RSS 2.0 FeedSeptember 3, 2010, Bellmore Life
Hurricane or not, FEMA to the rescue?
FEMA encourages homeowners to buy flood insurance.
With Hurricane Earl possibly strafing – or barreling down on – Long Island this weekend, a new program from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) will extend for two years a low-cost Preferred Risk Policy flood insurance program to South Shore homeowners in a high-risk flood zone who have been forced to pay hundreds – if not thousands – of dollars more since FEMA issued new flood zone maps beginning October 1, 2008.
The new program will permit homeowners now classified in a high-risk AE flood zone to purchase flood insurance beginning January, 2011, at previous low-risk X-zone rates. By 2013, when policies are up for renewal, homeowners will be able to renew flood insurance at greatly reduced prices.
These rates will be higher than previous X-zone rates, but greatly reduced over high-risk AE-zone rates, Mary Colvin, chief of flood plain management and flood insurance for FEMA, Region 2, told Bellmore Life.
The new program comes in response to phone calls and letters to FEMA, part of the Department of Homeland Security, from homeowners all over the state concerned about sudden sharp rate increases, and the inability to pay for them in the face of economic hardships, Ms. Colvin continued.
When FEMA drew up new flood zones to include previously low-risk properties in Bellmore, Merrick, Wantagh, Freeport and other shore communities, and reclassify them as high-risk properties, it sent homeowners’ flood insurance as high as 400% more for many.
Higher costs, but no flooding
“We have clients down by the canals whose property was always classified as X, or low risk, because the properties are built on landfills,” remarked Greg Conneely, owner of Conneely Agency on Grand Avenue.
But when the properties were reclassified as high-risk properties for flooding, or AE, “FEMA set the new rates and provided the coverage,” he continued, requiring anywhere from $1,600 to $3,000, depending upon discounts and grandfathering of existing flood insurance into the new coverage.
That’s when, he says, many of his clients began challenging the zoning. “I have clients who are one foot away from the water but whose home elevation is well above the water line, and they’ve never flooded,” he continued.
At their request, he helped them get the necessary paperwork from FEMA, such as special forms, and helped get surveyors to survey the elevation to fill out elevation forms proving the elevation was higher than FEMA’s elevation criteria for flooding.
Can’t measure every home
“We used the very latest technology in topographical mapping” to arrive at the new flood plain maps, Ms. Colvin said, but admitted that budget constraints did not allow FEMA to measure every home. She said that the state’s new criteria put the water level line at two feet about sea level.
She added that it was also known that some topography is uneven, causing irregularities. Because of this irregularity, FEMA provides a built-in process for challenging the flood map. If any part of the land, even around the foundation, is under that two-foot water line, the property is considered in a high-risk zone, she said.
She said reasons for remapping the flood zones included new flood patterns emerging from erosion and storms, water-surface levels, new land development, which redirects channels of water, and past history. “Flood maps of the Long Island area went back to the 1960s to 1980s,” she said, and are now inaccurate.
Bellmore resident Joanna Galanis is in the process of getting a surveyor to survey her elevation and certify that her land is above FEMA’s base flood level criterion. With the certification she can get a Letter of Map Amendment, which would remove her from the AE zone, and reduce her flood insurance costs.
“I agree with rezoning for the shore communities,” Ms. Galanis told Bellmore Life, “but I don’t agree when parts of North Bellmore and other communities away from the shore are also being put in the AE zone.” “I can’t answer to that precise point,” Ms. Colvin said. But, “When you fly over flooded areas you see the changes from the old maps,” she said, and then you see new pockets of flooding that you can’t answer to.
It is those unknowns, she said, that moves FEMA to encourage homeowners to purchase flood insurance, and why it could include communities farther from shore being placed in a high-risk AE zone. Close to 90% of the state is at risk of flooding, she said, and 25% of all claims come from an out-of-flood area. She added that some 1,200 communities that have no flood hazard participate in the program.
Banks require flood insurance
Ann Boxenhorn, a Bellmore resident who never had flood insurance, challenged the new flood zone maps when she was forced to buy flood insurance, and got it reduced. She said that because she had paid off her mortgage it was not necessary for her to have flood insurance, and admitted to taking a chance by not owning flood insurance.
“Homeowners must be advised that it is their bank, their mortgage holder, that requires them to purchase flood insurance,” she told Bellmore Life. While she had paid off her mortgage, she held a home equity line of credit, which banks consider the same as a mortgage.
Her bank told her she had to buy flood insurance. But FEMA wanted $3,000 for the insurance, and her property had never flooded. She added that had she purchased flood insurance originally, it would have been grandfathered into the new insurance figures, and she would have paid far less under a Preferred Risk Policy than she had to pay in buying it for the first time. Incensed at the steep prices for FEMA flood insurance, she learned from her bank that she could challenge the map.
“It cost $550 for a surveyor,” and several hundred dollars in other fees to prove FEMA was wrong in its elevation assessment, she said. “Will FEMA reimburse me and others for this cost?” she asked.
“No,” Ms. Colvin responded. She said that any costs incurred in challenging the map would be regained over the years of savings at being placed back into a low-risk zone. Meanwhile, John Sirabella, president of the Sabre Agency, cautioned homeowners to beware of the changing insurance industry on Long Island.
“Check with your insurer regarding deductibles for homeowners – and even flood – insurance,” he said, because brand-name insurers are leaving Long Island, leaving the market to smaller insurers and third parties.
“Insurers are feeling the increased risk associated with a catastrophic storm on Long Island,” he said. He agreed that, from a business viewpoint, it may not pay for some insurers to write homeowners and flood insurance policies in the face of a growing threat.