skip to main content
skip to newscasts

Monday, March 18, 2024

Public News Service Logo
facebook instagram linkedin reddit youtube twitter
view newscast page
play newscast audioPlay

SD public defense duties shift from counties to state; SCOTUS appears skeptical of restricting government communications with social media companies; Trump lawyers say he can't make bond; new scholarships aim to connect class of 2024 to high-demand jobs.

view newscast page
play newscast audioPlay

The SCOTUS weighs government influence on social media, and who groups like the NRA can do business with. Biden signs an executive order to advance women's health research and the White House tells Israel it's responsible for the Gaza humanitarian crisis.

view newscast page
play newscast audioPlay

Midwest regenerative farmers are rethinking chicken production, Medicare Advantage is squeezing the finances of rural hospitals and California's extreme swing from floods to drought has some thinking it's time to turn rural farm parcels into floodplains.

FEMA Flood Maps Lead to Potential Disaster, Say NC Coastal Leaders

play audio
Play

Monday, April 2, 2018   

NAGS HEAD, N.C. – As the Trump administration looks at plans to overhaul the National Flood Insurance Program, many of North Carolina's coastal communities say the latest Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) flood maps will have them knee-deep in trouble when the next significant storm hits their shores.

Currently Dare, Currituck and Hyde counties are among those that say the latest maps from the agency don't accurately depict the flooding risk. Nags Head deputy town manager Andy Garman says what they call a miscalculation could lead to developers building dwellings at ground level, or modifying existing structures that are currently built on stilts.

"A lot of times that's done because there's a flood regulation that causes them to elevate the structure,” he says. “Well, if you're taken out of the flood zone, they can go in and enclose the ground floor as living space, and we've documented in previous storms that some of those areas beneath those structures have been flooded one or two feet."

Placing some at-risk areas out of the FEMA high-risk flood area also precludes them from benefiting from the National Flood Insurance Program that offers affordable insurance to property owners. Scientists predict that sea-level rise from climate change could increase flood risk even beyond what has been seen in recent years.

In a statement, FEMA says its maps are "based on the best available data, and adhere to rigorous scientific and engineering standards."

Garman says coastal leaders are concerned about property owners that may build according to current flood maps, only to be precluded from accessing flood insurance – public or private – in the future.

"Those people would in the future have problems getting flood insurance or paying really high rates because they're now below base flood and they don't meet the future standard and they become nonconforming,” says Garman. “You're not only talking about mitigating risk, but you're also talking about protecting property owners from high costs."

As less people qualify for the federal flood-insurance program, the private flood insurance market grew by 51 percent last year. FEMA is lifting a "non-compete" policy that limited the ability of insurers to sell private policies if they also sold insurance on behalf of the government.

Garman says Nags Head and other towns on the coast are considering local codes that would mandate their own building codes to mitigate the risk created by what they say are inaccurate FEMA flood maps.



get more stories like this via email

more stories
Corporate partners sign contracts to offer a graduate assistantship and pay the students. In turn, MSU pays the graduate assistant's tuition, fees and salary, so the assistantship is directly tied to the academic experience. (pressmaster/Adobe Stock)

play sound

By Victoria Lim for WorkingNation.Broadcast version by Farah Siddiqi for Missouri News Service reporting for the WorkingNation-Public News Service Col…


Social Issues

play sound

A new report brands Connecticut's tax system as "regressive" for low- to middle-income residents and uses a report from the state to make its point…

Environment

play sound

Backers of a new federal rule said it will increase fairness for livestock and poultry producers, in North Carolina and across the country. The U.S…


A study by the advocacy group Inseparable showed one in five adults said at any given time, they consider their mental health to be either 'fair' or 'poor.' (Adobe Stock)

Health and Wellness

play sound

Mental health care advocates are encouraging federal agencies to adopt a proposed update to regulations which would expand access to psychological car…

Social Issues

play sound

With hotter summers bringing hotter working conditions, the Maryland Department of Labor is implementing a heat stress standard to protect workers …

Social Issues

play sound

By Jimmy Cloutier for OpenSecrets.Broadcast version by Roz Brown for Texas News Service reporting for the OpenSecrets-Public News Service Collaboratio…

Environment

play sound

Recreational fishermen in New England say commercial trawlers are threatening the survival of smaller businesses relying on a healthy stock of Atlanti…

 

Phone: 303.448.9105 Toll Free: 888.891.9416 Fax: 208.247.1830 Your trusted member- and audience-supported news source since 1996 Copyright © 2021