npr:

When the Camp Fire raced into the Northern California town of Paradise on Nov. 8, destroying nearly 19,000 structures and claiming 85 lives, Chris Beaudis narrowly escaped. He drove out of the Sierra foothills in his Ford Bronco with only his pit bull. He lost everything and has no insurance.

“It’s been really stressful at times,” he says. “You think that it’s the end of the world, especially when everything you have is gone.”

All Beaudis has for now is a 300-square-foot FEMA camper trailer. It is wedged into a corner of the fairgrounds in Yuba City, in the valley about 50 miles south of what’s left of Paradise. His is one of about 7,200 Camp Fire survivor households relying on direct federal aid, according to FEMA.

“Thank God that I was finally able to get on the help list and receive help,” Beaudis says. “Since then it’s just been the biggest stress reliever of my life.”

With nowhere else to go, Beaudis is likely to stay in this trailer for another year before he can rebuild.

But that help list that Beaudis was able to get on is emblematic of a bigger problem in the way we respond to natural disasters: Disaster strikes, emergency help is deployed, checks are cut, communities are rebuilt — even in high-risk places. Many say that reactive response has to change.

Rethinking Disaster Recovery After A California Town Is Leveled By Wildfire

Photos: Meredith Rizzo/NPR
Video: Ellie McCutcheon for NPR