Imagine your home, car and personal belongings have been decimated by a Michigan tornado, ice storm or flood -- and your storm-related problems persist weeks later. Where can you turn for help?
Enter After the Storm, a relatively new Michigan nonprofit that has no headquarters but works from temporary offices wherever storms take place. Since its founding in 2022 as a division of the Michigan Conference of the United Methodist Church, it’s helped thousands of families cope financially, logistically and emotionally from the aftermath of brutal weather events in regions including Gaylord, Kalamazoo, Detroit, Grand Rapids, and Lansing. Next up, the organization may help Northern Michigan residents with recovery from an historic ice storm that occurred in late March.
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After the Storm Nancy MoneyExecutive Director Nancy Money explains that After the Storm fills an important niche by connecting families with key resources once other emergency services have addressed their immediate needs. Continually working with a fluctuating budget based on corporate, community and private donations and government aid, the organization can usually step in to start long-term recovery within a month of a given disaster.
“I absolutely love my job,” notes Money, the organization’s only permanent employee and the lynchpin for the entire program. “I consider it a ministry and a blessing. My staff is amazing in how they build all these relationships and find opportunities for people. After the lights and sirens are gone and the survivors ask, ‘Now what do I do?’ they walk alongside them and help them navigate."
Solving aftereffects one family at a time
How does After the Storm function?
Everything starts with Money, who maintains a long list of people, organizations and temporary staffers she can call upon for help. Once a storm hits, she contacts emergency organizations like the Michigan Emergency Management & Homeland Security and Voluntary Organizations Active in Disaster (VOAD) to assess the need and governmental funding for regional long-term assistance, and to apply as a service provider.
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She assembles a working budget after contacting community organizations that often provide additional money that can be spent on a wider list of needs. Following the 2022 Gaylord tornado, for example, the nonprofit was gifted $600,000 by partners, including the Otsego Community Foundation, Otsego County United Way, E-Free Church, Gaylord Methodist Church and St. Vincent De Paul.
Most of the governmental funding pays for the hiring of professional case managers who typically work for two to four years; Money ensures they’re based in affected areas so they’re familiar with local resources. The series of severe storms in the summer of 2023 -- covering nine Michigan counties -- called for the hiring of 70 After the Storm staffers.
The case managers then work individually with families to identify their financial, logistical, medical and sometimes psychological needs and connect them with organizations that can help.
As Otsego Community Foundation Executive Director Dana Bensinger puts it, they “walk alongside survivors and connect them with resources to help make them whole again.”
After the Storm also pays for resource coordinators who work to establish and maintain relationships with public and private organizations and keep databases current.
“The survivors lead us, and we build recovery plans together then support them through that process,” Money emphasizes. “We’re very careful not to instill our own values of what recovery looks like, because it’s different for everybody. We prioritize (assistance) based on a matrix of risk factors, knowing that the most vulnerable have the least opportunity to recover by themselves. They could be a senior living alone, a single mom with kids, or someone with a disability.”
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After the Storm After the Storm volunteers help clean up a home after severe storms.Common needs include home repair, replacement of home furnishings and mold remediation; often, the nonprofit can access building contractors that offer under-market pricing. After the Storm can also direct people to “intangible things like spiritual or emotional help,” Money says.
Any unrestricted funds donated to After the Storm can be spent on discretionary necessities like roofs or HVAC systems, with priorities evaluated by the nonprofit’s board of directors. Recently, the group purchased a car for a Kalamazoo client who lost theirs in the 2024 tornado.
“One really cool thing is that we finished some work at Christmastime for a young mom and child who had lost everything to the Detroit floods,” she remembers. “We connected them to an organization that did not just Christmas gifts for the child, but a whole Christmas tree to make their house a home."
On the job: Work can be a deluge
Money reports that case managers’ work can become challenging when clients have overblown expectations as to available funding.
“Our staff does an amazing job explaining everything from the beginning, but there are always misconceptions. We’re trying to help people live safely in their homes, but we can never put somebody’s house back to exactly how it looked pre-disaster."
To deal with on-the-job stress, After the Storm also provides staff training in self-care and how to set boundaries, notes Money.
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After the Storm A volunteer removes trash from a Detroit house following a severe flood. “It can be very hard, especially when staff are first starting out and they really understand how folks are living. They can experience secondary trauma from hearing a lot of heavy stuff day in and day out," she says. "But for me, it’s a good stress because I know what I’m doing is valuable and meaningful and impactful. Even when I’m awake mulling things over in my head, I’m still very thankful for the opportunity to serve.
“For me, the most challenging part is making sure people understand its importance and value before they need us," she adds. "A lot of what we experience in Michigan is flooding that doesn’t wipe out whole homes, so two weeks after it’s over people assume everything’s fine because the damage isn’t visual any longer. But there is still great need in our state, long after the debris is removed from the curb."
Looking ahead: Need and opportunity, but uncertain funding
What’s in the five-year plan? Next, After the Storm may be helping families recover following
March’s Northern Michigan ice storms, depending on whether long-term case management becomes a designated need.
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File photoAfter the Storm may step into help residents who sustained extensive damage during the late March ice storm.“We’re definitely here to support if needed, following their damage assessment,” Money notes.
In the meantime, she’s
pleased to be able to offer valuable career experience to interns and other young professionals, and she’d like the group’s intern training program to grow even stronger.
“Typically, they’re social work students looking for field experience and want to go into disaster work,” she notes. “The reward is twofold: I get to see survivors’ lives transformed, but I see the folks I hire grow their skill sets and tools so when their stints end, they’ll make their next set-up better."
Also on her wish list: Established groups of After the Storm volunteers in Michigan communities that can spring into action immediately following storm damage.
“We won’t have to find funding but will have trained volunteers working while we’re trying to raise funds so there’s even less gap time."
Looking forward, funding models for organizations like After the Storm may change significantly. In May, for example, the Trump administration
canceled hundreds of FEMA grants slated to fix disaster-related infrastructure problems in rural communities.
“I believe our work and the way it’s funded could look very different in the future,” Money comments. “At the end of the day, I just pray we can do support recovery in the best way possible."
Originally from Kalamazoo, freelance writer Michelle Miron now lives in the frozen tundra of Minnesota, where her side hustle is selling vintage clothing.