FEMA contractors needed in Midwest following 100+ tornadoes in 24 hours over weekend

My San Antonio via PR Web: FEMA contractors are needed after over 100 tornadoes ravaged the Midwest in only 24 hours over the past weekend, according to the New York Times. Although the current death toll is low due to concentration in rural areas and early warnings from officials, conditions for severe weather in the region are still ripe throughout the week and FEMA is standing ready to assist and support affected communities.

Six fatalities have been confirmed in Woodward, OK, as well as 29 injuries, due to an EF3 tornado. A State of Emergency has been declared by the Governor of Oklahoma in 12 counties. Thousands are currently without power in both OK and KS. 75% of Thurman IA was destroyed by an EF2 tornado whose path stretched 10 miles long. The recent string of tornadoes comes only just over a month after another devastating storm rocked the Midwest and South with deadly and destructive tornadoes.

To fulfill its emergency response and support mission, FEMA relies heavily on contractors from the private sector to provide services and assist affected communities. While there is an immediate need for debris removal and construction contractors, FEMA has a need for products and services in virtually all industries. With tornado season off to a prolific start and hurricane season quickly approaching, contractors nationwide should begin preparing for future contracting demands by checking their registration status....

Sorry I made a mess, dude. A NOAA shot of an April 12, 2012 tornado in Marquette, Kansas

Breaking the repetitive disaster damage scenario

A little happy talk from Federal Emergency Management Administration, but it's still a good idea: Of the more than $200 million the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) is expected to reimburse the commonwealth for infrastructure damage from Irene and Lee, more than $30 million of that will be used to rebuild infrastructure to a higher standard.

The work is known as mitigation - an effort to break the cycle of damage and repair and reduce repetitive losses. FEMA's Public Assistance (PA) program helps fund local governments and certain private nonprofit organizations for eligible disaster-related costs for debris removal, emergency protective measures and repair or restoration of public infrastructure.

FEMA provides 75 percent of the mitigation grant funding. The commonwealth's share of eligible project costs is 22 percent; the remaining three percent is paid for by the applicant. The Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency (PEMA) administers the program and allocates the funds.

Generally, the PA program restores disaster damaged infrastructure to pre-disaster conditions. However, where it is cost effective and technically feasible, additional funding can be approved to restore the facility to a higher standard and make it more disaster resistant....

Fifth & Liberty Streets in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, during the flood of 1907

Putting climate change politics before people

Will Hewes in American Rivers: Yesterday [referring to June 2] was a sad day for common sense in Washington, DC. The House of Representatives approved an amendment [subscription required] by Rep. John Carter (R-Texas) that would keep the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) from participating in the Interagency Climate Change Adaptation Task Force, which is helping to ensure that federal agencies are preparing for potential climate change impacts and that they will continue to function smoothly and efficiently in the future.

…Representative Carter’s defense is that EPA and NOAA are already working on climate change. To begin, much of EPA’s work on climate is related to mitigation, i.e. reducing carbon pollution. He doesn’t seem to get that distinction. But more importantly, every agency needs to thinking about how future change of any kind will affect their operations. The fact that EPA is thinking about climate change does nothing for DHS. Worse yet, DHS is highly vulnerable to climate change. For goodness’ sake, FEMA is part of DHS, and it administers the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP)! Increased flooding is one of the key impacts of climate change, and if the future looks anything like the floods we’ve seen along the Mississippi River in the past month, there needs to be some serious reflection about how NFIP should change.

…This is a particularly disturbing example of putting ideology in front of good policy. Sadly it’s part of a trend that has some members of Congress burying their heads in the sand to prove that they’re the most anti-science of the bunch. Talk about cutting off your nose to spite your face. Unfortunately the consequences will reach far beyond Representative Carter’s petty actions. It’s hard to see this as anything but cynical politics at its worst, and a case that, with an ounce of foresight, runs counter to the stated goals of lowering the debt and using government resources efficiently. Putting blinders on DHS and keeping them from coordinating with other agencies will not serve the American people or the federal budget well.

Front page of "The Mascot" newspaper, New Orleans, for 6 June 1891. Unflattering caricature of Louisiana Governor Francis T. Nicholls as a street organ grinder with corrupt monkeys, being rebuked by an allegory of "Public Judgement" arising from a ballot box

Flooding may end the stalling for FEMA maps

Mike Fitzgerald in the Belleville News-Democrat (Illinois) covers an issue that’s going to keep arising – the unsoundness of building in flood-vulnerable areas. It’s going to be a farrago of corruption, wishful thinking and malfeasance as homeowners and politicians attempt to argue the risks away: Metro-east leaders have for years succeeded in playing for time when it came to new flood-hazard maps for Madison, St. Clair and Monroe counties. With the help of federal lawmakers, they persuaded the Federal Emergency Management Agency again and again to push back deadlines for implementing the long-dreaded maps -- dreaded because they would sharply increase the number of property owners forced to buy flood insurance, as well as the cost of premiums to obtain it.

But now, with record floods overwhelming towns along the lower Mississippi River, it looks unlikely that FEMA -- and leaders of Congress -- will want to budge beyond the February deadline for the new flood maps. Such is the gloomy assessment of Les Sterman, the chief engineer for the Southwestern Illinois Flood Prevention District Council.

Faced with almost $18 billion in debt arising from Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath in 2005, FEMA needs to rake in new revenue by extending the zones where property owners must buy federal flood insurance, according to Sterman.

"There are members of Congress who want it to stand on its own," said Sterman, who is overseeing the $130 million effort to rebuild the metro-east's levee system. "It can't do that without collecting more insurance premiums from other folks, particularly other folks like us who'll probably never flood."

