 | Welcome to the Flood Zone is a nationally distributed resource for those interested in flood zone issues, land surveying, real estate, history, and educational opportunities. This newsletter has been proudly featured by the Association of State Floodplain Managers, the National Society of Professional Surveyors, and the Maine and New Hampshire Floodplain Management Programs. Please feel free to share with your friends and colleagues! If you no longer wish to receive this newsletter, simply click the unsubscribe link in the footer of this message. | In this Issue of Welcome to the Flood Zone: Maine NFIP Corner: "Municipal Guidance for Coastal Resilience" and "The Beaches Conference"
Real Estate Corner: "What Climate Change Will Mean For Your Home" and "How Does Climate Change Affect Real Estate Prices?"
In the News: "Bad News for the 2022 Hurricane Season: The Loop Current, a Fueler of Monster Storms, is Looking a Lot Like it Did in 2005, the Year of Katrina" and "The Adverse Effect of "Mandatory" Flood Insurance on Access to Credit"
Resources: "Rate Explanation Guide" and "Introduction to Storm Surge"
Climate Corner: "How Climate Change is Contributing to the Sand Shortage"
Banner Image: The Elkhorn River in Omaha, Nebraska, March 17, 2019. Photo from Jeff Bundy/Omaha World-Herald via AP. | Maine NFIP Corner Sue Baker, CFM, State NFIP Coordinator Municipal Guidance for Coastal Resilience The Southern Maine Planning and Development Commission and FB Environmental Associates have recently published "Municipal Guidance for Coastal Resilience: Model Ordinance Language for Maine Municipalities". This document was developed to support municipal staff and planning boards in order to integrate resilience measures into land use regulations. The document provides a menu of land use provisions and resilience measures that municipalities can incorporate into existing ordinances or combine for a standalone coastal resilience ordinance. Building climate resilience is essential for communities’ well-being and local action is critical for addressing the impacts of climate change and coastal hazards. Municipal land use planning and regulations are indispensable tools for enhancing local climate resilience. Where and how communities accommodate growth and development affects the exposure of people and property to natural hazards, as well as the health of the natural environment. Maine’s home rule status offers valuable opportunities for municipalities to adopt creative, innovative, and flexible land use solutions that address coastal hazards and are tailored to local needs and conditions. Click here to view the Municipal Guidance for Coastal Resilience Fact Sheet. Click here to download the full 45-page Guidance document. | The Beaches Conference Friday, June 10th at Berwick Academy, South Berwick The Beaches Conference is designed to inspire learning, appreciation and awareness, and promote informed decision-making and actions on our changing beaches and coasts. The event fosters the exchange of scientific, cultural, and experiential knowledge from diverse interests. Please join us in building and celebrating the partnerships needed to support long-term beach and coastal monitoring, management, and stewardship. Registration now open!
Click here to view the 2022 program and register online. | Real Estate Corner It is great to see more attention being given to the effects of climate change on real estate. See below to learn more! What Climate Change Will Mean For Your Home By: Michele Lerner, The Washington Post, March 24, 2022 Lack of knowledge about climate risk makes it difficult for buyers to recognize that their home could be more costly to maintain, more expensive to insure, and more exposed to damage and possible destruction from a storm or fire. All those possibilities could also contribute to a decline in a property’s value or the inability to sell the home in the future. Yet few consumers consider these issues when buying a home. Click here to read the full article. | How Does Climate Change Affect Real Estate Prices? By: Andrew Dehan, Rocket Mortgage, May 18, 2022 Whether you notice it or not, climate change is affecting the world around us. From droughts to fires to rising amounts of hurricanes, we’re noticing how our world is changing. These changes are causing shifts in the real estate market. But how does climate change affect real estate prices? What are the short- and long-term implications of climate change on real estate? What markets are the most at-risk? Click here to learn more! |  The Loop Current was about as far north as Tampa, Florida, in mid-May 2022. The scale, in meters, shows the maximum depth at which temperatures were 78° F (26° C) or greater. Nick Shay/University of Miami, CC BY-ND | Bad News for the 2022 Hurricane Season: The Loop Current, a Fueler of Monster Storms, is Looking a Lot Like it Did in 2005, the Year of Katrina By Nick Shay, The Conversation, May 18, 2022 The Atlantic hurricane season starts on June 1, and the Gulf of Mexico is already warmer than average. Even more worrying is a current of warm tropical water that is looping unusually far into the Gulf for this time of year, with the power to turn tropical storms into monster hurricanes. It’s called the Loop Current, and it’s the 800-pound gorilla of Gulf hurricane risks. Click here to learn more. | The Adverse Effect of "Mandatory" Flood Insurance on Access to Credit By: Kristian Blickle, Katherine Engelman, Theo Linnemann, and João A.C. Santos, Liberty Street Economics, May 23, 2022 We find that the chance of a loan application being accepted by a lender—as well as the size of loans that are accepted—are smaller in regions that experience a growth in the flood-zone coverage. Commensurate with the hypothesis that the costs of flood insurance reduce the ability of marginal households to borrow, we find that the reduction in lending is strongest for households with lower relative income and lower FICO scores, after accounting for the actual occurrences of flooding, the riskiness of a region, and borrower and bank characteristics. Click here to learn more about the study. | Rate Explanation Guide FEMA’s new rating methodology, Risk Rating 2.0: Equity in Action, considers specific characteristics of a building – the Where, How, and What – to provide a more modern, individualized, and equitable flood insurance rate. Understanding these characteristics helps to identify the building’s unique flood risk and associated premium. This fact sheet offers a simple breakdown of how rates are calculated under Risk Rating 2.0. Click here to download a PDF of the fact sheet. | Introduction to Storm Surge This 5-page infographic from Weather.gov offers a great introduction to storm surge and the many factors that influence it. Storm surge is defined as an abnormal rise of water generated by a storm, over and above the predicted astronomical tide. All locations along the U.S. East and Gulf coasts are vulnerable to storm surge, and storm surge can penetrate well inland from the coastline. During Hurricane Ike, the surge moved inland nearly 30 miles in some locations in southeastern Texas and southwestern Louisiana. Click here to view "Introduction to Storm Surge". |  Click the image above to view the 5:53 minute video on NBC News. | How Climate Change is Contributing to the Sand Shortage Video by NBCnews.com, May 30, 2022 NBC News' Joshua Johnson explains how one organization in Louisiana is battling the global sand shortage amid climate change. Click here to learn more about the sand shortage from Science.org. |  Cartoon by Nick Anderson, April 20, 2016 | | | |
