Bob Freitag - Floodplain Management: A New Approach for a New Era
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- Book:Floodplain Management: A New Approach for a New Era
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A flooding river is very hard to stop. Many residents of the United States have discovered this the hard way. Right now, over five million Americans hold flood insurance policies from the National Flood Insurance Program, which estimates that flooding causes at least six billion dollars in damages every year. Like rivers after a rainstorm, the financial costs are rising along with the toll on residents. And the worst is probably yet to come. Most scientists believe that global climate change will result in increases in flooding.
The authors of this book present a straightforward argument: the time to stop a flooding rivers is before is before it floods. Floodplain Management outlines a new paradigm for flood management, one that emphasizes cost-effective, long-term success by integrating physical, chemical, and biological systems with our societal capabilities. It describes our present flood management practices, which are often based on dam or levee projects that do not incorporate the latest understandings about river processes. And it suggests that a better solution is to work with the natural tendencies of the river: retreat from the floodplain by preventing future development (and sometimes even removing existing structures); accommodate the effects of floodwaters with building practices; and protect assets with nonstructural measures if possible, and with large structural projects only if absolutely necessary.
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The National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) makes no attempt to control the river, but instead focuses on reducing the adverse impacts of water on the floodplain. Although it is a federal program, it is enforced through lending institutions and local governments. Some critics feel that NFIP encourages building in floodplains because it insures against flood losses. Suggestions for improvements to the program are given.
The significance and the breadth of participation in the National Flood Insurance Program are enormous.
Insurance
- Average annual flood losses in the United States are currently estimated at $6 billion.
- Between 1978 and September 31, 2007, the NFIP paid $33.2 billion for flood insurance claims and related costs.
- The average claim paid for the years 1997 through 2006 was $46,168.
- Homeowners insurance seldom covers flood damage.
- More than 5.5 million people currently hold flood insurance policies, in more than 20,300 communities across the United States.
- A $100,000 flood insurance premium on a house would be only about $33 a month.
- If you live in a FEMA-designated Special Flood Hazard Area (SFHA) or high-risk area and have a federally backed mortgage, your mortgage lender requires you to have flood insurance.
Mapping
- FEMA flood maps exist for more than 19,000 communities across the United States and its territories.
- These maps were the result of the Flood Disaster Protection Act of 1973 and many are more than thirty years old. The state of the flood maps is inadequate. FEMA is in the midst of map modernization, but in many places these maps do not fully reflect the true risk to life and property.
Regulations
- NFIP communities have adopted, and are enforcing, floodplain management ordinances to reduce future flood damage.
- Over one thousand communities participate in the Community Rating System (CRS), with two communities as of this writing qualified for insurance premium discounts of up to 40 percent.
Toward the end of the 1920s, the emphasis turned to construction of large structural solutions to address flood problems. Good flatland was increasingly hard to find and communities were moving into flood-prone areas. Our technological knowledge was increasing and giving us the confidence (often arrogance) to embark on very large public works projects.
By the 1960s, we began to realize that these big public works projects were very expensive to maintain and didnt work all that well in dynamic environments such as rivers and floodplains. Our flood-related damages were not decreasing. A new approach was needed. Gilbert White, sometimes called the father of floodplain management, developed one. He argued for focusing on reducing the effects of flooding.
When it was created in the late 1960s, the National Flood Insurance Program represented a major shift in policy, based largely on Whites ideas. It moved away from the policy of trying to fix the river with large structural projects to one focusing on nonstructural solutions and providing incentives to reduce the effects of flooding.
The NFIP has three major components.
- Insurance : Flood insurance is available in participating communities that require new and substantially damaged buildings to comply with a set of flood riskreduction measures. Purchasing insurance is required if the federal government was involved in the construction or financing.
- Regulation : Risk-reduction regulations are required for new and substantially improved structures.
- Mapping : FEMA prepares floodplain maps that reflect existing conditions and regulates new and substantially improved structures located within this mapped area.
Before the NFIP, the private insurance industry could not sell affordable flood insurance policies because only those at high risk would buy them.
In 1965, as a result of the devastating effects of Hurricane Betsy on the Gulf Coast, Congress passed the Southeast Hurricane Disaster Relief Act. The 1965 act was designed to provide financial relief to flood victims. It also authorized an insurance feasibility study entitled Insurance and Other Programs for Financial Assistance to Flood Victims . The study would help pave the way for the development of the NFIP.
Prior to 1968, the federal government attempted to control coastal and riverine flooding on a national scale through rechanneling, using dams and levees to restrict the flow of waters, and developing hydroelectric power and irrigation projects that had flood-control benefits. However, the increasing costs of these projects and high annual totals of flood-related damage influenced the government to explore the possibility of decreasing disaster relief payments through flood insurance.
The National Flood Insurance Act made federally subsidized flood insurance available to owners of improved real estate or mobile homes located in a floodplain if their community participated in the NFIP. Modeled loosely after homeowners fire insurance, the NFIP was a voluntary program from 1968 until the adoption of the Flood Disaster Protection Act of 1973. But, as floods occurred, it became obvious that few were buying insuranceso it became mandatory.
As long as a community participates in the NFIP, flood insurance is available both within and outside of floodplains. Flood insurance is required if the federal government is involved in improved real estate (insuring loans through regulated lenders) and the land is located within a SFHA.
Insurance premiums differ for new and old construction. For the purposes of the NFIP, new refers to structures built after the Flood Insurance Rate Map (FIRM) went into effect and are referred to as post-FIRM construction. Post-FIRM structures pay rates based on real risk and these actuarially based rates can be very high. Rates for insurance on such structures can reach 25 percent of the value per year if built in violation of community NFIP regulations. Structures built before the FIRM became effective are called pre-FIRM and pay subsidized rates set by Congress that are not based on risk.
Insurers purchase contents and structural coverage from private property and casualty insurance companies. The federal government underwrites the risk. Policy premiums support the administration of the program.
The NFIP also offers insurance to cover the costs of meeting the building codes they require. This insurance is Increased Cost of Compliance (ICC) coverage. Currently ICC is limited to $30,000 and is restricted to four situations.
- Elevation Raising a home or business to, or above, the flood elevation level adopted by the community.
- Relocation Moving a home or business out of harms way.
- Demolition Tearing down and removing a flood-damaged building.
- Flood-proofing Waterproofing, through a combination of adjustments or additions of features to the building, which reduces the potential for flood damage.
For insurance to be available, communities must adopt and enforce floodplain management measures to regulate new construction. They must also ensure that substantial improvements to existing buildings within SFHAs are designed to eliminate or minimize future flood damage. The communitys floodplain management ordinances must require:
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