Faith-Based Organizations in Disaster Relief: Locally-Based Strategies for a Higher Demand Future

Due to the effects of climate change, natural disasters are beginning to occur more frequently and are causing greater destruction. The American disaster relief system currently relies on a nationally focused, top-down approach. As resources become more and more limited, it is expected that disaster relief fatigue will occur, required local communities to take a larger role in their disaster relief processes. Right now, major player in both local and national disaster relief are Faith-Based Organizations (FBOs), who provide many crucial services before and after disasters This paper develops an economic model of the rebuilding stage of disaster relief in order to examine the prioritization and resource allocation problems it faces. Through a series of case studies, the model is applied and used to point out a series of systems and methods by which local FBOs have, and might further be able to play larger and more significant roles in disaster relief