Converging together to confront multiple intersecting and cascading disasters: a network of mutual aid approach Open Access

The Disaster Justice Network (DJN) is a volunteer network that emerged during the COVID-19 pandemic to lend support and share critical information that was not easily accessed for the 2020 and 2021 Hurricanes Laura, Delta, Zeta, and Ida recovery processes in coastal Louisiana (Kozlov, 2021; Yao et al., 2022). While forged in the aftermath of these disasters, DJN has maintained momentum to address the cascading effects of interrelated extractive environmental injustices, climate crises, and more (Benton et al., 2023). DJN includes community and faith leaders, advocates, activists, practitioners, social and natural science researchers, and students weaving together environmental justice and disaster expertise. DJN incorporates multiple forms of knowledge, expertise, and strands of research to organize and mobilize actions and activities within a network-of-mutual-aid framework.

DJN's goal is to support healthy people and ecosystems, clean water and air, resilient homes, neighborhoods, schools, and jobs, and a sustainable future for all. We employ an ongoing, iterative, non-linear process to nurture pathways for a rejuvenated future based on human and environmental rights. DJN draws from a community-based participatory action approach (Laska et al., 2010; IDJC et al., 2019) to develop and share strategies for a justice-centered disaster preparedness and recovery process (see also Jerolleman, 2019). Collaborative processes and methodologies, such as participatory action research and community-led disaster planning processes, can serve to facilitate partnerships among a diverse group of partners engaged in hazards and disasters work “to solve challenges and fill gaps in preparedness” (FEMA, 2019; also Dietrich, 2020).

In this article, we discuss DJN's approach, sharing how the seed for DJN was planted and how, through a multi-disciplinary, -organizational, -generational, and -location effort, DJN has grown through a process of converging and collaborating together. We reflect on how the unique geographic and social isolation conditions in which DJN was formed relate to the multi-locational character of the Network and its members, which is a unique strength of the network-of-mutual-aid approach that evolved. We discuss DJN's efforts to share resources and knowledge between southeast and southwest Louisiana -- two regions of the state with different social and political contexts and not typically in collaboration -- given their shared but temporally staggered struggles following the 2020–21 Hurricane seasons.

As recovery to the hurricanes evolved, along with the Network's activities, DJN dedicated significant effort to simplifying and communicating ways to navigate the notoriously complicated process of receiving federal disaster assistance. DJN members provide training on disaster case management so that impacted communities are more familiar with the tools and processes to appeal denials and receive the assistance they deserve. In partnership with the Bill Anderson Fund, which empowers the next generation of leaders in hazards and disaster research, scholarship, policy, and practice ^[1], DJN also integrates students into the network and connects them with community partners for community-driven research priorities (e.g. Ayala Alanis, 2024).

In all, DJN develops strategies to address inequitable disaster response and recovery, confront multiple intersecting and cascading disasters, and pave the way for a more disaster resilient and just future together. We discuss lessons learned on navigating challenges, questions, and the possibilities for reducing harms. These insights are shared to support knowledge sharing across other webs of mutual aid and hubs for community-driven and justice-centered disaster preparedness and recovery processes.

Hurricanes Laura, Delta, Zeta, and Ida, which pummeled Louisiana in August and October 2020 and August 2021—are the latest in a complex history of co-occurring disasters and injustices to hit communities and ecosystems along Louisiana's Gulf Coast (Montano, 2024). The communities most affected by these disasters were already experiencing high levels of pollution, poverty, poor housing, failing infrastructure, extreme land loss, subsidence, and climate and weather impacts. Hurricane Laura, for example, tore through southwest Louisiana's oil- and gas-based production region in August 2020 (Jalloul et al., 2020). Immediately there was great concern about the immense amount of unknown toxins and hazardous risks – both in the affected areas and where people temporarily relocated – and what official recovery decisions would be made (Sneath, 2020). One year later, Hurricane Ida (August 2021) caused extensive damage to tribal communities in southeast Louisiana, with nearly 58 of the almost 70 houses in the Pointe-au-Chien Tribal village rendered unlivable in the wake of the Category 4 storm (Rebuilding Pointe-au-Chien Together, 2024).

Communities of color, Latinx, Vietnamese, Indigenous, Afro-American, Creole, and historied populations have been negatively impacted by decisions made in the Hurricane recovery processes based on formerly-crafted master plans and economic regional models (Hemmerling et al., 2020; Nguyen and Salvesen, 2014). Experience with previous crises, such as the British Petroleum (BP) Oil Spill and earlier hurricanes, shaped expectations that they would be left out of the loop with regard to government and formal agency assistance (Maldonado and Peterson, 2021). Slow and inaccurate information trickled down from official response systems and the onus was on survivors to navigate the federal recovery assistance system and know whom to call, what to say, and what paperwork to fill out, all while weathering subsequent storms and living in cars—or worse (McLendon, 2022). At the same time, COVID-19 affected these communities through pre-existing, environmentally unjust health and housing conditions, limited health care, and the public's reluctance to purchase their harvests – oysters, crabs, shrimp – for fear of contamination (Paradis et al., 2021; Smith et al., 2020).

