New Flood Insurance Maps

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New Flood Insurance Maps

USFederal Emergency Management Agency's new flood insurance rate maps are scheduled to go into effect later in 2015

Changes and significant rate increases are in store for people who live in floodplain areas as the Federal Emergency Management Agency's new flood insurance rate maps are scheduled to go into effect later this year, said Brent Gotsch, Watershed Educator at the Ashokan Watershed Stream Management Program.

The stream management program is a partnership between the Cornell Cooperative Extension of Ulster County, the New York City Department of Environmental Protection and the Ulster County Soil and Water Conservation District.

Gotsch, who works for the Cornell Cooperative Extension of Ulster County, said the maps are done with much more sophisticated technology than the older maps, which date to the 1980s.

The map teams' tools range from traditional surveying equipment set up along stream beds, to a system where airplanes map topographic features by projecting lasers down to the ground, he said.

This data is sent back to office employees who analyze data and create new digital maps for use by folks ranging from planning boards to residents and businesses, he said.

This is combined with extensive stream gauge data to estimate how high waters will rise and what areas will inundate during a 100-year flood, he said.

Properties have both been added to and removed from the area of the maps where people with mortgages on their property are required to buy flood insurance, he said.

He clicked on an overlay of the new and old flood maps on Ulster County's Parcel viewer website and they showed areas of Phoenicia, and especially West Shokan that have been removed from the floodplain.

"A lot of people think FEMA just adds new properties to the maps just to add more properties to the flood insurance program," he said.

DECODING THE MAPS

Standing over a new flood insurance rate - or FIRM - map on a large table in the programs office on State Route 28, he said the 100 year flood plain is represented on the new maps by a blue shaded area. The blue area with white cross hatching was what he called the floodway.

"This is the area that has the deepest swiftest moving water," he said. "This is the most dangerous part of the floodplain, there's a lot of restrictions associated with developing there."

"We generally encourage people to stay away from it," he said.

Farther out in the blue area is the "flood fringe" where there is less danger and less restrictions on building.

But he said there is still a real flood hazard and buildings should be elevated if they are a home or flood proofed if they are a business.

And he sought to clear up misconceptions about the meaning of 100 year and 500 year floodplains.

He said a common misconception that 100-year floodplain means that it will only flood once every 100 years, he said, noting it actually means there is one percent chance of a flood that would inundate the shaded areas on the map each year.

A 500-year flood plain, represented by a black polka dot area on the map, equals a .2 percent annual chance of a flood, he said, adding that flood insurance is optional and rates are lower for residents and businesses in those areas.

Work on these new maps started in late 2012 after large areas of the Watershed were devastated by flooding related to Hurricane Irene, he said. The maps are just getting ready to become legally binding after the end of extensive public comment periods and opportunities for property owners to challenge decisions made on the maps.

COUNTING THE COSTS

None of this is cheap. Gotsch estimated that creating the new maps costs approximately $13,000 to $14,000 per stream mile.

By time remapping is done nationwide, he estimates that it will have cost billions of dollars

FEMA officials declined to comment for this article, referring all requests for information to the agency's website.

Gotsch said there will be significant rate increases in the coming years for residents in the 100-year-flood plain as FEMA grapples with making the program solvent in light of disasters like Hurricane's Katrina, Irene, Lee and Sandy.

He said the last piece of legislation effecting flood insurance rates was the Flood Insurance Affordability Act of 2014 which didn't have rate increases, but instead capped increases for homeowners to anywhere between five to 18 percent annually until the risk rate is reached.

These increases represent a phasing out of subsidized rates for structures that were built on the 100-year flood plain before the FIRM maps went into effect, Gotsch said, adding that property owners are not charged the full risk rate a private insurer would charge in a riskier area, he said.

This latest reform replaces the Biggert-Waters Flood Insurance Reform Act of 2012 that permitted far faster rate increases, he said.

As for the why flood insurance has been handled by the government since it's creation in 1968, and not private firms like other kinds of insurance, he said the risk of a flood causing damage to a property in flood plains is greater than other disasters, like fires, making it unprofitable.

He said the rate increases, which vary from building to building, allow the program to become more resilient to future disasters.

Second homeowners and businesses are also being hit with a $250 surcharge, he said.

But even with the percent increase cap, some Ulster County businesses and homeowners have still seen their flood insurance rates soar, said Jeanne Beck, operations manager at Ryan and Ryan Insurance in Kingston, which serves as broker for the flood insurance program.

She said remapping placed parts of Kingston - including Kingston Plaza and the Dutch Village Apartments complex - into the flood plain in 2008 after a levy built in 1978 protecting them was deemed inadequate by FEMA.

She offered a few examples of just how much rates have gone up for some property owners like a person in the 100-year area that now pays $1858 a year for flood insurance on a $250,000 house with a $5,000 deductible.

In contrast, she said the same homeowner pays just $980 for regular homeowners insurance.

"With this client, the rates are not done going up," she said.

She said businesses that were not in the floodplain on previous flood maps, but now are in the floodplain, are also being hit hard, adding that one commercial client who formerly had a grandfathered flood insurance rate of $646 now pays $3952 with a $5,000 deductible, and they have no coverage for the contents inside their business.

People who rent in flood plains can buy optional contents coverage for their apartment, but she said those are few and far between.

Even higher rate increases under the previous 2012 Biggert-Waters Act legislation got the attention of elected officials like U.S. Rep Chris Gibson who said he's worked on trying to keep flood insurance rates as low as possible

He said the rate increases FEMA was pushing under Biggert-Waters were outrageous and he's worked with constituents in their dealings with the agency.

"There was one case rate of $500 a year going to $5,000," he said. "We got involved stopped FEMA from doing that." Instead, he said, Congress ordered FEMA to do studies on finding a viable way to ensure the viability of the flood insurance program.

Source: Daily Freeman

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