The Blueprint for Resilient Recovery, a Wrap-Up Report

Executive Summary

On April 26, 2024, several EF4 Tornados created large-scale destruction that traveled 32.5 miles across Blair, Bennington, Elkhorn, Kennard, and Waterloo. Nearly 1000 homes were partially damaged or demolished, impacting a majority of vulnerable, elderly, and rural neighbors.

The Omaha Community Foundation was called into action following the tornado by its donors to support a meaningful response, setting up to receive donations on their website within hours. After raising $1.3 million for the Arbor Day Tornado survivor recovery, OCF launched a coordinated recovery effort that was based on the unique assets of each community. Its long-term stewardship of the funds has ensured that even 18 months after the tornadoes, survivors continue to receive case management and can apply for unmet needs support.

Traditional disaster recovery models struggle with significant delays, fragmented services, and funding bottlenecks. This white paper outlines a blueprint for recovery with three pillars:

• Coalition Building
• Specialized Case Management
• Innovative Funding Orchestration

By integrating community assets with expert navigation and a centralized “community bank” funding model, the gap between immediate disaster relief and long-term stability has been bridged for more than 254 closed cases and 54 current active cases. This effort will wrap-up on May 3, 2026 after more than two years of recovery support.

Pillar 1: Building a Coalition of Community-Based Assets

Effective recovery is not the work of a single agency but the synchronized effort of a multi-disciplinary coalition. When the 2024 Arbor Day Tornado struck, there was little infrastructure to support a coordinated response and no resources to drive long-term recovery. For a typical event like an EF4 tornado, recovery can take up to two years after the event.

Following national best practices through United Methodist Committee on Relief (UMCOR) case management and the National Voluntary Organizations Active in Disaster‘s (VOAD) community asset model, Omaha Community Foundation formed the Tri-County Long Term Recovery Coalition to bring agency experts, neighborhood leaders, elected officials, and donations resources together to coordinate a multi-county response.

The work of the Tri-County Long Term Recovery Coalition focused on integrating six core service areas into a unified response structure:

• Community Assessment: Canvass and connect early responder data to obtain community-wide assessment of needs and connect survivors to long term recovery.
• Construction Management: Coordinating owners’ representation support services, connection to contractors and skilled labor to prioritize structural integrity and code compliance.
• Counseling & Mental Health: Addressing the trauma of post-event experiences with survivors. Tornado survivors were connected to a series of free mental health counseling and partnered with Nebraska Strong via Region 6.
• Volunteer Coordination: Partnering with the Nebraska Emergency Management Agency and local Douglas and Washington counties to train on the importance of tracking volunteer time. Various events were curated by the Tri-County Coalition, and more than 150 long-term volunteers engaged in community clean-up days, tree distribution days, and supporting local move-ins back into permanent housing.
• Resource Coordination: Physical donations management was coordinated through partners like Heartland Hope Mission and Salvation Army. Development of physical donations management is still needed. Where the Tri-County coalition thrived was by streamlining the intake and distribution of financial donations to maximize impact through the unmet needs committee – Neighbor Recovery Fund.
• Integrated Case Management: Serving as the connective tissue between all other assets to ensure no survivor falls through the cracks, the Tri-County Coalition partnered with UMCOR to train 12 specialized case managers to lead the survivor recovery outreach. This highly successful team has positively impacted more than 292 cases.

Pillar 2: The Specialized Disaster Case Management (DCM) Workforce

The heartbeat of this work is a specialized DCM workforce. They are the key ingredient to the survivor recovery journey success.  Unlike general social work, disaster-specific case management requires high-level technical expertise about property damage assessment, insurance coverage and claims processes, FEMA process, and the ability to co-currently serve the survivor and hold them accountable to complete their self-driven recovery journey. This complex relationship places the survivor and the DCM as partners in the process.

Due to the Arbor Day Tornado’s national disaster declaration for individual assistance, the Omaha Community Foundation was awarded a $1M FEMA grant that provided paid Disaster Case Management time for the workforce to canvass, advocate, and serve the survivors as they work to reach a new normal.

Expert Navigation and Insurance Advocacy

Our DCMs were trained as subject matter experts in:

1. Insurance Literacy: Navigating complex policy language, understanding “Actual Cash Value” (ACV) vs. “Replacement Cost Value” (RCV), and identifying “underinsured” gaps and when to make an appeal to the insurance company or FEMA.
2. Claims Processing: Assisting survivors in documenting losses and appealing denied claims to maximize private recovery funds before tapping into public or philanthropic resources.
3. The Recovery Roadmap: Moving survivors through a phased approach—from stabilization to rebuild—ensuring that every family has a tailored, achievable path home.

Pillar 3: The Neighbor Recovery Fund (NRF)

To ensure that Arbor Day Tornado funding was aligned for maximum impact, eight major funding organizations engaged into a Community Bank Model, called the Neighbor Recovery Fund. This centralized fund, totaling $1.6 million, revolutionized how investments were made among more than 46+ households and 102 unmet needs across Douglas and Washington Counties.

The Neighbor Recovery Fund “Community Bank Model” was made possible by the following funding partner agencies:

• The Salvation Army
• Omaha Community Foundation
• Saint Patrick’s Catholic Church
• Washington County Long Term Recovery Group
• First Lutheran Church of Blair
• Heartland Hope Mission
• COPE Elkhorn
• The Society of Saint Vincent dePaul

Each of these organizations is a member of the Tri-County Long Term Recovery Coalition and thus were aligned and ready to join the Neighbor Recovery Fund as a united collaboration on behalf of tornado survivors.

The “Community Bank” Mechanics

Instead of families applying to six different grants, they call 211 or they work directly with their own Disaster Case Manager to apply. The NRF operates on a collective impact principle:

• Unified Deployment: Decisions are made by a Rapid Review Panel of agencies, thereby ensuring equitable distribution and a focus on the donor intention for the funds.
• Efficiency: Reduced administrative overhead by centralizing the vetting process through the DCM workforce. Using one system and one, neutral facilitator, the Community Bank partners can commit to the county or specific need that aligns with their criteria.
• Impact Metrics: To date, the NRF has served 46+ families and distributed $864,037 across Arbor Day Tornado-impacted survivors.

Conclusion: A Scalable Blueprint

The success of the Arbor Day Tornado recovery demonstrates that when community assets are organized, case managers are specialized, and funding is centralized, the timeline for recovery is drastically shortened. This blueprint serves as a scalable model for any municipality facing the aftermath of a natural disaster.

Work continues to capture this established infrastructure in a shared coalition manual for replication in future large-scale disasters. Douglas County Emergency Management Agency has committed to convene the first long-term recovery coalition in the event of a future disaster, using the current protocol. The Red Cross and Salvation Army have stepped in as anchor institutions to lead the future volunteer and physical donations processes. Finally, the coalition facilitated local planning sessions to help curate key resources across Douglas County to utilize in the event of the next disaster. These maps continue to grow resources and remain a critical resource for emergency response.