U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Springfield, disagreed with Sterman's assessment. In March, Durbin announced that FEMA had finally agreed to a request by Durbin and other senators to recognize the existence of flood-protection levees in the metro-east and elsewhere nationwide.

…For Durbin, the issue of flood insurance represents a swinging political tight rope. On one hand, Durbin realizes the new FEMA flood maps are extremely unpopular. Government and business leaders predict they could trigger economic calamity for 150,000 American Bottoms property owners in the region, many of whom live in some of the state's poorest neighborhoods.

Sharply higher insurance premiums would force many to leave the area, while stifling badly needed economic development. But Durbin has also grown worried about the increased frequency of 100- and 500-year flood events brought on by climate change, according to Mulka. Durbin "wants to make sure that areas are prepared, whether that means protecting yourself with flood insurance or upgrading the levees," Mulka said....

An aerial view of Alton in Madison County, Illinois, taken June 20, 2008, shows flooding of the Mississippi River. US Air Force photo

FEMA's new flood plain mapping could cost coastal Mainers dearly

Tux Turkel in the Portland Press Herald (Maine): The seaside ledge where Bob Blackwood's house stands was first developed as a hotel and a cottage around 1885. It's only 65 feet from mean high tide, but set high enough that waves haven't damaged it through more than a century of hurricanes and winter storms. Bob Blackwood's property, located on a cliffside high off the ocean on Cloyster Street in South Portland, is in a newly designated floodplain zone.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency isn't impressed by that history. The agency, in preparing new flood plain maps for five Maine counties, has placed Blackwood's home in a high-risk zone. During a 100-year storm, it's assumed, 3-foot waves could crash into the building and cause major damage.

…Determining flood zones isn't an exact science. The settlement reached last month between FEMA and the city of Portland over mapping around Portland Harbor shows how the agency's highly technical calculations are open to debate. Similar disputes are happening across the country, and they're shaping up to be especially heated on the Maine coast. In Casco Bay, the dynamic seascape of islands, peninsulas and ledges is not well-suited to FEMA's baseline wind and wave measurements.

…The maps are the basis for federal flood insurance, which is required on mortgages for property in flood zones. With millions of dollars and future development at stake, the outcome of the early appeals may be instructive, as more flood plain maps are updated across Maine in the years ahead.

…But as the issue heats up, one key part of the debate is missing -- the impact of climate change and sea level. …That's bound to put more property at risk of flooding. But because no one can agree on the rate of sea level rise, there are no legally accepted numbers that engineers can plug into computer models for mapping flood plains….

Maine Coast Near Bar Harbor, by Hermann Ottomar Herzog

Before the flood

Bangor Daily News: The city of Portland recently prevailed in a showdown with the Federal Emergency Management Agency over a new map that would have classified part of the city’s waterfront as a high-risk flood zone. That’s good news for the city. But given factors such as climate change and the predictions of higher sea levels that come with it, and a hurricane cycle that is likely to bring a big storm to the Northeast in the next few years, FEMA’s capitulation may prove to be a devastatingly shortsighted move.

Last year, FEMA had the entire harbor in the high-risk flood zone, which would have prohibited new construction along the waterfront and stopped reconstruction of any buildings that had 50 percent or more destruction. The buildings in the flood zone also would have paid higher insurance rates. More recently, the FEMA designation was reduced to just the end of the Maine State Pier, which the city owns. That designation remains, but it will not affect the city’s efforts to redevelop the pier.

Portland was the first New England city to face the new mapping, which FEMA is undertaking along the entire East Coast. Other Maine coastal communities have faced updated FEMA regulations in recent years, and at times, the agency was inflexible. And its rules resulted in odd development outcomes, such as rendering the ground level of some buildings unfit for habitation.

Though science drives the mapping decisions, there is, of course, a political component that comes into play when the new rules are dramatically more restrictive, as was the case in Portland. Both Sen. Susan Collins and Rep. Chellie Pingree worked on behalf of Portland to get the less restrictive map. And the question that remains is if — or when — a storm like the so-called perfect storm that clobbered the southern Maine coast in 1991 hits Portland and causes extensive property damage, will FEMA officials be saying, “We told you so.”…

The Old Port in Portland, Maine, shot by PhilipC at http://www.flickr.com/photos/flissphil/3036263855/, Wikimedia Commons via Flickr, under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license

FEMA grants $5 Million for sea level rise study in North Carolina

Allamericanpatriots.com: The state of North Carolina will receive $5 million for a statewide risk assessment and mitigation strategy demonstration of the potential impacts of climate change-induced sea level rise. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security's Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) will use the results of this study to assess the long-term fiscal implications of climate change as it affects the frequency and effects of natural disasters. Information from the study will be shared with other states to inform their climate change mitigation efforts.

According to FEMA Regional Administrator Phil May, the information and results from this study may help formulate strategies to deal with potential effects of sea level rise on the nation's coast. "North Carolina has been very proactive in implementing and improving upon coastal zone management activities and policies," May said. "Although the study is focused on just the state of North Carolina, the results of the study should be applicable to other coastal states as well. In addition, the study will compliment an existing study currently being performed by FEMA which focuses on the effect of climate change on the National Flood Insurance Program."

FEMA's Mitigation Directorate administers the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP). The NFIP is an insurance, mapping, and land use program that provides the availability of federally backed flood insurance to home and business owners located in communities that participate in the NFIP….

Cape Hatteras Light is a lighthouse located on Hatteras Island in the Outer Banks of North Carolina near the community of Buxton