But new reporting shows that FEMA didn’t take basic steps to ensure that happened: When the agency inked contracts with private companies to identify homes they could rent for survivors, it didn’t prohibit them from signing up properties that had been occupied by long-term residents.

FEMA officials said they didn’t want their housing program for survivors of Maui’s 2023 wildfires to displace any residents. But they didn’t bar the agency’s contractors from leasing properties previously occupied by long-term tenants.

An initial increment of new rent-free temporary homes developed in Lahaina by the Federal Emergency Management Agency for survivors of the 2023 Maui wildfires has opened for use.