow and seemingly uninvolved response from FEMA following the Dumas tornado. Ever since then, our relationship with FEMA has steadily improved, due to better responsiveness from the federal government, and, unfortunately, from the experience of numerous natural disasters in recent years.
After seeing the trail of destruction in East End and Scotland, I asked President Obama to declare a federal disaster in nine Arkansas counties and make individual storm victims eligible for federal assistance. Along with direct federal aid, such a declaration would provide temporary housing, building repairs, medical services, disaster unemployment aid, and low-interest loans for small businesses. I've also requested that U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack declare Faulkner, Lonoke, Mississippi, and Woodruff Counties disaster areas, due to crop damage caused by hailstorms and heavy winds.
If the federal government approves our request, it would be our second federal disaster of 2010. Last year, FEMA helped us acquire federal funds to respond to five disasters - three floods, the April tornado that hit Mena, and the devastating ice storm in January.
As I visited Arkansans in the affected areas, I was struck, as I always am, by the strength and resiliency of our people in the wake of natural disasters. What it comes down to is this: these disasters are really local situations. They happen within Arkansas, and the State responds by deploying resources, but they happen to the residents of specific communities, whose families, possessions, hopes, and dreams can be obliterated in a single moment. Nonetheless, many of our citizens end up rebuilding, sometimes from scratch, in the same place. Even if the building and belongings are gone, it remains their home, and their neighbors rally around them. In these dire situations, we witness selfless acts and a sense of community spirit that make us proud to be Arkansans.
Arkansans have had to endure Mother Nature's wrath many times in recent years, but our resourcefulness and our compassion for each other give us the strength to rebuild and to move forward.