So a client comes storming into the office. We've been helping him through a regulatory process so he can use his water this year, with what I'm afraid is going to turn into a large cost by next year "cleaning up" all his water issues.
I see he's upset and I'm thinking, now what did they dump on him? Turns out he got a letter from his lender demanding he pay $800 a month flood insurance based on their new 2012 flood maps, my question was what flood maps? I haven't heard of any mapping being done in that part of the county, I would usually hear about that because they used us to do control for the large mapping project to produce the new panels and this area wasn't inculded, so who did this and what data did they use? So now I have to track down this new "map" try to see if I can get cross-section, profiles and BFE's. What are the odds none of that is available . I don't think I've seen one this bad, he clearly is out, on a high elevation 400' east of a stream, just a quick look at google shows his house 30+ feet above the stream and you have to go 2000' west to find the same elevation. There was a 100 year flood in 77 and one close to it in 2011, neither came anywhere near him.
If there really is a new flood map with BFE's then not too bad to get him released, but if as I suspect something else is going on then he's stuck with doing a flood study at his expense. Which I'm afraid is where this is heading.
I had a taste of that about 6mos ago with some clients at a lake subdivision.
Suddenly out of nowhere the requirement to have flood insurance is ask of many that have homes in areas that would never ever flood.
A few decades ago the county did not agree to match monies to have a flood study and this is the result.
Across the county there are a few idiots that have built in areas that flood and every few years their dwellings are filled with water.
Since the 2012 digital maps were published the epidemic has been creeping around the county claiming victims that built safely above any natural flood level.
Mostly what gets them is something to do with extending 60 feet beyond the pool elevation of a lake, even when that distance goes uphill along a 1 to 1 slope.
:-O
What we ran into along this same line were cases where some of the property that was mortgaged was, most definitely, in the flood plain but the residence was, most definitely, not. Paperwork had to be done. The local flood plain administrator was able to turn in a USGS topo with a dot drawn in where the residence was situated and then do the same on a firmette. That worked for the extreme cases. We ended up doing several elevation certificates where there really was some potential for concern based on the ten-foot contour lines not depicting the true circumstance.
One prime example was a case of the property mainly being on a bluff far above a river but the property extended to the middle of the river. All the lender needed was an unbiased assurance that the house was not constructed in the river. The lender was not allowed to make this determination himself.
If you punch his address into FEMA's Map Service Center website, does a 2012 FIRM panel come up?
Demand the lender provide a map that shows he's in.
Does this help?
Scroll down to FEMA NFHL and download the FEMA NFHL v3.0.kmz
It shows the mapped floodplain in GE with layers you can toggle on and off. If the BFE was mapped, it is on a layer.
I have plotted the GE file and placed it under the FEMA digital file (for my county) of two different projects of mine and cannot discern a visible difference within reason.
Yes, now that I got the paper work this morning the house is clearly in the "new" panel, and this is a new panel from FEMA-2012. There are no BFE's shown on the copy sent to me, so I need to dig into it.
Buuuuutttttt a quick look at the flood plain and I see all kinds of issues with it. They have the flood pane at about 4084' on the west side of the creek and maybe 50' west of the stream and at 4113 on the east side 600' east of the stream, putting my clients house in the flood plain, to get to the 4113 elevation on the west side of the creek I have to go cross the entire bottom of the valley and start up the big ridge at the edge of the cultivated meadows (google elevations so I don't really trust them although the quad shows the same). Anyway, I can't see how the house is actually in the flood plain but he will have to do his own study to get it out.
The problem is someone designed a flood plain (who knows how they did it) and put my clients house in Zone A when he clearly isn't. How can homeowners go back on these flood plain designers to recoup the cost of doing their jobs for them?
Does this help?
Thank you, I really want to know who was the engineer who did this, is there a way to find that info out?
Does this help?
When I was having trouble locating NGS benchmarks near a townsite on a river (no surviving benchmarks), I scanned through the FEMA site to see if they were updating the FIRM(s) in my area from 2005 to 2013 and came upon that webpage with the download. As far as the engineer, I would not know. Since it is a FEMA site and provided kmz, I would assume it is the same data that they use to produce the FIRM maps. If you zoom out to take in all of the CONUS, you will see it covers a good bit of area and there is still a good bit of vacant areas. That is a massive data set so I would tend to think it pulls from the FEMA data each time.
Scroll through the layers and toggle things on/off that you do/don't need.
Then you can save the images and print them out.
Be sure to toggle it off before exiting Google Earth or the next time you open GE it may be slow to load, especially if you have a slow connection like me.
[sarcasm]What, you don't believe the water will have a 4.5% slope?[/sarcasm]
FEMA TSDN
MM,
The WHO, WHAT, and HOW to the re-mapping is found in the TSDNs.
Contact your community or state floodplain administrator and request a copy.
Procedure Memorandum No. 62 - TSDN Submittal and FEDD File Review Protocol for Mapping Projects.
https://www.fema.gov/media-library/assets/documents/21808?id=4705
Technical Support Data Network (TSDN)
For FEMA-contracted studies/mapping projects (including projects initiated under the CTP Program), FEMA mapping partners and contractors must organize deliverable materials in a standardized format. This allows FEMA to maintain nationwide standards for mapping under the NFIP. The current FEMA standard is the TSDN. The TSDN contains all of the support data for a community for which FEMA published a flood map and revisions to that flood map. The requirements for the TSDN are documented in Appendix M of FEMA's Guidelines and Specifications for Flood Hazard Mapping Partners.
A Partner may submit a digital TSDN, in lieu of the hard copy; all materials that are not in digital format must be submitted in hard copy format. A transmittal letter clearly identifying the project and the materials provided must be submitted along with the TSDN.
http://www.fema.gov/cooperating-technical-partners-program/cooperating-technical-partners-program#5
Don't let them give you the run-around. The TSDNs DO EXIST.
DDSM:beer:
It's very upsetting, clearly the new flood plain is worse than the old one, I don't know who drew it or what the thought process was to send junk like it out, very discouraging. How something like it could ever be "official" is beyond me.
FEMA TSDN
Thanks, I hate to have to dig into this mess, but I guess I will need to.
Thanks for the info Dan...
I am printing this out for future reference.
The lender has no responsibility to prove anything. They can require whatever they want for any reason they want.
In this case the problem doesn't lie with the lender, they got a new panel plotted on a photo showing the residence well into the flood zone A.
The problem is with the flood plain itself, it's really bad, not kinda bad but really, really, really bad; they have it climbing a hill to the east, but not filling in the flat, low ground to the west of the stream. The reason the house was sited where it is, is to keep it on high ground and out of any flood. Anyway, it's just a nightmare for these people along this stream to have this new data pop up all of a sudden. It would be fine if it was correct, but not like this!!!!
Same story, different county.