Residents and property owners in coastal areas of Lee County can view new draft preliminary
Flood Insurance Rate Maps (FIRMs) at three upcoming public open houses on Sept.
The city's plans to improve the 7th Avenue Creek corridor have been in the works for the last decade, paralleling the Federal Emergency Management Agency's efforts to revise its
flood insurance rate maps for the area.
When the NFIP was created, communities that wanted to participate had to first agree to adopt
flood insurance rate maps (FIRMs) that delineate flood risk zones, and specify building codes and land-use regulations to reduce future water-related damage.
Historically, few resources offered any insight in the risk of flooding to individual properties beyond the
Flood Insurance Rate Maps published by the NFIP.
For property owners to qualify for NFIP coverage, their locality must participate in the NFIP and develop "floodplain management policies to manage floodwaters and reduce risk to property." (56) Participating communities must also create
flood insurance rate maps (FIRMs) that identify special flood hazard areas, or one-hundred-year floodplains (SFHAs).
Local communities would adopt floodplain management ordinances; the federal government would administer what are called
Flood Insurance Rate Maps.
The scariest part: Only a small portion of property considered at risk for flooding (identified by FEMA's
Flood Insurance Rate Maps, or "FIRMs") actually was affected by this particular storm.
Floodbroker.com's flood-zone database tracks with FEMA's digital
flood insurance rate maps. There are communities around the country that are not yet digitally mapped, so cases exist where the Floodbroker.com system may not be able to generate a quote.
Overseen by Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), the program uses statistical data to create
Flood Insurance Rate Maps (FIRMs), which display regions at or below Base Flood Elevation (BFE)--meaning they have a one-percent chance of annual flood and therefore are in a Special Flood Hazard Area (SFHA).
Bill McDonald, vice president for special programs, Waggoner Engineering, said Mississippi was one of the first states to comply with a directive from Congress to update out-of-date paper
Flood Insurance Rate Maps. The development of Digital
Flood Insurance Rate Maps was done through a Mississippi Emergency Management Agency/MDEQ/Federal Emergency Management Agency partnership.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) is updating the
Flood Insurance Rate Maps (FIRM) with new rainfall, elevation and flood risk data to gain a clearer snapshot of today's flooding risk.
When a property is "substantially damaged" by more than 50 percent of what the dwelling is worth, the dwelling must be brought up to existing codes to comply with the latest
flood insurance rate maps (FIRM).