Disasters often reveal multiple layers of systemic social and environmental injustices, violence, and racism. There are many policies, programs, and institutional practices, and resulting processes that often perpetuate systemic barriers placing communities increasingly in harm's way to hazards (Wisner et al., 2004; Browne, 2013; Tierney, 2014; Jerolleman, 2019; Hendricks and Van Zandt, 2021). Examples include benefit-cost analysis favoring more expensive homes, coastal gentrification being stimulated by the hurricanes resulting in development of plans to address the impacts that are not racially and income diverse, and benefiting more affluent people due to inequitable funding mechanisms (Marino et al., 2019; Domingue and Emrich, 2019). Disasters disadvantage historically marginalized populations and neighborhoods, exacerbate injustices and disaster risk, and hinder community actions and implementation. The prevailing governance is often ineffectual and structural violence renders the overburdened and overlooked communities as invisible and if seen, dispensable (Maldonado and Peterson, 2021).

As Hurricane Laura made landfall on August 27, 2020, and recognizing that COVID-19 would prevent typical on-the-ground volunteer support from happening on the scale necessary, two of this article's authors (Peterson and Maldonado) started imagining possible ways to support communities in this context. They quickly reached out to friends, colleagues, and networks in the region and around the country towards a very different kind of volunteerism than usually occurs following disasters, asking a basic fundamental question: “What can we do?” This question quickly turned into the statement of: “What we can do is …”

Through support from grant funds received through the Urgent Action Fund, local women community leaders and organizers assessed their community's Hurricane damage and immediate and long-term needs. Partners acquired information about the Federal Emergency Management Agency's (FEMA's) on-the-ground operations, talked with survivors, and gathered information for their recovery appeals (Robinson and Singh, 2024). They discerned gaps and barriers in the formal disaster relief and recovery services available, worked with faith-based organizations to find resources, created and disseminated information about water filters to address water quality concerns, and shared information about resilient rebuilding (LeBleu, 2022). This information proved to be critical with the accumulating issues of enduring multiple storms.

Through these interactions, DJN emerged, forming a volunteer network-of-mutual-aid for justice-centered disaster recovery. Drawing on existing and growing relations and trusted collaborators, DJN rapidly mobilized individuals and resources to deliver supplies in the wake of the 2020–2021 hurricanes, addressing urgent needs for impacted individuals and households. In response to ongoing challenges and overlapping and compounding disasters and crises, the Network continues to mobilize disaster recovery while also offering communities preparedness and mitigation support.

DJN includes members from a wide breadth of experts who collaborate to enhance coastal communities' disaster recovery. New ideas for processes and innovation to address communities' recovery challenges are shared in turn to DJN's partnering organizations through the volunteer network, such as sharing information about resilient rebuilding approaches.

Establishing a non-hierarchical structure for collaboration in which knowledge is shared and the work is collectively held can work to strengthen each partner's effectiveness and capacity (Laska and Peterson, 2011; Peterson, 2020). Cross-boundary organizing, including a diversity of disciplines, communities, and ideas can connect people, places, programs, organizations, and resources. Boundary organizations – formal or informal, such as DJN – can work as a credible, salient, and legitimate collective (Breder and Carney, 2025; Cash et al., 2002), and at times act as facilitators, interpreters, and resource advocates and connectors (Taylor et al., 2012; NASEM, 2018; Peterson, 2020), coordinating complementary expertise (Meadow et al., 2015; Maldonado et al., 2016) to reduce disaster risk and focus on community disaster resilience (Maldonado and Peterson, 2021).

Below, we elaborate on the processes and connections that facilitated mobilization in the aftermath of the 2020–2021 hurricanes and that continue to sprout new initiatives and collaborations.

To start organizing immediately after Hurricane Laura made landfall, some small funds were applied for and received through the Natural Hazards Center Quick Response Research Award Program (National Science Foundation), Urgent Action Fund, and the University of California-Santa Barbara. This was used to support local and early career organizers and students in organizing efforts, gathering data and information related to potential forms of population displacement as the recovery unfolded, and developing strategies to intervene in potential forms of coming displacement (e.g. abandonment of damaged lower-income housing, increased gentrification as housing was purchased from modest-income storm victims, and evictions for repair). Information was gathered about housing policies, land use and restoration plans, and toxic environmental hazards.

