Politicized Spending? An Examination of Disaster Recovery Expenditures.

• In Event: Federalism and Environmental Policy and Outcomes

Abstract

Do state governments politicize the administration of disaster recovery funding to local governments? Municipalities and counties rely on the federal and state governments to receive crucial financial assistance in recovering from disasters and emergencies. Previous research has provided evidence that presidents are at least partly motivated by electoral considerations in making declaring disasters and emergencies. This raises not only the question of whether decisions to allocate federal grants for declared disaster areas are similarly politicized, but also if the politicization extends to governors who may also be motivated by electoral and party political considerations. I address these questions with new data on transfers of federally obligated amounts to local governments in 11 states. I employ the as-if random assignment of mayoral partisanship to estimate a causal effect of having the same party as the governor on the amount of grants received and the amount of time in which payments are received. Further, I evaluate and discuss the effectiveness of federal regulatory attempts to limit the discretion of state governments.

Author

• Sebastian Thieme, Princeton University