[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 163 (2017), Part 10]
[House]
[Pages 13867-13868]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                SOLVING PROBLEMS OF REPETITIVE FLOODING

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
Oregon (Mr. Blumenauer) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. BLUMENAUER. Mr. Speaker, as we watch the horrific scenes of 
destruction from Hurricane Harvey and Irma, I must say that I have been 
taken back in time.
  I came to Congress 20 years ago in the aftermath of serious flooding 
in my hometown of Portland, Oregon. I was Portland's Commissioner of 
Public Works at the time, and we had to scramble to try and prevent 
flood damage into our central city.
  Since that time, I have spent a great deal of time and energy 
focusing on what we can do to solve problems of repetitive flooding, 
having Federal policies in place that makes it less likely that people 
will be in harm's way. Sadly, over the course of over 20 years, we are 
very slow to learn these messages.
  First and foremost, we continue to provide payments to properties 
that are repeatedly flooded. When we started over 15 years ago on a 
program for reforming the flood insurance program, one of the best 
examples that we used for the need for reform was a home in suburban 
Houston that had flood insurance payments 17 times in less than 20 
years. The total was over $1 million for a piece of property that was 
less than $120,000 in value. We would have been far better off buying 
it at a generous price and returning it to its natural state, saving 
the taxpayers money and minimizing future flood damage.
  Such is the case when we looked at what was going on with Hurricane 
Katrina, where we have problems in Louisiana over the years, a city, 
New Orleans, that is slowly settling, and has engaged in development in 
some areas where people, like in the lower Ninth Ward, were repeatedly 
subjected to flood damage.

[[Page 13868]]

  But what we have done too often in the past is we have put people 
back in harm's way. We shouldn't be spending Federal flood relief to 
put people back in the same situation and having a problem with rising 
tides because of global warming, changing weather patterns that are 
going to cost us more money and put more people at risk.
  There are some simple steps. First, we ought to get rid of the 
deficit for the flood insurance program. There is no way that premiums 
are going to make up a deficit of over $24 billion that is going to be 
even bigger after the bills become due for Irma and for Harvey. Let's 
stop pretending that.
  Wipe the slate clean, like we did with the so-called doc fix, and get 
down to solutions. Part of the solution is to make sure that people pay 
actuarial rates for flood insurance. Pay what it has cost. Disguising 
that cost gives people a false sense of security and reduces that 
economic incentive to get out of harm's way, while it makes it less 
likely that the program will be self-supporting.
  Have adequate, accurate flood insurance maps. We ought to immediately 
move towards accurate flood maps so that people get the right signals. 
Now, actuarial rates, actual flood insurance maps will cause some 
disruption and financial problems for some people, so this should be 
phased in over time; it shouldn't happen immediately. But those pricing 
signals should be clear. We should stop subsidizing some and sending 
inaccurate signals for others.
  We ought to invest in mitigation. We save about $4 for every dollar 
we spend flood-proofing areas, making them less dangerous in the 
future. These are simple, commonsense steps that have been suggested by 
experts for years.
  We do nobody any favor subsidizing them living in harm's way; 
allowing local governments to evade their responsibilities to make sure 
that people don't build in dangerous places; and putting first 
responders, police, firefighters, and utility workers at risk as they 
rush in to try and save people in dangerous situations.
  Over the next 3 months, we have a unique opportunity to finally learn 
these lessons, save taxpayer dollars, save lives, save property, and 
get on with the business in a way that is more sustainable. Given the 
problems we are facing with climate change in the future, these 
problems are only going to get worse. We ought to start now to solve 
the problem.

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