Through this initial response phase, DJN helped to procure and deliver critical resources for immediate survival within the context of a housing and health emergency. Much of the initial organizing happened through peer-based, academic, and faith community ties. The connective tissue among these groups and spaces enabled the Network to convene until, nearly six months after Hurricane Laura, the process of weekly full-group virtual meetings, forming topic-based working groups, and establishing a Google-group for communications emerged.

Initial support included people working within their disciplines or abilities, as well as finding ways to lend support remotely. For example, we used social networks to recruit volunteer participants nationwide, via a distributed survey, to provide critical organizational and research capacities and labor. Providing virtual options for engagement was key to recruiting undergraduate and graduate students, enabling them to work from wherever they were and allowing people across vast geographies to support the efforts. Virtual engagement was particularly necessary given the continued lockdown conditions and social distancing precautions during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 and beyond.

Early convening efforts focused on forming partnerships with grassroots and community groups (e.g. Micah 6:8 Mission, First Peoples' Conservation Council of Louisiana, Pauline Hurst: Greater St Mary Baptist Church – The Hope Complex and a multitude of faith-based groups, non-profit research and advocacy groups (e.g. Healthy Gulf, Environmental Working Group), policy groups (e.g. National Low Income Housing Coalition), and scholarly and student-focused organizations (e.g. Bill Anderson Fund/BAF). These partnerships expanded the work beyond the core convening team. For example, BAF's Executive Director Nnenia Campbell shared, “Being a member of the DJN enables the BAF to connect the Fellows with opportunities to develop research relationships that are grounded in trust, mutual respect, and reciprocity rather than extraction. Vital experiences such as these are often not part of the training that students receive through graduate programs” (DJN, 2023). Having such experiences early in their careers likely impacts their approach to research throughout their careers.

We formed working groups, each with a coordinator/point of contact, standing meeting time (starting off weekly), Google-group, and Zoom-line. The initial working groups included: full-group, communications, environmental hazards, housing, health, justice, and water and sanitation, with each group outlining short- and long-term goals. For example, the environmental hazards group focused initially on understanding where temporary and illegal dumping sites and spills are, building towards the long-term goal of understanding where chemical plants and storage facilities are, what they produce, how much, how it travels, health consequences, and where the most vulnerable areas are in extreme weather.

We worked to address immediate emergency response needs, such as facilitating deliveries of material assistance; wrote grants for direct services, support, and advocacy; problem-solving issues, such as makeshift case management for recovery assistance; and worked on policy advocacy. We focused on resources to support communities who would likely be overlooked in the Hurricane Laura recovery process. Our intent was to support local community organizers working on-the-ground, and communities, families, and individuals' informed decision-making about their future well-being (Krajeski, 2018). The idea was that doing so would also enable the process of a just recovery and support a rejuvenated future based on human and environmental rights (Moulton et al., 2017).

To further develop the process, we worked with a professional public affairs and organizational group to help develop a clear strategy and objectives with tactics to navigate the myriad of challenges in the disaster recovery processes, some of which was translated and shared through DJN's website, https://disasterjusticenetwork.org/. We focused on continuity and sustained efforts, by volunteers giving moments of time as best they could. The benefits are focused on long-term resource sharing, mutual aid, and solidarity. Through the generosity of time and commitment, individuals and organizations share resources and expertise to avoid usual pitfalls in disaster recovery and help find healthy, safe alternatives.

The network-of-mutual-aid-approach in organizing for Hurricane Laura disaster recovery evolved as the disasters continued to layer on throughout coastal Louisiana in 2020 and 2021 – Hurricane Delta, then Zeta, winter freeze, early summer floods, Hurricane Ida, and all in the context of a pandemic forcing physical distance and finding new ways to organize and connect (Belblidia and Kliebert, 2022).

DJN has spanned several disasters, multiple regions, experiences, and backgrounds and continues to expand and grow. As we face the reality of more disasters, higher risks, and the increasing importance of supporting overburdened communities through a justice-focused recovery process, we assess and reflect along the way to improve positive impact, individually and collectively. This process, which included surveying members and facilitating group discussion sessions, revealed critical existing strengths to build on, such as: (1) access to information, ideas, and resources, as one DJN member articulated as a “living tool-kit”; (2) enhancing existing connections and developing new connections with community members, researchers, students, practitioners, and people in government agencies; (3) DJN's structure for communicating and continuity, keeping members engaged through online meetings and Google-group to share calls for advocacy support; (4) breadth in expertise in coalition building with people from around the region and country including those that were not in Hurricane crisis mode working from a distance; (5) relationship and companionship, including sharing values, a way to keep grounded and support to avoid burnout, and the invaluableness of knowing you're not alone in this work; and (6) advocacy efforts, nimbly moving between bigger picture and specific action items, such as collaborating on public comment letters, organizing webinars, and input in published guidance for decision-makers.

