Advanced Search
June 27, 2019
The 116th Congress is making progress on legislation to improve resilience. A $19 billion disaster aid bill (H.R. 2157/P.L. 116-20) passed with bipartisan support and was signed by the President on June 6, ending a roughly six-month long approval process.
The bill funds a multitude of government programs to help communities, farmers, military service members and others recover from climate/weather-related disasters that have occurred in the United States since 2017, including hurricanes in Puerto Rico, Florida, Georgia, Alabama, North Carolina and South Carolina; wildfires in California; and floods in the Midwest. The legislation appropriates $2.4 billion for HUD community development block grants, $3 billion for the Department of Agriculture to cover producers’ losses, $720 million to reimburse the Forest Service for money spent fighting wildfires, and $1.4 billion for Puerto Rico, including $600 million in nutrition assistance.
The bill also appropriates $3.25 billion for the Army Corps of Engineers to repair damaged infrastructure and prepare for future storms, and $25 million for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) to improve hurricane intensity forecasting; flood prediction, forecasting, and mitigation capabilities; and wildfire prediction, detection, and forecasting. These investments in pre-disaster mitigation are particularly valuable as we seek to make communities and infrastructure more resilient to the impacts of climate change.
The legislation also acknowledges the role of natural systems and infrastructure in disaster mitigation. For example, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is directed to use $50 million to “restore and rebuild national wildlife refuges and increase the resilience and capacity of coastal habitat and infrastructure to withstand storms and reduce the amount of damage caused by such storms.”
Another important provision extends the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) through September 30 -- Congress’s 11th short-term extension of the program since 2017. Administered by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), the program provides affordable flood insurance to millions of property owners, renters and business owners.
More than an insurance program, NFIP is also a risk management program and “plays an important role in disaster preparedness and resiliency by providing flood maps, setting standards for floodplain management, and investing in mitigation for our homes, businesses, and infrastructure,” according to House Financial Services Committee Chairwoman Maxine Waters (D-CA).
NFIP has lapsed twice since 2017, and without a long-term extension, could be vulnerable to more lapses in the future. In the absence of funding authority, NFIP cannot write new policies or renew existing policies, start new mapping, continue certain floodplain management activities or award mitigation assistance. And, because federally-backed mortgages require certain properties to carry flood insurance, NFIP lapses disrupt the housing market and potentially put property owners at risk if flooding were to occur during a lapse in coverage.
The National Flood Insurance Program Reauthorization Act (H.R. 3167), introduced by Rep. Waters, would provide a 5-year reauthorization of the program, along with other important reforms. The bill was approved by the House Committee on Financial Services on June 12 and awaits action by the full House and the Senate.
The NFIP Reauthorization Act would establish a pilot demonstration program to provide discounted premiums to low-income policyholders – defined in the bill as “the primary residence of a household whose income does not exceed 80 percent of the area median income.”
The bill would also expand and improve flood mapping through increased funding and more advanced technology, and “require FEMA to provide financial and technical assistance to communities to incorporate future flood hazard conditions as an informational layer on their flood map.”
The legislation also includes many important reforms on the mitigation front, such as increasing funding for mitigation assistance to policyholders and creating a revolving loan fund that states can use to finance mitigation activities. The bill would also increase the options available to policyholders living in flood-prone areas by providing premium discounts for home resilience improvements and expanding the opportunity for buy-outs for policyholders who want to move out of harm’s way.
The Committee-passed bill does not address ways to deal with NFIP’s $20.5 billion debt to the U.S. Treasury and the burden of annual $400 million interest payments. The bill also did not address ways to better harmonize development of a private insurance market while sustaining NFIP flood risk management functions and improved flood information disclosure requirements, according to the Association of State Floodplain Managers, Inc.
Author: Chloe Rogers
Advancing science-based climate solutions
Top-Rated Climate Nonprofit – 4-Star Charity