An NPR report on research by El Instituto/Political Science joint faculty member and Associate Professor Charles (Robert) Venator highlights the disorganized and slow response by Federal authorities to the plight of Hurricane María refugees and how this top-level management inefficiency threw the main weight of resettling the displaced people and providing their needs onto Puerto Rican families and local governments. Venator’s research has been commissioned by the city of Holyoke, Massachusetts, and aims also to draw valuable lessons for future disaster-related displacements of people, expected to grow in frequency and magnitude as a result of global climate change.

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