Some of the results thus far include: (1) advocacy efforts of forming new alliances to develop stronger policy statements and strengthen voices for change-making, and translating critical disaster recovery issues into media items for broader reach (see for example, https://www.lowlandercenter.org/rebuilding-information); (2) resilient rebuilding initiatives, such as community sharing of tangible instructional resources, tool-lending libraries, and housing repairs; (3) laying the structure and groundwork for connecting with people and funding resources through networks, facilitating access to critical information early on for emerging water and environmental issues and for considerations of future needs; (4) material resources for immediate needs, such as rental assistance, tents, medical equipment, blankets, bicycles, building materials, gas cards, etc.; (5) mentorship, in supporting students with action-oriented research projects for theses and dissertations, with permission and in partnership with community groups; and (6) coalition building across regions at-risk, through personal relationship building and connecting communities across different regions of coastal Louisiana together.

A multitude of convergence and collaborative actions have emerged through DJN, some of which are described below.

With the layers of issues in compound disasters it is difficult to have a plurality of knowledge and sets of expertise readily available (Bethel et al., 2022). DJN's format evolved through learning, through connections, and general and technical data that keeps changing over time. This was done by engaging academics (faculty and graduate students), leaders and members of advocacy groups, and other independent advocates for justice-based disaster recovery. The primary disaster justice benefits in this context are securing timely information for decision-making and response capacity by and with communities who have been left out of official information networks, decision-making, and resource processes, as well as the long-term network building that local organizations and people can access through DJN on a personal and professional level.

This work was done through partners working on, for example, facilitating disaster recovery by garnering government resources and university student/faculty participants in projects to design gathering places/emergency shelters using solar power to support electrical needs (Purdue University, Engineers Without Borders); religious congregations' disaster response and evaluating the disaster-area needs to match resource support (Pauline Hurst Mercy Center); prepositioning portable solar units and generators (Sky Power for the People); testing for air and water contamination post-disaster and analysis of post–hurricane pollution reports (Healthy Gulf); working to extend housing resources, to preserve access to housing assistance programs, and to engage in disaster-related housing policy reform (National Low Income Housing Coalition); and connecting local community grassroots leaders with federal policymakers.

Louisiana, as with most states, has a high prevalence of old infrastructure and housing, which was not resiliently built initially for the wind and flooding storm damage, relying instead on insurance, which is now impossible for most coastal Louisianians to afford. There is growing anecdotal evidence that modest-income homeowners do not carry insurance and thus have limited resources to recover, often living in risky, unhealthy homes following a storm. Developing a strong, resilient construction culture is mandatory for supporting modest-income housing as well as supporting household and community well-being.

The “Rebuilding the Boot” campaign for the resilient repair of storm-damaged structures focused on disseminating information and connecting households with the tools in order to complete repairs (see Figure 1). This was done through technical brochures approachable to homeowners about how to resiliently repair or build new structures in high Hurricane risk coastal Louisiana. The focus was on modest-income homeowners and rental property owners, with outreach through flyers and an online presence. The work included tool lending from shipping containers for resilient rebuild guided by instructional brochures (through funding from the Center for Disaster Philanthropy) and resilient roof design models in communities. These efforts were only possible through a collaborative partnership between the Lowlander Center with the National Low Income Housing Coalition, Center for Disaster Philanthropy, Micah 6:8 Mission (Sulphur), Town of Jean Lafitte, Evergreen Missionary Baptist Church in DeQuincy, communications experts at Nicholls State University, housing experts in wind and natural hazards, and others who distributed information to libraries, construction stores, and government offices.

While the project's target audience is modest-income residents, contractors who serve more wealthy residents can also enhance their resilient rebuild capacity by reviewing the techniques on handouts attached through quick-response codes to online instructions, thus strengthening the broader community recovery. The entire country is inadequately informed about resilient construction. Given the increased risk due to weather damage from climate changes, all communities should pursue resilient construction focused on their weather risks.

The support and expertise offered through Micah 6:8 Mission's (M68 M) connection to the DJN has made their Hurricane Laura recovery efforts more effective. M68 M was involved in rebuilding efforts in Calcasieu Parish, where more than 50% of buildings and homes were damaged in Hurricane Laura, some beyond repair (Hamburger et al., 2024; Quigley, 2021). The Rebuild the Boot program provided the needed information to ensure that the recovery efforts M68 M supported gave homeowners roofs that could withstand hurricane-force winds when the next Hurricane hits our area. And given the warming of the globe, we know that these future hurricanes will be stronger and occur more often.

