The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) has approved a disaster declaration for the Native Village of Kipnuk to fund repairs to infrastructure damaged by the remnants of Typhoon Halong.
The tribe originally applied for the declaration in January, several months after the October 2025 storm destroyed an estimated 90% of homes and led to the mass evacuation of nearly all of the community’s roughly 1,000 residents.
Through the new declaration, Kipnuk’s tribe is eligible for public assistance covering permanent work on water systems, public utilities, and boardwalks.
Tribal administrator Rayna Paul said that it’s too early to say what the ultimate extent of the damage is and whether public assistance will be sought through the tribal declaration as opposed to the state declaration. The lengthy process of assessing eligible damage has only begun.
"I think the next step for us is to meet and navigate through this and piece out all the pros and cons," Paul said.
The May 29 tribal declaration comes as the public assistance needs of the community are still being assessed under a separate federal disaster declaration for the State of Alaska approved in the days after the storm.
Most of the federal assistance approved for Kipnuk under the state’s declaration has gone to families in the form of individual assistance. In an email, FEMA said that it has dispersed roughly $12.6 million in individual and household assistance to the Native Village of Kipnuk.
Under the new tribal declaration, the tribe would be on the hook for a share of the costs for any assistance it receives directly from FEMA. The agency automatically recommends a 98% federal cost share in cases where non-administrative public assistance for tribes reach a threshold of $200,000 – far below the likely total costs of repairing the community.
The FEMA declaration is the second for the Native Village of Kipnuk. In January 2025, the tribe was among the first-ever in Alaska to receive a federal disaster declaration. It came in response to flooding in August 2024 that inundated homes and washed away boardwalks in the community.
The Native Village of Kwigillingok also received a federal disaster declaration for damage caused by the 2024 flooding. But following severe damage from Typhoon Halong and the mass evacuation of the community, the tribe said that it decided not to directly apply to FEMA as Kipnuk has done.
Both Kipnuk and Kwigillingok have voted to relocate to higher ground. It’s something lawmakers at the state and national levels have advocated greater support for, but there’s no clear mechanism for achieving the major moves through FEMA as the Trump Administration considers sweeping changes to the agency.
