It ain’t easy being FEMA. The Federal Emergency Management Agency has had more than its share of the limelight lately, thanks to a rash of federally declared disasters converging with political posturing over budget cuts. Much less attention has been paid to the agency's recent headway in building a more disaster resilient nation.

Last month, FEMA announced two major accomplishments: the release of the first edition of the National Preparedness Goal and of the final National Disaster Recovery Framework. The two documents are first steps in fulfilling this March's Presidential Policy Directive 8, which is meant to identify a system that will strengthen national preparedness overall.

While the preparedness goal outlines “core capabilities” needed to prevent, respond to, and recover from disaster, the recovery framework defines processes by which federal actors and local governments and organizations can work together to rebuild communities after disaster strikes.

The long-awaited recovery framework addresses longstanding complaints that FEMA assistance doesn’t consider local needs, doling out aid with a clumsy bureaucratic hand wrapped in red tape.

“If I add up all the phone calls and all the work I've had to do with all the agencies of government, FEMA has caused more problems than all the rest put together,” said outspoken FEMA critic Rep. Ron Paul (R-Tx.) recently on NPR. “And most of the time it's the fact that when FEMA comes in and there's a disaster they interfere with the local people. The local people, the landowners can't do what they want.”

The recovery framework will hopefully counter that perception by laying the groundwork for more collaboration. It’s designed to unify various groups—from FEMA responders down to neighborhood churches—as they attempt to create jobs, reopen schools, restock businesses, and accomplish the many other tasks of starting over after a disaster.

At the heart of the recovery framework, which syncs with the National Response Framework, are nine core recovery principles: individual and family empowerment, local primacy, pre-disaster recovery planning, partnerships and inclusiveness, public information, unified efforts, timeliness and flexibility, resilience, and emotional and psychological recovery.

“The National Disaster Recovery Framework recognizes that local, state, tribal and territorial governments have primary responsibility for the recovery of their communities,” writes Elizabeth Zimmerman, FEMA deputy associate administrator for response and recovery, on the White House Blog. “It identifies core principles to ensure all community members have equal opportunities to participate in recovery efforts in a meaningful way.”

But for those still dissatisfied with the rate of progress—and presidential commitments —there's always Stafford Act reform.

Reform legislation was introduced by Senators Mary Landrieu (D-La.) and Thad Cochran (R-Miss.) on September 23—the same day the National Disaster Recovery Framework was released.

According to a Landrieu press release, the bill creates state and local incentives to adopt and enforce building codes, allows for pre-negotiated response contracts, streamlines regulations to start recovery projects more quickly, addresses children’s disaster needs, encourages the use of local businesses in recovery, and establishes a credentialing requirement for FEMA employees.

“I have witnessed numerous systemic failures, misguided policies and squandered opportunities in the way we go about facilitating community recovery after a disaster," Landrieu stated. "This legislation would ensure the federal government has the right tools in its toolbox to help communities recover from disasters in a smarter and more efficient way.”

Landrieu praised the recovery framework, according to the Times-Picayune, but sees the reform legislation as much further reaching. Some, however, stand by the agency and the president's path to reform. "There needs to be changes in the system," Jack Harrald, former chairman of the National Academies Disasters Roundtable, told the Shreveport Times in reference to the work being done under PPD-8. "Those changes are slowly being made."