Connections made through DJN have enabled connections to environmental organizations that have supported M68 M's “upstream” work combating the local environmental degradation from the fossil fuel industry, which has an outsized part in contributing to climate change through greenhouse gasses. Toxic air emissions from the local coastal petrochemical industry have contributed to the area's extremely high rate of cancer and cardiovascular disease. The connections made through the DJN, including the Environmental Working Group, have allowed M68 M to educate and advocate for the communities it serves, such as connecting with the services of student interns through the Loyola Environmental Law Clinic and Georgia State University, including a public health intern developing an educational program about the hazards in the local water post–Hurricane Laura. This issue is closely linked to the storms, which damage petrochemical plants, resulting in more hazardous, often undocumented emissions during the crisis (Cruz et al., 2001).

Resource connections through the DJN have provided a demonstration site showing how to implement the roofing techniques to fortify roofs in preparation for the next Hurricane. The demonstration is housed at Evergreen Missionary Baptist Church, one of our partners, located in DeQuincy, LA. The demonstration project has been featured on the local television station and is promoted on several local community organization websites and Facebook pages.

Evergreen Missionary Baptist Church, along with M68 M, hosts a tool-lending library initiated and supported by DJN members. Community members can borrow tools from the “library” to support their long-term recovery. The tools housed at these borrowing facilities include tools needed for debris clearing (chain saws, rakes, shovels), tools needed for reroofing (nail guns, magnetic rollers, generators, air compressors) as well as information from the Rebuild the Boot program outlining exactly how to rebuild effectively. Community members can check out the tools throughout the year, which helps M68 M emphasize our “Reduce, Reuse & Recycle” efforts in the community. The connections made through the DJN have been, and continue to be, a valuable resource for M68 M and other community-based organizations as we respond to disasters and the long-term needs impacted by those disasters. A similar program was created in Jean Lafitte, hosted by the town for a tool lending library and hands-on teaching demonstration site. Both received were developed by the volunteer labor and teaching of Dr. Tim Reinhold, retired from the Insurance Institute for Business & Home Safety (IBHS) and creator of fortified building standards.

In summer 2022, Hannah Friedrich, a doctoral student at the University of Arizona, had just finished her first year of the PhD. Drawing on her background in geospatial analysis, she wanted to craft a project that documented the spatial and temporal differences in recovery within communities impacted by the same disaster. She was intrigued by using satellite imagery to map initial blue tarp distribution, a striking and well-known symbol of Hurricane damage. Using a time series of satellite imagery, she could track housing recovery by the removal of tarps on damaged roofs. A few months prior, she had no idea where Lake Charles, Louisiana was on a map. Then, she met co-author Cindy Robertson (M68 M) at the Gulf Gathering for Climate Justice and Joy that summer. Cindy invited her to attend a DJN meeting and to visit her in Sulphur, across the Calcasieu River from Lake Charles. From conversations with Cindy and others during her visit and on DJN virtual meetings, she learned how important southwest Louisiana was to understanding disparate recovery. Moreover, satellite imagery from the region demonstrated clear disparities in recovery, showing tarps removed in some neighborhoods quite early after Laura and Delta in 2020 while remaining in others some years after (Friedrich and Tellman, 2022).

At an earlier DJN meeting, she shared how satellite imagery could systematically corroborate accounts from Cindy and others who lived the reality of uneven recovery in their community and show these at large spatial scales. Shirley and Kristina, other DJN members, suggested the blue tarp maps could help prioritize ongoing recovery areas that could benefit from Rebuilding the Boot, DJN's campaign to provide awareness on resilient rebuilding techniques. DJN and other partners could use the maps in grant applications for funding to support resilient recovery rebuilding. The use of the blue tarp maps to spur action is an ongoing conversation with DJN, but the potential use-cases identified from DJN's discussions clarified the research's potential impacts.

To undertake a project contextualizing a geography of uneven recovery, it was necessary to get to know a place and people about their experiences. Since first learning about the destruction of Hurricanes Laura and Delta, she has spent nearly nine-months living in Lake Charles, building relationships, and interviewing residents across Calcasieu Parish (Friedrich and Tellman, 2024). Many of these relationships trace back to the seeds of those initial connections from DJN. As this article's co-author Hannah Friedrich writes,

Based on the level of need and resources nearly two-years after Hurricane Ida (August 2021), through connections facilitated through DJN, the Lowlander Center partnered with the First Peoples’ Conservation Council of Louisiana and high risk communities to create partners to create a non-FEMA funded alternative disaster case management model, where leaders of local Tribes and at-risk communities in Lake Charles, New Orleans, and smaller bayou communities worked on case management for their local community members, supported by students and external experts from The Lowlander Center, Jacksonville State University, and other local non-profit organizations (Gopin, 2024; Hasan, 2022). Through existing relationships of mutual trust, the focus was on immediate case management needs, as well as developing a new model for local capacity building and sharing for future disasters, in the face of tremendous failures in the official disaster case management models and accumulating disasters.

