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Hey, you're listening to Outside In.

I'm Nate Hedgy.

Wild days right now.

I mean, it seems like every morning I open the New York Times app, and some arm of the federal government is on the chopping block.

U.S. Aid, Department of Education,

and another agency that a lot of Americans, conservative, liberal, poor, rich,

have relied on when disaster strikes.

I'll also be signed an executive order to begin the process of fundamentally reforming and overhauling FEMA or maybe getting rid of FEMA.

I think, frankly, FEMA's not good.

FEMA, the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

Now, you might imagine them as powerful, mysterious, kind of ominous, like they're the

men in black of disaster recovery.

But a lot of their work is actually pretty wonky, and we wanted to share a story from our

pals over at the Public Radio podcast, Sea Change.

This episode, it helped me understand what's at stake when we hear talk about getting rid of FEMA.

For better and for worse.

Enjoy.

Drive south from New Orleans, follow the Mississippi River, and about an hour later, you'll arrive in Pointe-A-Lahatch, Louisiana.

It's a tiny town on a rural, skinny stretch of land, sandwiched between the river and wetlands, just before it all disappears into the Gulf of Mexico.

Pointe of LaHatch is where I meet Virgie Ancalade.

I've been here all my life.

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