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2013-11-29 / Front Page
Flood worry
Predicting sea-level rise, checking accuracy of FEMA maps is a long process for Mid-coast
communities
BY GINA HAMILTON Times Record Staff
HARPSWELL
Harpswell got some bad news about its flood risk recently: Some 800 properties newly lie in flood zones.
People with property at risk will see flood insurance rates spike, perhaps unaffordably.
Now Sagadahoc County towns are receiving new, preliminary Federal Emergency Management Agency flood maps and starting the process of
examining them for accuracy.
It’s a long process before the new maps are enacted. Flood maps include statistical information such as data for river flow, storm tides, hydrologic
analyses, and rainfall and topographic surveys — all data that towns will likely challenge. Other factors may also render a map unreliable, including new
structures designed to change a tidal flow, a project to expand coastal wetlands, or other protective measures.
FEMA and the town negotiate, look at the town’s expensively gathered documentation, and eventually, either issue a new set of maps or stand firm on
its own data.
It’s all part of an effort to analyze and void flood risk by withdrawing insurance options for properties highest at risk.
In contesting new FEMA flood maps, Midcoast towns are also studying sea-level rise scenarios which pose their own potentially catastrophic changes to
working waterfront infrastructure, clamflats and residential areas.
Insurance ‘reform’
The towns take FEMA maps seriously because they are used to set National Flood Insurance Program rates — which can make or break a community.
In 2012, Superstorm Sandy required $15 billion in flood insurance payouts alone, another $20 billion in other insurance payouts. In response,
Congress passed the Flood Insurance Reform Act, which called on FEMA and other agencies to alter the National Flood Insurance Program. Key
provisions of the law require the NFIP to raise rates to reflect true flood risk, make the program more financially stable and change how Flood
Insurance Rate Map updates affect policyholders.
The changes will mean premium rate increases for some — but not all — policyholders over time. But anywhere in Mid-coast Maine, everyone near the
water will likely see rates rise; the closer to the water, the more likely the rates will rise higher.
The NFIP is virtually the only source of flood insurance for homes and small businesses in the United States. It was created in 1968 in response to
severe Mississippi River flooding which made flood insurance unavailable, and has, as of 2012, provided more than 5.6 million insurance policies.
About $1.35 trillion in assets are protected under the flood insurance program.
Designed to provide affordable insurance, it also provides lower insurance premiums for homeowners and communities that invest in flood-proofing
measures. A homeowner might raise his house above the flood line; a town might invest in levies or breakwaters.
In Harpswell, as one house was being sold under the older flood maps, a buyer was told his premium would be $38,000 per year. No matter which side
of the Cribstone Bridge one lives on, that’s not “affordable.”
Harpswell is somewhat ahead of the Sagadahoc towns, having mounted successful challenges to preliminary
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Flood worry | www.timesrecord.com | The Times Record
FEMA maps before and getting some properties removed from the revised maps.
Even as coastal and river towns challenge updated FEMA flood maps, future threats such as sea-level rise ensure such maps will be rapidly changing.
Sea-level scenarios
The Casco Bay Estuary Partnership has produced new maps for each town’s targeted areas that model 1- foot and 3-foot sea-level rise.
In Harpswell, the study projected sea-level rise would affect tidal wetlands and developed areas on Bailey Island.
Low-lying areas to the north of Abner Point Road are suitable for marsh migration inland if seas rise 1 to 3 feet. But even a rise of 1 foot would
adversely affect existing development there; a 3-foot rise would jeopardize access to Abner Point Road.
The new FEMA flood map also shows Mackerel Cove to be a serious flood threat, even with no sea-level rise. Insurance rates for homeowners there
will rise.
As a designated town harbor, there are dozens of moorings in Mackerel Cove, as well as working waterfront infrastructure that would be easily
destroyed in a serious flood.
Hiring analysts
Not all of the maps line up so neatly, however.
Harpswell and the other towns will likely use the Casco Bay Estuary documents in order to bolster their case that the flood zones in other areas aren’t
as dire as the FEMA maps would have one believe.
They also hired their own engineers to refute some of the information on the original maps.
Phippsburg is also part of another project called the Marsh Migration Project — along with Georgetown, Bath, Topsham and Bowdoinham — which aims
to predict the effect of sea-level rise on coastal wetlands. As with the Casco Bay Estuary project, it contemplates 1- and 3-foot scenarios. Phippsburg is
currently looking for a committee to review the maps, possibly to suggest changes.
In Phippsburg’s invitation to become a member of the review committee, the selectmen wrote, “This review is very important because the flood maps,
once finalized, will have a big impact on some coastline property owners by placing homes in new flood zones. This would affect future building
requirements along the coastline as well as insurance costs and mortgage requirements.”
Further north, the Lincoln County Regional Planning Commission’s Coastal Hazard Study is also looking at 1- and 3-foot scenarios.
The Natural Resources Council of Maine created 3- and a 20-foot scenarios — the latter of which it says may occur by the end of the century.
With a 3-foot rise in Bath, some downtown infrastructure and parts of the Bath Iron Works shipyard would be under water. Georgetown’s Reid State
Park would be changed dramatically, the Cranberry Islands off Mt. Desert Island would disappear and many local wetlands and beaches would be
gone. At 20 feet, much of downtown Bath would be under water.
[email protected]
IF AND WHEN: It’s a long process before the new flood maps are enacted.
In contesting the FEMA maps, Midcoast towns are also studying sealevel rise scenarios which pose their own potentially catastrophic changes to
working waterfront infrastructure, clamflats and residential areas.
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