By JOSEPH KELLARD
The Federal Emergency Management Agency last week released redrawn Nassau County flood plain maps, which show that nearly 30,000 more homeowners — including 3,000 or more in each of three communities, Long Beach, Oceanside and Valley Stream — may have to pay thousands of dollars in flood insurance.
The expanded zones are deemed at risk of flooding by coastal waters or during heavy rain storms, and the updated maps are based on more precise geographic and elevation measurements, according to FEMA.
The National Flood Insurance Program, an arm of FEMA, requires that homeowners in flood zones show proof of flood insurance, which is underwritten by the federal government. NFIP rates are based on such factors as a property’s elevation and whether its structure has a basement.
Homeowners will be able to appeal FEMA’s map plan, which the agency expects to finalize by next July. But homeowners are being warned that the plan may be finalized as soon as November, and are being encouraged to buy insurance now, while they can still get it at rates averaging $300 to $500.
“For some people, it’s going to hit them hard if they still have a mortgage,” said Denis Miller, a flood and home specialist in Long Beach. “And if they don’t buy a policy prior to the changing of the maps, they’re going to get slammed for $1,500 or $2,000, and they can buy a policy now for $300.”
Ruth Hansell, 90, who has lived on West Olive Street in Long Beach since 1970, said her insurance company recently mailed her a letter urging her to take out flood insurance. But Hansell, who said her home has never flooded, refuses to do so. “How can they require that I take out insurance?” Hansell said about FEMA’s plan. “They’re going to tell me what to do? All they want is money.”
In Long Beach, West Olive, West Penn and West Beech streets, between Laurelton and Magnolia boulevards, are among the streets listed on the temporary maps.
“Three thousand houses sounds like a lot, but not compared to the total number of houses in Long Beach ...,” said Miller, who has studied all the temporary maps. “The truth is, Long Beach isn’t affected that much, since the majority of Long Beach is [already] in a flood zone.”
Miller said that in addition to Long Beach, virtually every home in Point Lookout, Atlantic Beach and North Woodmere will now be included on FEMA’s flood plain maps, and that Valley Stream and Oceanside will be hit hardest. “Oceanside is getting slammed — slammed,” said Miller, who believes that as many as 3,000 houses in the community, most of which is not currently part of a flood zone, will be affected.
“The map is kind of hard to read, but it looks like places like the Alahambra and Valley Townhouses are changing,” he continued. “Third, Fourth and Fifth streets and Mott Street, and the streets back by Oceanside park, Greentree Drive and others, are changing, along with Chamberlain and its surrounding street, too.”
Homeowners will have the chance to question the redrawn maps at three public meetings, coordinated by FEMA and the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation, at Cantiague Elementary School in Jericho on July 22, at the Theodore Roosevelt Legislative Building in Mineola on July 23, and at Nassau Community College in Garden City on July 24. Nassau County Emergency Management Commissioner James Callahan and Legislator Denise Ford said they asked FEMA to hold an additional meeting on the Long Beach barrier island so its residents don’t have to travel too far. “They told me they are going to look into it, but we’ll see,” Callahan said.
After the meetings, residents can challenge the map plan by way of an appeals process. But both Miller and Callahan said that most residents will not go to the trouble to take this step, which may move the date by which the maps are adopted up to as early as November. “It’s going to be so hard to appeal because you are appealing wave surge and elevation of your homes, and that’s going to be tough, and it’s going to go fast,” Miller said.
Barbara Lynch, a spokeswoman for FEMA Region 2, which encompasses New York and New Jersey, said the appeals process would likely begin in August and last 90 days, after which the agency has six months to resolve any questions. “The way the statute is written,” Lynch explained, “the maps would not go into effect until six months after the last appeal is resolved.”
Morris Kramer, an Atlantic Beach resident who has studied environmental issues for four decades, said that while FEMA’s focus is on a major — Category 3 — hurricane, Long Beach is more likely to be hit by a Category 1 storm that can nevertheless cause “a lot of damage and death.” Kramer explained that many houses on the barrier island are built on concrete slabs, without basements, and wave action from a direct hit by a Category 1 hurricane could push them off their foundations and into other homes, and cause flooding in every home and first-floor business.
“This is something that is definitely needed,” Kramer said of the redrawn maps. “ … Basically, we have to get more people into the flood insurance program. Obviously no one likes the incredible rate increase, but that’s where the market rate should be, instead of being subsidized by the government.”
Martha Ross, who bought her home on West Penn Street in 1999, said she would rather have the option not to buy flood insurance. “I didn’t need flood insurance when I bought my house in 1999 and I’ve never had a flood here, not even the basement got wet,” Ross said. “It frightens me because I’ll have to spend more money.”
Since Hurricane Katrina, FEMA has been running a financial deficit, and with the recent massive floods in the Midwest, the agency is expect to pay out many claims that will likely make that deficit grow. But while some homeowners, like Hansell, believe the expanded maps are simply a way for FEMA to refill its coffers, others say the agency’s plan is not necessarily a reaction to recent natural disasters.
“It’s something they started several years ago,” Callahan said. “New Orleans and the surrounding areas were done before Hurricane Katrina. So they tend to try to redo the maps every 10 years, but it’s been a lot of years since they’ve redone them. So I cannot say it’s a knee-jerk reaction because they need money. I would guess that the recent floods had absolutely nothing to do with this.”
Lynch said that legislation was passed in 2003 to redo the maps, and that for many parts of the nation, including Nassau County, those maps are up to 30 years old. “So there was a widespread conviction that the maps, if they were to be useful at all, had to reflect the facts on the ground today,” she said.
Others worry that the increased insurance costs — as well as the costs of potential requirements to raise buildings or homes and other renovations to reduce flood risk — could further cripple an already damaged housing market. “This is another potential blow to homeowners in this mortgage crisis market,” said Joseph Ponte, a broker for Prudential Douglas Elliman in Long Beach and a member of the Long Island Board of Realtors. “Some of these increases can go up to $4,000 to $5,000 based on the value of your home. This could jeopardize their homes and they might have to sell them.”
For more about the current and proposed flood maps, go to Nassau County’s Web site, nassaucountyny.gov, and click on “FEMA Flood Map Information” at the bottom of the home page, or call Callahan at (516) 573-0636.
Comments about this story? JKellard@liherald.com or (516) 569-4000 ext. 213.
