[Congressional Bills 109th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 3969 Introduced in House (IH)]







109th CONGRESS
  1st Session
                                H. R. 3969

To provide for the designation of a Department of Agriculture disaster 
   liaison to assist State and local employees of the Department in 
 coordination with other disaster agencies in responding to federally 
                          declared disasters.


_______________________________________________________________________


                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                            October 6, 2005

Mr. Blunt (for himself, Mr. Cardoza, Mr. Bonner, Mr. Rogers of Alabama, 
Mr. Pickering, and Mr. Wicker) introduced the following bill; which was 
                referred to the Committee on Agriculture

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL


 
To provide for the designation of a Department of Agriculture disaster 
   liaison to assist State and local employees of the Department in 
 coordination with other disaster agencies in responding to federally 
                          declared disasters.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE LIAISON FOR DISASTER EMERGENCIES.

    (a) Deployment of Disaster Liaison.--The Secretary of Agriculture 
shall deploy disaster liaisons to State and local Department of 
Agriculture Service Centers in a federally declared disaster area 
whenever Federal Emergency Management Agency personnel are deployed in 
that area, to coordinate Department programs with the appropriate 
disaster agencies designated under the Robert T. Stafford Disaster 
Relief and Emergency Assistance Act (42 U.S.C. 5121 et seq.).
    (b) Qualifications.--Disaster liaisons shall be selected from among 
employees of the Department of Agriculture who have experience 
providing emergency disaster relief in federally declared disaster 
areas.
    (c) Duties.--A disaster liaison shall--
            (1) serve as a liaison to State and Federal Emergency 
        Services;
            (2) be deployed to a federally declared disaster area to 
        coordinate Department interagency programs to provide 
        assistance to agricultural producers in the federally declared 
        disaster area;
            (3) facilitate the claims and applications of agricultural 
        producers who are victims of the disaster that are forwarded to 
        the Department by the appropriate State Department of 
        Agriculture agency director; and
            (4) coordinate with the Director of the State office of the 
        appropriate Department agency to assist with the application 
        for and distribution of economic assistance.
    (d) Federally Declared Disaster Area Defined.--In this section, the 
term ``federally declared disaster area'' means--
            (1) an area covered by a Presidential declaration of major 
        disaster issued under section 401 of the Robert T. Stafford 
        Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act (42 U.S.C. 5170); 
        or
            (2) determined to be a disaster area by the Secretary of 
        Agriculture under subpart A of part 1945 of title 7, Code of 
        Federal Regulations.
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