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Risk Map Conversion Meetings
January 20, 21, 2011
FEMA staff will be making presentations to local community officials at four meetings organized in York and Cumberland Counties. The presentations will focus on benefits to be derived from converting to the new Risk MAP program. FEMA has expanded its mapping program to provide more tools to communities for communicating risk, risk mitigation and planning for flood risk resistant communities.
The meetings will cover the components of Risk MAP Charters including: - Mapping and Assessment
- Planning
- FEMA Resources to Support Mitigation Actions
- Communication and Coordination
- Project Milestones and Schedule
- Roles and Responsibilities
For more information contact Joseph Young at 207-624-6234 |
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Cumberland and York Counties
By Joseph Young
Mapping Coordinator
The preliminary maps have been withdrawn and the appeals process stopped. Informational meetings have been scheduled for January 20, and 21 to meet with community officials in York and Cumberland counties. (See the featured article for more information)
Kennebec County
FEMA has issued its Letter of Final Determination(LFD) and set an effective date of June 16, 2011 for the new digital maps. Communities must update their floodplain ordinance to reflect the date change and new floodplain map panels numbers by the effective date. If the ordinances have not been approved by that date the communities will be suspended from the program. For communities with town meetings in June and July this may cause a problem and require calling a special town meeting to approve the changes needed to bring their floodplain ordinance into compliance. If you have any questions regarding ordinance language or the adoption process you can contact Sue Baker (624-6230) or Janet Parker (624-6233) Androscoggin County
Most of the hydraulic and hydrological studies have been completed and the contractor is now working on mapping. Preliminary maps are expected to be distributed in May and community meetings scheduled by June providing work continues without any new problems arising.
Fort Kent
Preliminary work maps are scheduled to be delivered to the community by the end of January for review and comments from community, state and FEMA staff. Final preliminary maps for public review are scheduled for delivery in March.
For any questions regarding the floodplain mapping program please contact Joseph Young (624-6234)
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 Insurance Agent Training Scheduled
Sue BakerNFIP Coordinator
This seminar addresses basic flood insurance issues as well as some more advanced components. At the conclusion of this seminar, attendees with little or no prior NFIP experience will understand how to build a flood insurance policy from the ground up. More experienced attendees will develop an even better understanding of the:
- Standard Flood Insurance Policy's major coverage areas
- FEMA's elevation certificate
- Increased Cost of Compliance coverage
- And much more!
For more information visit our web site. |
Planning for More Resilient Communities
The NOAA Coastal Services Center provides several products and services designed to foster more resilient coastal communities:
--Summary of the April 2010 report entitled
Hazard and Resiliency Planning: Perceived Benefits and Barriers Among Land Use Planners is now available at
http://www.csc.noaa.gov/publications/social_science/Planning_for_Coastal_Hazards.pdf.
The full report, which explores the reasons that local planners do or do not incorporate hazard mitigation in their planning efforts, is also online at http://www.csc.noaa.gov/publications/social_science/NOAACSCResearchReport.pdf.
-- The Coastal County Snapshots, available at http://www.csc.noaa.gov/snapshots, are a product that gives coastal managers an instant picture of a county's exposure to flooding. Information about a county's demographics, infrastructure, and landscape is presented in easy-to-understand web based charts and graphs that can also be downloaded as a PDF report. In addition, users are given actions they can take to help address flooding in their community.
--The Road Map for Adapting to Coastal Risk Training introduces a process and key resources for incorporating hazard and climate change issues into local planning efforts. The Road Map process is designed to help communities identify priority vulnerabilities and develop strategies for integrating this information into local operations. Participants will also gain a better understanding of resources useful in a risk and vulnerability assessment. Upcoming Road Map webinar dates are November 10, 2010 and February 9, 2011. For more information or to sign up for a webinar training, visit http://www.csc.noaa.gov/digitalcoast/training/coastalrisk.html.
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Natural Hazards and Sustainability for Residential Buildings
New FEMA Publication, FEMA P-798
This document examines current green building rating systems in a broader context. It identifies green building practices-the tools of today's green building rating systems-that are different from historical residential building practices and that, unless implemented with an understanding of their interactions with the rest of the structure, have the potential to compromise a building's resistance to natural hazard events. This document discusses how to retain or improve natural hazard resistance while incorporating these green building practices. While most common green building practices provide sustainability advantages with little or no effect on structural performance or durability, others require reevaluation of the building's structural design or detailing to retain its integrity during natural hazard events. Often, only minimal design modifications are required to maintain natural hazard resistance. In this publication, FEMA defines sustainable building design as "Building design that addresses fundamental sustainability principles by optimizing the use of land, materials, energy, and water for human occupancy and ecosystem health while considering the ability of the building to resist natural hazards."
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FEMA Publications for eReaders
In 2009 Mitigation initiated a project that made the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) the first Federal Agency to make their content available through Google Books. Google Books is an online resource that allows publishers to offer viewable, search-able and download-able versions of their publications on the Google website.FEMA mitigation publications were the first to be added to the Google Books website, are available free of charge, can be downloaded and shared in PDF format.
This year, Google launched an e-reader service, making every FEMA publication housed on Google Books convertible to formats that can be downloaded and read on portable e-reader devices such as Kindles, iPads, iPhones and a broad range of eReader devices. Visit description of Google's eReader service for a complete description and visit FEMA for a sampling of FEMA publications available.
There are currently over 80 mitigation publications available on the Google Books website, and each publication is available for download to an eReader device. Searching Google Books by author, users are able to locate and download mitigation publications in PDF or eReader formats. Click here to view a sample search.
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SPO Newsletters
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Newsletter Funding
This newsletter is funded with a grant provided by the Federal Emergency
Management Agency (FEMA)
EMB-2007-CA-0874
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