Posted on 05/21/2003 10:43:07 AM PDT by AAABEST
A consulting firm is still trying to prove that Collier County flood maps created by the Federal Emergency Management Agency are wrong.
Collier County Commission and Naples City Council hired Tomasello Consulting Engineers Inc. to study FEMA's flood maps and prove that the maps were inaccurate and outdated when they were presented to officials in 1998.
Although local officials have argued with FEMA that the maps are incorrect, FEMA still intends to implement the maps on Oct. 2. The new maps drastically change the flood zones in parts of Collier County, which will cause some flood insurance premiums to increase by 60 percent.
The commission agreed to pay $188,000 or 80 percent of the cost of the study, while the city is paying 20 percent, or $47,000.
The city has already spent $6,184 and the county has spent $24,736 since the study began in January. The council and commission agreed during a joint meeting Tuesday to continue the study because they believe the consulting firm will show that the maps need revising.
Bob Devlin, the city's former flood plain management coordinator who is now the city's facilities maintenance supervisor, said there were several errors in the proposed maps, such as incorrect names for city roads and streets. He also said that the border for the city of Naples was in the wrong place.
Naples Mayor Bonnie MacKenzie said FEMA used data from Atlantic Ocean storms as a model instead of examining the effect of storms in the Gulf of Mexico — that hurricanes on the west coast of the state are different from those on Florida's east coast.
Devlin said FEMA officials have said they are willing to review what the firm finds during its study, but that the city and county have to do the work.
He said that FEMA officials are forcing the community to correct its mistakes.
"The burden is placed on the county," Devlin said.
Messages seeking comment were left with FEMA officials on Tuesday, but officials could not be reached.
County Commissioner Fred Coyle agrees with Devlin.
"They're forcing us into a situation of developing an up-to-date database, which they themselves will use," Coyle said.
MacKenzie said she is more frustrated with "FEMA's reluctance to take our word over their contractors' word."
"Our information and documentation has been very well done," MacKenzie said. "I think FEMA could easily accept it and rely on it as a good predictor for future risk for the whole community. I think they could be a little more cooperative."
The map changes include adding 600 properties to the county's highest-risk zone. Those properties, from Port Royal to Seagate, are now in a lower-risk zone. That could increase those properties' flood insurance premiums by 60 percent.
Another change would remove about 300 properties from a zone where flood insurance isn't required, creating the need for those property owners to buy the insurance.
The map changes also would require flood insurance for Golden Gate Estates residences currently not required to have flood insurance. The area doesn't have a history of flooding.
The agency's zone for the Estates doesn't assign properties an elevation above which a home must be built to avoid having to pay the big insurance premiums. That means every homeowner — even if he or she lives above the flood level — will pay the biggest premium.
Flood insurance rates for homeowners in the new flood zone could be up to $2,200 for a $150,000 house, compared with $600 now.
The new zones fall generally east of Ninth Street Southwest and Ninth Street Northwest in the Estates, including non-Estates parcels south of Immokalee Road, north of Interstate 75, in Orangetree, Big Corkscrew Island and parts of Immokalee.
Hundreds of additional properties will fall under FEMA guidelines under the new maps. Those property owners will not be able to renovate more than 50 percent of the dollar value of their property. Instead, the owner would have to rebuild it following FEMA standards.
City and county officials have appealed the maps and stated their concerns, but said FEMA hasn't listened.
This is yet another example of the assault on SW Florida by yet another federal agency. How did we get to the point where we allow these digusting and couterproductive agencies to so drastically rule over entire demographics. They quiteliterally have dictitorial, finger waving power.
This is not America and they must be stopped.
The money doesn't go to insurance co's, except for a small handling charge under the write your own program. It actually goes to FEMA's flood insurance sub agency. And even FEMA's non-subsidized rates for structures built after the flood insurance rate maps were created are a total bargain over what private insurance co's could afford to charge.
And there is no place in SW FL that is entirely safe from flooding. Not only do you have rivers, streams, canals, storm surge, hurricanes, but you also have dramatic growth (i.e., paving of permeable surfaces), development of wetlands, inadequate storm sewer systems, and so on.
The real crime here isn't that they're raising premiums, which will still be too low - it's that they provide taxpayer funded flood insurance at all anywhere within 25 miles of the Florida coast. Government insurance is always a raw deal for the taxpayer in the end.
LOL!!! Maybe not in the real estate developers' miopic view but..., I hunted from airboats and swamp-buggies in much of "Golden Gate Estates" in the late 40's!
Much of Florida is sold to folks who don't have a clue as to the way a good wet hurricane can turn their home into an island!
Developments throughout the state are prone to getting deluged, it is only a question of when! Just because you see a nice dry lot, believe me..., Mother Nature can (and often does) change that at the most inopportune times!
That pretty much covers the rest of the county, where there are homes.
Flood insurance rates for homeowners in the new flood zone could be up to $2,200 for a $150,000 house, compared with $600 now.
There are very few homes that fit in the under $150,000 category.
Nonsense. Most of Southwest Florida is high and dry and always has been. My parents are building a house on 6 feet of fill as we speak, water will never touch their house ever. We also have these things down here called levies, dykes, canals and other such modern conveniences. T
The real crime here isn't that they're raising premiums, which will still be too low -
OK you didn't read, WE DON'T PAY FLOOD INURANCE. Never have, don't need to because the only floods we have here are the ones that the feds purposefully create in order to "save the Everglades."
I agree with you that taxpayers shouldn't have to pay flood premiums, but I'll be damned if they should steal food off my table to solve their cashflow problems.
We're literally being robbed to the tune of several hundred dollars a month.
http://www.naplesnews.com/community/goldengate.html
I don't know were you were hunting in the 40's There was no Golden Gate Estates then.
Not for anything, but "Golden Gate Estates" didn't even exist in the 40's. It was developed around 2 decades later.
Yes sir there is much dry land here. Land that always has and always will be dry. Land that FEMA will now declare in a flood zone and use as a multi-million dollar cash cow. Just because they can.
It's the same with the Bureau of the Census. The Feds are years behind local municipalities in mapping and mulishly refuse to use municipal maps.
That statement could be anywhere in the US - developers are building IN FEMA flood ways NOW. But just let a private citizen try it - Cha-Ching!
ROFLMAO.
SW Florida is filled with clueless people who, because of the (EXTREMELY FLUKEY) abscence of major hurricanes striking SW Florida directly in the last 25 years, think there's no flood danger because they haven't been flooded while they've been living there.
Once things return to "normal" based on the long-term average almost all of SW Florida is going to be under 6-10 feet of water (moving 20+ miles inland) every 4-5 years or so. And, of course, taxpayers like me will have to pay to repair the damage each time through flood insurance subsidies.
There's no fundamental difference between hurricanes on the East Coast of Florida and the West Coast of Florida, meteorologically.
It's just that in one of the most incredible flukes of hurricane hit patterns the SW coast of Florida hasn't been hit directly by a Cat 3+ in ages and ages and ages...almost all of the development has been since the last several hit. And most of the population has moved somewhere else. Thus, many of the people living there thing there's some fundamental "protection" from hurricanes there.
However, prior to this "hit drought" SW Florida was basically a punching bag for strong hurricanes.
The SLOSH maps for a Cat 3-5 hitting SW Florida are ridiculous...deep water (and water with 10 foot waves on top of it, mind you, not standing water) annihilating everything for dozens of miles inland. Incredible disaster waiting to happen.
Of course, the local boosters want to hear none of that.
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