Immediately after Hurricane Ida's eye passed over the Pointe-au-Chien Indian Tribal Territory, Tribal leaders outside of the impacted area began contacting local and state officials, but did not receive the services they requested in a timely manner. Communication breakdowns and government officials' lack of education regarding Indigenous rights delayed and even prevented several coastal Tribes from accessing critical resources. After multiple requests, Tribal leaders were able to meet with local elected officials to discuss the community needs for response and recovery efforts.

Community activists and Tribal leaders participated in a four-day training course learning how to complete FEMA applications and appeals, which had to be scanned and uploaded online. Today's technical expectations during disaster response and recovery prove an added challenge to disenfranchised communities whose access to electronic technology has been severed by storm damages and whose majority of residents are elderly and lack the education and training to navigate these often complex data systems. Getting information from and communicating with FEMA disaster representatives was severely lacking post–Ida. One example of this is the need for repeated appeal submissions due to the requirement that documents be uploaded as a JPG-file to the clients' case file online; however, many clients were not informed of this limitation.

Local leaders are well-known and have earned community residents' trust. They understand the language and dynamics of their respective communities. Having local community leaders trained and available to assist residents with disaster recovery needs, applications, documentation, and appeals can drastically shorten recovery times. In the community of Grand Caillou/Dulac, Tribal leaders have established the Community Outreach Program Office (COPO). The building located on Shrimpers Row was damaged during Hurricane Ida and is now being renovated to fortified standards. This location will serve as a resilience hub for community residents before and after hurricanes.

In 2022, multiple DJN members expressed a desire to create a forum for deep and open conversations about specific topics, while raising awareness and disseminating relevant and timely information that could be helpful for communities and organizations pursuing climate and disaster justice-related work. At the same time, DJN member Simone Domingue was also pursuing a way to support her organization, the University of Oklahoma's Southern Climate Impacts Planning Program (SCIPP), in their climate justice-oriented research and outreach. Starting in the summer of 2022, SCIPP and DJN decided to collaborate to produce three virtual webinars. Domingue led organizing speakers with input from DJN members, including assistance from student volunteers, and SCIPP provided technical, media, and logistics support.

The first webinar – Climate and Infrastructure Funding: A Conversation on Justice Opportunities and Challenges – featured speakers discussing the Biden-Harris Administration's Justice40 Initiative and federal funding opportunities. Invited speakers shared resources such as The Emerald Cities' Collaborative's guidebook for assisting communities in creating climate mitigation and adaptation benefits plans.

Entitled The Next Big One: The Ongoing Work of Disaster Recovery and Preparedness for Communities on the Frontlines, the second webinar hosted researchers presenting Hurricane Ida's impact on the release of toxic pollution in coastal Louisiana and spotlighted the work of disaster mutual aid groups organizing in predominantly Black communities located in a stretch of the lower Mississippi River often referred to as “cancer alley” (Blackwell et al., 2017).

The third webinar was titled Hurricane Harvey Aid and Recovery Equity for People of Color Communities. The session included researchers and housing advocates who discussed the barriers Mexican-origin immigrants and other communities of color faced following Hurricane Harvey (2017).

The series was advertised through SCIPP and DJN's email listserv and advertised on social media. The webinars' announcement received thousands of impressions on Twitter, and in total, 337 people registered for the webinars. Participants represented numerous types of institutions, including academia, federal agencies, the non-profit sector, local health departments, water boards, regional stakeholder networks, and community advocacy groups. Participants also consisted of independent consultants, researchers, and community members.

Post-webinar surveys captured examples of participants' experiences in the webinars. Participants shared that the best aspects of the webinar included: hearing from experts in the field working directly with community members, the opportunity for making connections across sectors and geographic scales, free-flowing conversation, and access to resources and information. Participants reported being able to apply the webinars' information to their work in research, program implementation, and coalition and network building. Links to the videos of each webinar, along with resources shared during each event, can be found on SCIPP's website (https://www.southernclimate.org/events-outreach/meetings-workshops/).

Shortly after Ida made landfall in August 2021, coastal Louisiana community and tribal networks with close relationships to DJN members began reporting overwhelming, widespread damage to homes and critical infrastructure and great needs for help and supplies such as drinking water and gasoline to power generators. As described elsewhere in this article, it became quickly obvious that local, parish, state, and federal governmental disaster and emergency management agencies did not have the capacity to respond quickly or efficiently to the vast, critical needs of impacted communities. A small group of DJN members immediately set up an ad-hoc network of volunteers, donors, and suppliers who could rapidly collect and distribute materials, supplies, funds, and human labor.

