The Nation's Responses To Flood Disasters: A Historical Account

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POSTSCRIPT
Over the last 30 years the nation has learned that effective
floodplain management can reduce vulnerability to
damages and create a balance among natural and human
uses of floodplains and their related watersheds to meet
both social and environmental goals. The nation,
however, has not taken full advantage of this knowledge.
The United States simply has lacked the focus and the
incentive to engage itself seriously in floodplain
management.
Sharing the Challenge: Floodplain Management Into the 21 st Century
What assessments can be made of the nation’s responses to flood disasters during
the 20th century, particularly during the last three decades after creation of the NFIP, a
watermark event? Judged by the record, the response has been mixed. More than 19,000
communities adopted some form of regulation over development in identified floodhazard
areas. Awareness of floodplain functions and resources, and of their importance
and value, greatly increased. Floodplain management became “institutionalized.”
Average annual flood losses continued to increase, tracking a similar finding at midcentury
after a massive effort of flood control starting in the 1930s. Congress did not
assign authority or give responsibility to address the nation’s flood problems and causes
to a single agency nor did it provide a coordinated approach to federal efforts to reduce
flood losses and protect floodplain natural functions. Instead, present approaches involve
many laws, executive orders and directives, administrative regulations, agency policies
and programs, and interagency actions. The federal response during the 1990s generally
involved liberalized programs of disaster assistance.
There have been other judgments. The Interagency Floodplain Management
Review Committee noted in its 1994 report that “over the last 30 years the nation has
learned that effective floodplain management can reduce vulnerability to damages and
create a balance among natural and human uses of floodplains and their related