Relationship Building and Pre-Disaster Planning: Effective Strategies for Rural Resilience Following the 2016 West Virginia Floods

Extreme weather events are becoming more commonplace in the United States and across the globe. Infrastructure cannot be built to completely withstand damage from these extreme events, thus communities must prepare themselves to recover quickly and efficiently to limit disruption to community members' livelihoods. Non-coastal, rural communities in the Appalachian region are affected by many of the same barriers to recovery as more populated suburban and urban communities, however, they can also face unique circumstances due to heightened vulnerability caused by depressed socioeconomics, reduced access to public services, and nominal capabilities of small, rural town governments. Rural communities face challenges to disaster recovery, but they can also benefit from increased social capital and population homogeneity that reduces cultural and language barriers and has the potential to improve coordination and collaboration. Financial and coordination barriers, such as the late or slow allocation of funding and limited management capacity of local governments during disaster recovery, are prevalent in rural Appalachian communities. Legal and socio-cultural barriers to rural disaster recovery include historical development patterns in and around floodplains, higher percentages of vulnerable populations, and difficulty navigating the federal disaster aid application process. Collaborative planning efforts and capacity building through the cultivation of relationships among disaster recovery stakeholders are necessary to provide an efficient and effective recovery. Additional funding, and more timely funding, are often proposed to solve a variety of challenges, but money alone will not be enough to overcome many prominent barriers. By adopting planning and cross-sector collaborative practices, local governments can better leverage available resources and facilitate the recovery process for the benefit of the affected communities. The 2016 West Virginia floods served as a case study and recovery strategies used following this event provide lessons learned to mitigate disaster recovery barriers in the future. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 25 people from 15 organizations ranging from state cabinet secretaries and mayors to engineers and nonprofit workers. Interviews were transcribed and coded using qualitative data analysis software. Site visits accompanied interviews and thematic content analysis was used to analyze interview transcripts and supporting documentation. Codes were validated by an independent, third-party coder.