State builds highway in floodway. Extraordinary rain event occurs. Town flooded & blames highway design. Read more here ...
This is interesting because there have probably been insurance claims against the NFIP.
FEMA jurisdictional authority here is the question. If this were a Community, as FEMA defines it, FEMA and the NFIP would have contractually required a flood ordinance prohibiting building in the Floodway. But the State outside of a FEMA Community? Maybe not. The County probably has a flood ordinance, but whether it could hold the State to complying with it is the question. This may not be over. I wonder if it could end up in Federal Court for two reasons. FEMA and the FHWA (Federal Aid Highway?)
Inverse Condemenation
By not building the bridge to the required 100 year floodway design, which means the 100 year flood passes with 1' of freeboard, hence allowing an even greater flood to pass, the state condemned the damaged properties to future damages. The state "took" property value and the owner's are due compensation. Water rights law which predates the USA does not provide any statutue of limitations for recovery from a past act of construction because it understands the nature of the timing of these historic water events. To state that the state used proper engineering precludes the fact that the first part of proper engineering is to comply with the statutes then apply proper engineering.
Paul in PA
Inverse Condemenation
I agree with LPL. It was clear in the lawsuit that the structure was built to Q50 at the time even though the Q100 was required. Case closed.
