[Congressional Record Volume 146, Number 90 (Thursday, July 13, 2000)]
[House]
[Page H6026]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




              REFORM OF THE FLOOD INSURANCE PROGRAM NEEDED

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Oregon (Mr. Blumenauer) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. BLUMENAUER. Mr. Speaker, we are engaged in a race with Mother 
Nature that we will most assuredly lose. In the past on the floor of 
this Chamber I have discussed reform of the flood insurance program, 
which as presently constituted encourages people to live, in fact, 
subsidizes people to live in places where God has repeatedly shown that 
He does not want them. Currently this is a critical issue, because we 
are concentrating our population in areas that are near the coastline. 
In California alone, 80 percent of the population lives within 30 miles 
of the Pacific Ocean.
  We have had studies, the most recent one the Heinz Report, which has 
shown in several of the areas that they have studied in the coastal 
area development has increased 60 percent in the last 20 years in high 
hazard areas. The report concluded for our Federal Emergency Management 
Agency that in the next 60 years, we will probably lose 25 percent of 
the structures that are located within 500 feet of the coastline. In 
the next 10 years alone there are 10,000 structures that are directly 
at risk.
  Yet at the same time we are involved with a massive program 
attempting to reconstruct our beaches, without a sense of cost, and, in 
many cases with a 50-year maintenance operation, we are at work dumping 
the equivalent of over 3,000 truckloads of sand per day in this race 
with nature.
  There are many States that are fortifying the coastline, virtually 
walling them off, keeping people away from the beaches, and, 
ironically, this costly effort at engineering is actually accelerating 
the erosion process. We are in fact making it worse by our efforts.
  We are giving a false sense of security so more people live in harm's 
way, which increases the amount of Federal money at risk. The 
fortification halts the natural process of regenerating the beaches, 
and the construction of what are called groins and jetties in the 
fortification actually deflects that power further along the coast and 
increases the scourging action, undercutting and sweeping the beaches 
away. In many cases, we are doing this time and time and time again.
  Since 1950, in Virginia Beach, Virginia, there have been 46 efforts 
at restoring that beach. It is time to stop making it worse with 
development and with remedial actions that are not carefully thought 
through.
  I strongly suggest that this Congress take three important steps:
  First, to revise the funding formulas, so that we are not subsidizing 
people living in harm's way and putting the Federal taxpayer at risk.
  It is time to revise the flood insurance program. The legislation 
that the gentleman from Nebraska (Mr. Bereuter) and I have introduced, 
the Two Floods and You Are Out of the Taxpayer Pocket, would be an 
important step in that fashion.
  Finally, and perhaps most important, it is time for us to stop having 
development occur in these inappropriate coastal locations.
  If we take simple, common sense steps, we can end up making our 
communities more livable, saving the taxpayer money and avoiding more 
serious problems in the future.

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