Emergency Management Specialist (Recovery)
Federal Emergency Management Agency
Posted: January 12, 2026 (2 days ago)
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Federal Emergency Management Agency
Department of Homeland Security
This job involves helping communities prepare for and reduce the impact of disasters by identifying risks and creating plans to prevent or lessen damage, mainly through FEMA's Public Assistance Program.
It requires working with government agencies and stakeholders to develop proposals, provide guidance, and deliver training on hazard mitigation.
A good fit would be someone with experience in emergency planning or disaster recovery who enjoys collaborating and problem-solving in high-stakes situations.
The primary purpose of this position is to perform emergency management work including the identification of mitigation measures and the development of those measures into hazard mitigation proposals in support of the Public Assistance Program.
All qualifications and eligibility requirements must be met by the closing date of the announcement.
To qualify for this Emergency Management Specialist (Mitigation) position at the IC-11 level, you must possess one full year of specialized experience equivalent to at least the IC-09 level in the Federal government, which has equipped you with the skills needed to successfully perform the duties of the position.
Experience may be obtained in the federal government, a state or local government, or private sector, and must demonstrate the following: Reviewing emergency management operations to provide recommendations; and Developing Hazard Mitigation program materials for stakeholders, such as briefings, training workshops, and/or presentations; and Providing assistance to stakeholders on mitigation programs.
OR Ph.D. or equivalent doctoral degree OR 3 full years of progressively higher-level graduate education leading to such degree OR LL.M, if related OR Combination of education and experience.
To qualify for this position at the IC-12 level, you must possess one full year of specialized experience equivalent to at least the IC-11 level in the Federal government, which has equipped you with the skills needed to successfully perform the duties of the position.
Experience may be obtained in the federal government, a state or local government, or private sector, and must demonstrate the following: Applying emergency management standards, regulations, practices, training, or procedures in regards to disaster-related recovery activities; and, Providing guidance to customers concerning response management initiatives; and, Collaborating or fostering relationships between Federal, State, local, or tribal entities regarding hazard mitigation processes.
Please read the following important information to ensure we have everything we need to consider your application: Do not copy and paste the duties, specialized experience, or occupational assessment questionnaire from this announcement into your resume as that will not be considered a demonstration of your qualifications for this position.
Your resume serves as the basis for experience related qualification determinations, and you must highlight your most relevant and significant work experience and education (if applicable), as it relates to this job opportunity.
Please use your own words, be clear, and specific when describing your work history. We cannot make assumptions regarding your experience. Are you qualifying based on your work experience?
Qualifications are based on your ability to demonstrate in your resume that you possess one year of the specialized experience for this announcement at a comparable scope and responsibility.
To ensure all of the essential information is in your resume, we encourage you to use the USAJOBS online Resume Builder.
If you choose to use your own resume, it must contain the following information organized by experience/position: (1) job title, (2) name of employer, (3) start and end dates of each period of employment (from MM/DD/YY to MM/DD/YY), (4) detailed description of duties performed, accomplishments, and related skills, and (5) hours worked per week (part-time employment will be prorated in crediting experience).
Federal experience/positions must also include the occupational series, grade level, and dates in which you held each grade level.
Are you a current or former FEMA Reservist/Disaster Assistance Employee (DAE)?
To accurately credit your experience from intermittent positions and Reservist Deployments, you must list the dates (from MM/DD/YY to MM/DD/YY) of deployments that are relevant to your qualifying experience, along with the job title and specific duties you were responsible for during each deployment.
Determining length of General or Specialized Experience is dependent on the above information.
Failure to provide the above information in your resume may result in your application being found "not qualified." Experience refers to paid and unpaid experience, including volunteer work done through National Service programs (e.g., Peace Corps, AmeriCorps) and other organizations (e.g., professional, philanthropic, religious, spiritual, community, student, social).
Volunteer work helps build critical competencies, knowledge, and skills, and provides valuable training and experience that translates directly to paid employment.
You will receive credit for all qualifying experience, including volunteer experience.
For additional information on crediting experience and/or education, please reference the OPM General Schedule Qualification Standards Major Duties:
What will I do in this position if hired?
In this Emergency Management Specialist (Mitigation) position, you will interpret engineering data, criteria, policy and regulations related to engineering design and construction as well as reviewing projects for technical credibility and cost effectiveness.
Typical assignments include: Using customer service skills to facilitate the delivery of all 406 Hazard Mitigation aspects of the Public Assistance Program, to include applying policy and procedure to Applicant briefings, recovery scoping meetings, site inspections and follow up meetings.
Providing technical assistance to Public Assistance staff (PA) in identifying and developing hazard mitigation proposals.
Providing technical assistance to PA staff by reviewing PA Projects for sound mitigation opportunities/techniques.
Providing technical assistance on compliance with codes, specifications, standards and regulations.
Providing technical support to stakeholders on benefit cost analysis (BCA) utilizing the FEMA approved BCA tool. What else do I need to know?
At FEMA, our mission is to help people before, during and after disasters, and every employee at FEMA has a role in emergency management.
Every FEMA employee has regular and recurring emergency management responsibilities, though not every position requires routine deployment to disaster sites.
All positions are subject to recall around the clock for emergency management operations, which may require irregular work hours, work at locations other than the official duty station, and may include duties other than those specified in the employee's official position description.
Travel requirements in support of emergency operations may be extensive in nature (weeks to months), with little advance notice, and may require employees to relocate to emergency sites with physically austere and operationally challenging conditions.
This announcement is for a position as a CORE (Cadre of On-Call Response/Recovery Employee).
CORE employees are full-time employees hired to directly support the response and recovery efforts related to disasters. Employees are hired under the Robert T.
Stafford Act and are excluded from the provisions of title 5, United States Code, governing jobs in the competitive service.
They can be hired under a streamlined process instead of a competitive process.
After three years of continuous service, Stafford Act employees may be granted competitive eligibility to apply for permanent full-time positions at FEMA.
This position will be hired into a temporary excepted service appointment. Appointments may be renewed based on workload, funding, and supervisory approval.
This position has promotion potential to the IC-12.
Promotions are dependent on your ability to perform the duties at a higher level, successful performance review displaying at least one year of experience at the lower grade, the continuing need for an employee assigned to the higher level, and management approval.
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