Carla Richard
Assistant Deputy Director
Carla Richard serves as the Assistant Deputy Director of the Governor’s Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness (GOHSEP). Carla has been with GOHSEP for over 18 years, where she worked in the Public Assistance, Legal and Executive divisions.
In her current role as Assistant Deputy Director, Carla supports the Director and Deputy Director in the development and implementation of the agency’s vision, mission and goals. She works to ensure that the agency’s day-to-day operations run efficiently and effectively.
Carla currently manages teams across various functions, including Human Resources, Legal, Individual Assistance, External Affairs, Strategic Engagement and Visualization Services.
Carla is also GOHSEP’s Congressional and Legislative Affairs Liaison providing leadership, message coordination, communication, analysis, relationship-building and decision making support on agency policies, plans, programs, key initiatives and actions that affect internal and external stakeholders.
Carla started her career in emergency management with GOHSEP in 2006, and has held numerous positions in the Public Assistance division to include Appeals Specialist, Appeals and Arbitration Manager and as an Executive Officer in the agency’s Legal and Executive divisions.
During her 11 years in the Public Assistance division, Carla oversaw the State’s technical support, submission and approval of hundreds of written and oral appeals of FEMA administrative decisions across multiple disasters.
She was also a part of the team that successfully arbitrated the very first arbitration case before the Civilian Board of Contract Appeals (CBCA) in Washington, DC in 2010, Facility Planning and Control, State of Louisiana Repair/Replacement of Charity Hospital. Given the success of the first arbitration case, many Louisiana Public Assistance applicants that met the threshold requirements chose to arbitrate. Between 2010 and 2017, Carla and her team represented the State in over 30 administrative hearings before the CBCA and successfully recovered over 1.2 billion dollars in PA funding for Louisiana applicants.
Carla has served as the Louisiana State Coordinating Officer for Hurricanes Zeta (2020) and Ida (2021), Severe Winter Storms (2021), Louisiana Severe Storms, Tornadoes and Flooding (2021), and Louisiana Saltwater Intrusion (2023). Since September 2021, Carla has served as the GOHSEP Project Manager for Louisiana’s Non-Congregate Sheltering Program/Ida Sheltering Program. A first of its kind state operated, federally supported program that has provided 5,300 travel trailers to shelter over 15,000 families impacted by Hurricane Ida.
A native of Louisiana, Carla holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science from Louisiana State University and a Juris Doctor from Southern University Law Center. Prior to joining GOHSEP, Carla was the Law Clerk to the General Counsel for the Louisiana Department of Revenue where she assisted the legal team with policy research and preparations for litigation, mediation, formal settlement negotiations, participation in administrative hearings, and policy planning and advisement.