The almost immediate creation of this DJN ad-hoc Ida rapid response Network (hereafter referred to as the “Network”) was enabled by a combination of social media, the personal pre-existing relationships of individual DJN members, and word-of-mouth. Network members included: generous and dedicated individuals, some with their own networks such as veterans groups; local and national NGOs; mutual aid groups, both pre-existing and those founded as a response to Ida. Three DJN members acted as the Network's central organizers, meeting daily via phone or web-conference and keeping in constant contact by text and phone. This central triad created a spreadsheet to keep track of contacts, needs, supplies, and locations (for the template and lessons learned in this process, see, https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1vSP64hbCBA6-4YWuR3HlNtbbYjz3A_M0ft36fHf4lA0/edit?gid=0#gid=0). Volunteers would buy or collect supplies from various sources and deliver them to individuals needing assistance or community centers and other central locations. The Network was active for almost one-year, and several individual volunteers remained active for much longer. For example, one volunteer coordinated fresh produce donations from a food bank to a Lafourche Parish-based Tribal community for well over a year after Ida.

We learned valuable lessons from our experience creating and maintaining the DJN ad-hoc Ida rapid response Network, such as: trusting and close pre-existing relationships with members of impacted communities are extremely helpful; and having a secure location for staging supplies before distribution is crucial and often difficult to find (for more details, see DJN website). The DJN post–Ida response Network helped to fill critical gaps; it was made necessary by failures of existing municipal and government agencies whose stated purposes are disaster response and recovery (Noel et al., 2025). Justice-based disaster responders need to continue to demand improved processes, efficiency, and response times from these agencies so that, ultimately, our ad-hoc mutual aid and grassroots efforts will someday no longer be needed.

The failures of the official agency response systems are neither surprising nor unexpected. The government has consistently refused to sufficiently resource tribal communities and other communities of color and place-based communities (for example, see Nolan, 2021; Lallo, 2022). It is therefore also of no surprise that non-government alternative strategies were needed for specific activities, including advocacy work to preposition resources for Hurricane preparedness; training on case management and communications so that the communities could assist their own residents to apply; developing the process to allocate resources and document needs; and developing the approach and mechanism for post–hurricane advocacy, communications, and information flow. The capacity to carry out these activities successfully includes tremendous organizing capacity, with the DJN including dozens of partners collaborating together in a network of mutual aid (see also Peterson, 2020). DJN also provides direct access to diverse expertise (e.g. legal, technical, communications, research) and emerges from long-established relationships based on mutual trust, respect, and reciprocity.

Importantly, the local community organizers have multi-generational, traditional ecological, local, and community knowledge-of-place. These mostly volunteer, predominantly women grassroots activists and resource people are deeply trusted and entrenched in their communities, as the people go to for help and guidance to seek wisdom, resources, or moral support to get through the day. They all have several things in common: courage, ingenuity, and generous hearts, and they are all coping with the impacts of multiple disasters. The institutions – public, private, and non-profit – have, for the most part, overlooked and/or dismissed the communities in which these women live. Yet, they are the core for endurance and support. Even basic funding support can help their work at a very base level, allowing crucial and sometimes lifesaving interventions to take place.

For example, one of this article's authors, Cindy Robertson, lives and works in an area of Sulphur, Louisiana that has many families that are under-housed, houseless, living rough, and have severe health issues in many forms. She has created an oasis for help and resources while encouraging, empowering, and lifting up those who lost their voice from years of various types of oppression. The community has also borne the brunt of multiple storms with little support from the formal and non-profit sectors. Cindy empowers the local women to take on water sampling (unsafe water - think Flint, Michigan) and air monitoring, which included support from the Environmental Working Group, attend council meetings, and be proactive with food gardens, tool-lending libraries, and more. She runs a community exchange for multiple types of resources, which enables the women to build their agency and lessen their personal and community vulnerabilities. Elder Chief Shirell Parfait-Dardar (Grand Caillou-Dulac Biloxi-Chitimacha-Choctaw-Tribe), as a mother and leader for her Tribe, facilitated navigating options for families who were displaced and whose homes were destroyed, as well as their lifeways (fishing fleet), acting as a voice to outsiders, non-profits, and reporters to help interpret the region's needs, issues, and priorities, and doing all of this while experiencing loss of shelter and displacement due to Hurricane Ida.

