RFI…And We Are Off!!
Last week completed the first leg of what I hope will be a journey towards new and improved floodplain management standards for the nation. More than 400 organizations and individuals submitted comments in response to FEMA’s Request for Information (RFI) on minimum land use and development standards within the National Flood Insurance Program (see related article).
FEMA’s leadership deserves to be commended for responding positively to the joint ASFPM and NRDC petition for rulemaking last year by issuing this RFI, which has the potential for leading to real, long-lasting NFIP reform. This much is certain, as flood losses continue to rise, something has to be done.
As most of you recall, the NFIP is a four-legged stool, each leg having the ability to impact and reduce flood damage: floodplain mapping, flood insurance, flood mitigation, and floodplain management standards (regulations). But, I would argue that among the four legs, none has more potential for affecting change than improving the minimum land use and development standards of the NFIP.
Sure, we absolutely need mapping to tell us where the flood risk exists, and the $3.2 to $11.8 billion to get the job done under the requirements of the National Flood Mapping Program is really pretty cheap when compared to the annual damages brought about by flooding. It seems that we could spend an endless amount of money on flood mitigation and it wouldn’t be enough given the amount of buildings and infrastructure at risk from today’s and tomorrow’s flood threats. Nonetheless, investments in flood mitigation are still critically important not only to reduce risk to families and businesses, but to lessen the financial risk to the NFIP by eliminating repetitive loss structures. Let’s hope that the $3.5 billion of FMA funding from the infrastructure bill makes a sizeable dent in those properties. Flood insurance is becoming more actuarially sound as a result of Risk Rating 2.0, which should help better communicate actual flood risk via flood insurance cost. But the one thing that hasn’t been touched in 35 years are the minimum land use and development standards. It’s time for that to change.
There are literally hundreds of recommendations for improving the minimum floodplain management standards of the NFIP. From freeboard to critical facility protection and siting, and from cumulative substantial damage to having no-rise floodways — all are improvements that several states and communities have already taken. We need a sensible and practical approach to addressing and incorporating endangered species concerns, and we need to finally declare that there are some uses that just aren’t compatible with floodprone areas (the NFIP minimum standards have a total of zero use prohibitions). But to me, the area that could lead to the greatest improvement is to have much better standards that apply to subdivisions.
Most new development today happens through the development of land subdivisions, which are typically carried out under state enabling authority. This authority typically gives communities the authority to regulate the layout of the land, roads, and utilities in accordance with local community plans and subject to local approval. Enabling statutes for subdivision control commonly permit or require the planning board to adopt subdivision regulations. These regulations specify the procedure to be followed in submitting plats for review, the information to be shown on preliminary and final drawings, and general standards for subdivision design. These regulations govern the actions of both the planning board and subdivider. The general standards for subdivision design govern anything from layout and locations of lots, to design of stormwater management features, to the design, construction, and maintenance of infrastructure in the subdivision. Subdivision standards address both land use and construction. And this is where there is an opportunity for vastly improving NFIP minimum standards.
About five years ago, in partnership with the American Planning Association, a Planners Advisory Service report on subdivision design in flood hazard areas was developed (PAS 584, found here). It contained more than 60 standards suggested for adoption that could improve overall flood resiliency. Two of them; however, stand out as the most important of the bunch:
1. If the tract being subdivided includes any watercourse that is designated as a USGS blue line stream that isn’t mapped by FEMA, the developer is responsible for mapping it.
2. The entire building envelope — that includes the home/business, accessory structure, and septic/septic field replacement — must be located on natural ground outside of the identified 100-year floodplain (that means no fill).
If the NFIP minimum standards were revised to include just these two standards that would apply to all subdivisions — or, at a minimum, major subdivisions — we would have an entirely new approach to land development and its relationship with flood hazard areas and avoid billions of dollars of future flood losses. And there would be the benefit of generating new flood mapping as development occurs. Of course, there are dozens of other standards in PAS-584 worthy of consideration as well.
In the end, good floodplain management is about avoiding risky development and reducing post-disaster suffering. It’s about no more sensational headlines because flood risk was anticipated, protected against, and avoided. And for those very reasons, floodplain management at the local and state level, especially higher standards, are often misunderstood by the public and elected officials. It is up to us, the floodplain managers of the world, to not only provide sensible recommendations on better standards, but to always remain vigilant in explaining to local and state officials the reasons for having such standards. In the meantime, we can only hope that FEMA’s rulemaking process is ultimately successful and floodplain management is truly improved in the nation for all.
