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

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The Nation’s Responses to Flood Disasters: A Historical Account
activities. During the first two years of the program, $2.3 million was available for 30
approved projects. In 1988, the South Carolina legislature acted to restrict new
development along erosion-prone beachfronts. In Wisconsin, a Governor’s Executive
Order directed every state agencies to ensure that all construction, funding, and
permitting actions consider flood hazard standards. State administrative rules, applicable
to local floodplain regulations, were also strengthened.
Local activities. Because it was not possible to survey all the nation’s floodprone
localities in the 1989 ASFPM study, the states provided information about local
programs. The ASFPM requested information about typical local floodplain
management activities in the states even though it recognized the difficulty of
determining a community with a typical floodplain management program. Seventeen
states provided information about local activities.
Local programs tended to vary most dramatically according to the size of the
community. Small communities generally lacked technical expertise, operated with parttime
personnel, and had only limited resources. Small, especially rural, communities and
in particular those in certain parts of the country tended to resist planning and regulation.
Larger towns and urban areas almost always accepted and provided for such measures as
an effective strategy for accommodating their populations and maintaining a certain
quality of life.
The reported approaches of local communities to flood hazard reduction varied
from state to state. Some states had statutes mandating localities to regulate in certain
ways, to certain standards, and take other flood loss reduction measures. Other states left
the decisions more fully in local hands. This had a significant effect on community
action. Unless the flood hazard was extremely serious, small communities generally
regulated to NFIP or minimum state floodplain management standards. A 1980 study 141
concluded that for most sizeable localities, flooding was simply not a salient concern
compared to other problems faced by local officials.
In an overview of state and local programs in effect at the end of the 1980s, the
ASFPM survey report stated that “in the information about local and state programs, the
NFIP minimum criteria and other ‘federal requirements’ are mentioned repeatedly. It is
clear that federal standards are compelling state and local governments to take certain
measures to cope with flood hazards. In some cases, the state and/or local activity would
not even be taking place if not for the fact that it is required by the federal government; in
other instances, complying with the federal requirement is the first step that sets the state
or locality off on its own tailored effort.” 142 Without question, by the end of this decade,
requirements imposed on states and localities to receive certain federal benefits to prepare
141 French, S. P., and R. J. Burby, Managing Flood Hazard Areas: The State of Practice, (University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 1980).
142 Floodplain Management 1989, p. 44.