When I read this, I remembered that the FEMA administrator at the time of Hurricane Katrina was a political appointee with zero relevant experience, so I went looking to see if Fugate is any different. Boy, is he!
Fugate has spent his entire career in this space, starting as a volunteer firefighter in high school, then working as a paramedic before spending ten years as emergency manager at the county level, then deputy director and director at the state level (in Florida). He turned down the FEMA administrator job in 2005 (when the aforementioned political appointee resigned in the aftermath of Katrina).
His reaction to being nominated by Obama for the role was to tweet "Pigs do fly" - https://twitter.com/disastersrus/status/1279506490
He supports the use of technology, including social media as a communications tool in the aftermath of disasters - http://www.dhs.gov/news/2011/05/04/written-statement-craig-f... - and crowdsourcing of disaster reporting via smartphone apps - http://www.fema.gov/disaster-reporter
He is a licensed ham radio operator and he used to run a website (domain registered in 2000; now inactive) with links, information and advice on how to prepare for disasters - http://www.disastersrus.org/bio.htm
This guy is awesome. If he says it's about numbers, I believe him.