EMX staff exchange brings non-federal emergency managers to FEMA. Nominations are open through December 15, 2022

 

FEMA Advisory

Emergency Manager Exchange Nominations Extended to Dec. 15

State, local, tribal, territorial emergency managers, join us! The 2023 Emergency Manager Exchange (EMX) is seeking four dedicated public servants who work in non-federal governmental offices or programs to spend time at FEMA in a 4-6 month paid work exchange. 

Staff Exchange

The EMX staff exchange brings non-federal emergency managers to FEMA to work alongside leadership and staff from FEMA’s Office of Response and Recovery or Resilience. State, local, tribal, and territorial emergency managers bring new perspectives and guide FEMA on how to improve our programs.

In an exciting update for 2023, the exchange will be fully reciprocal. As the participating government organization sends their employee to work at FEMA, in return, a full-time FEMA employee will be sent to support that non-federal government office or program.

Reimbursed Costs

For the duration of the assignment, FEMA will reimburse the participant’s home organization for the cost of the participant’s salary up to the federal GS-13 level, plus benefits. The exchange is authorized under the Intergovernmental Personnel Act (5 CFR part 34) mobility program. Where consistent with FEMA’s travel policies, this program includes travel costs and per diem in Washington, D.C. 

The visiting FEMA employee is available to address capability gaps identified by the non-federal government organization in their nomination letter. Nominations are open through December 15, 2022.

New Perspectives

This staff exchange provides FEMA and its partners with a new way to collaborate in support of emergency management priorities. This exchange opportunity highlights the “2022-2026 FEMA Strategic Plan” focus on strengthening the emergency management workforce.

This opportunity brings FEMA hand in hand with our emergency management partners and stakeholders as we work together to increase disaster resilience, and ultimately, help people, before, during and after disasters.

Nomination is by Home Organization

Each participant’s non-federal government organization must nominate their applicant to the program. Consistent with Federal ethics obligations and guidance, while at FEMA, non-federal government exchange participants may not work on issues that directly involve their home jurisdiction of employment.

The position descriptions and nomination instructions are available on FEMA.gov at Emergency Manager Exchange | FEMA.gov. Nominations will be accepted through December 15, 2022. The 4–6-month exchange begins in March 2023. Telework opportunities are available.

DEFENDER OF LATINO FARMERS IN THE US, RUDY ARREDONDO

 RUDY ARREDONDO, DEFENDER OF LATINO FARMERS IN THE US

 

March 23, 2018 

by Hernando Ramírez-Santos

Abasto Magazine

 

https://abasto.com/en/news/sweet-potato-a-special-guest-for-the-holidays/

 

If there is anyone who really knows the life of Latinos in the agricultural fields of the United States, it is undoubtedly the Mexican Rudy Arredondo, founder and president of the National Latino Farmers & Ranchers Trade Association.


Working in the harvesting of crops with his parents during his childhood, adolescence and in his adult life, educating and defending the labor rights of immigrants and the work of the small Latino farmers, Arredondo has lived the transformation in the fields and the impact that the growth of immigration has had in the last half century.

Arredondo was born in the Santiago valley in Guanajuato, México. His father, who was a farmer, immigrated to the United States in search of better opportunities in the early 1940s. When he was 3 years old, with his mother, they crossed the border and settled with their father in the Río Grande Valley close to Edinburg, Texas, where they worked in the fields.

“Since we didn’t have money to pay a babysitter, since I was 5 years old, my mother would bring me to work with her in the fields,” Arredondo remembers. During his childhood and adolescence, he traveled around the country with his parents working the harvest seasons.


During that time as day laborer, Arredondo had his first experience working as a volunteer in the early days of the Union of Field Workers, which later achieved a great recognition with his leader César Chávez.

He divided his time between the fields and his study. He graduated from high school, went to college in Edinburg where he studied business administration and did military service.

Due to his experience and knowledge of Latino field workers, around 1974 a law firm in the city of Washington, DC, offered him work as a paralegal in the area of legal aid to farmers.

SECRETARY PERDUE ANNOUNCES USDA’S FARM BILL AND LEGISLATIVE PRINCIPLES FOR 2018

 

THE NUMBER OF HISPANIC FARMERS HAS INCREASED

That’s where he began to explore the political world and the functioning of government agencies. In the Rural Housing Alliance, he served as general director of the area west of the Mississippi to help Latino families to own homes and was an investigator of cases of discrimination against agricultural workers in the Department of Agriculture.

In the late 1990s, Arredondo opened his own consulting office in terms of civil rights and as a member of the board of directors of the Rural Coalition, he noticed the rapid growth of Latino farmers in the country and the lack of an organization to represent them. “I realized that even though the Coalition was multi-ethnic, the voice of Latinos was not strong enough for the needs of this group,” Arredondo said.

According to the 2002 Agricultural Census, the number of Hispanic farmers had increased to 50,592 throughout the country. Given this situation, Arredondo decided to form the National Latino Farmers & Ranchers Trade Association.with a group of Hispanics.

During more than a decade, their association has been dedicated to offering small Latino farmers, whose number has doubled to almost 100,000 according to the 2012 Agricultural Census, technical assistance, information to obtain government resources, translations, help to prepare proposals, access to credit and markets and lobbying the government. Rudy Arredondo became the voice of these farmers who continue to fight for better opportunities to grow and that their products reach more consumers in the US.