As DJN continues to grow and learn, several challenging but necessary ingredients and crucial components have emerged, including, for example:

1. Growing the connections, facilitating opportunities to engage together and learn about what people are doing for opportunities to collaborate and connect outside of their current networks;

2. Growing the bandwidth/capacity, including the need for administrative support and support to help with external communications and facilitating more resource support, assessment of partners' capacities and commitment-level and assessing who is missing from the table and expertise gaps to fill, with the balancing act to grow a group and stay focused;

3. Advocacy efforts: power mapping to know where change can actually be effected and skills sharing around organizing and affecting such change;

4. Clear action strategies by soliciting feedback about what local community members need and want to create action plans and implement accordingly, to create positive progress moving forward and keeping each other accountable;

5. Creative communications, such as integrating art in information output, for increased access;

6. Document resources and processes to be able to mobilize quickly after a disaster, and having resources to share with communities and those affected so they can revise it for their own;

7. Continuity: Clear articulation of goals, values, and who we are serving, who the audience is, and then moving accordingly; develop metrics for knowing when we have met those goals;

8. Prepositioning for next Hurricane season to have available resources (material, people), policy, advocacy, and coordination;

9. Ensuring access to fiscal sponsorship; and

10. Celebrate and build off successes: focus on the joy that comes from making this work sustainable into the future.

For those considering adopting similar processes or activities, some key aspects must be generated, such as sustained capacity and resource support for organizing, communications, social media, and website updates. This directly speaks to how to disseminate knowledge, such as about resilient construction and rebuilding, as effectively as possible, considering the speed of communication, the breadth of the communication, and the target audience for who will do the construction/repairs and make the decisions to do so.

Most significantly, there is no one-size-fits-all model and this is not to paint a utopic picture of such collaborations. Challenges abound – sustainability of reliance on volunteered efforts, continuity amongst increasing demands on time and accumulating disasters, and working across cultures and worldviews, to name a few. A key navigation strategy in such a collaborative journey is capacity sharing, along with compassion, care, and providing space for people to weave in and out as life circumstances change and allow.

We shared here a snippet of what we've learned on this journey over the past few years, building from prior years of work and engagement that was not earlier organized as a “network.” Each disaster, place, and community is context and culture-specific. Even within one place and disaster, the needs, issues, challenges, and opportunities are evolving. The key is recognizing and being nimble and flexible to evolve and partner to adapt responses to meet the current moment.

As we enter the 2025 Atlantic Hurricane season, there are still many community members displaced and living in substandard housing due to Hurricanes Laura (2020)and Ida (2021). Recent Hurricane experiences have continued the long-time trend of abandonment of historied Indigenous, racial minority, and poverty-plagued communities and neighborhoods by government actors at all levels. Specifically, the underfunded federal response system wreaks havoc without proper funding and support mechanisms. Frontline activists, many of whom are women leading organizations and tribal governments, are forced to fill in the gaps to minimize loss of life, property, family, and community integrity. Prepositioning resources, creating systems for documenting needs and allocating resources, creating language and mechanisms for post-event advocacy, and training local leaders to access government resources that are supposed to be awarded by need but fail to be shared with those most in need are all urgently necessary at this time. Now, nearly four years after Hurricane Ida and five-years after Hurricane Laura made landfall, the level of recovery should be more advanced, but the process has been stifled. Given the multitude of increasingly extreme weather and climate impacts, aging and collapsing infrastructure, social inequalities, and limited access to resources, we are, society-wide, not adequately equipped or prepared to address compound, multiple disasters.

The urgent responses through DJN's network-of-mutual-aid approach included initiatives through the mutual aid groups and on-the-ground organizers to raise awareness around immediate and long-term needs of Hurricane Laura and Ida evacuees, as well as exposing the devastation, racism, violence, and erasure of historied and communities of color occurring through the immediate inadequate official response and recovery process. This initiative brought further to the public light the unjust, inequitable, and harmful official recovery responses and what is urgently needed to support evacuees and survivors, many of whom are women, single mothers, and people of color, moving towards a more just recovery process for the coming future storms and disasters. By understanding the historical context and complexities of co-occurring disasters and violence across space and time, and what is required to forcefully and permanently mitigate the effect of these primarily human-caused violations of humanity, we can begin to address the root causes of harm to more just ends.

Local voices continue to rise. DJN has served as a support system for the organic responses and organizing to emerge from the local level, and we are now witnessing that emergence. Through mutual dedication, imagination, and hard work, may we find new ways forward for a healthy, resiliency-building just recovery. We are committed to a justice-focused recovery process as a passionately committed network (DJN, 2024a).

The authors express their deepest, heartfelt gratitude to all the fearless volunteers who have gifted so much of their time, wisdom, expertise and sweat-equity through this work. To call DJN a labor-of-love is an understatement. We commend the work of this next generation of leaders and are deeply grateful for giving of their time to this effort. We would also like to thank The Lowlander Center for serving as DJN's fiscal sponsor; the Natural Hazards Center Quick Response Research Award Program (National Science Foundation), Urgent Action Fund, the University of California-Santa Barbara, and the Center for Disaster Philanthropy for funding on-the-ground work and materials, Caylah Cruickshank, Evan Chadlney and Alexandria Brahler for the SCIPP/DJN webinar support, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Climate Program Office for funding part of Dr Domingue's time and the Climate Assessment for the Southwest to support Hannah Friedrich's research activities.