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Risk Estimate Led to Few Flood Policies
Dennis Rowan Sr., with wife Antoinette Rowan, covers a door with plywood at the home of his wife's aunt in the Lower Ninth Ward of New Orleans. Although many of the neighborhood's residents lack flood insurance, the aunt had a policy. "I don't know what we're going to do," one resident said.
(By Sarah L. Voisin -- The Washington Post)
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Banks are supposed to require that borrowers have flood insurance for homes that are inside designated "special flood hazard areas."
About 61 percent of single-family homes in such areas in the South are covered by flood insurance, according to a Rand Corp. analysis cited by the Insurance Information Institute. By contrast, outside those areas, only about 1 percent of property is covered.
"Flood insurance is a very tough sell -- and very few homeowners seek out flood insurance if it's not required," said Cheryl Small, president of the National Flood Determination Association, a group that represents companies that work with the flood maps.
Most of New Orleans is considered a "special flood hazard area." But most of the Lower Ninth Ward, which is a few feet higher, is not.
"I had flood insurance, but they said I didn't have to," said Jessie Philson, an area homeowner who recently returned for a visit. To save money after retiring, she said, "we dropped it."
Upon seeing the damage for the first time, she burst into tears.
"It's going to cost a fortune," Philson, a retired group home manager, said with a sigh. "I don't know what we're going to do."
Most of the Lower Ninth Ward and much of neighboring St. Bernard Parish, which was also hit hard, were not designated flood hazards because the risks were determined by calculating how much rain would accumulate on a given property in a "100-year storm event."
The mapmakers took into account ground elevations and pumping capacity in neighborhoods, but they assumed that the levees would hold and that neither the Mississippi River nor Lake Pontchartrain would spill in.
"Now when the levee breaks, that's a whole different situation," said Michael Buckley, deputy director of FEMA's flood mitigation division.
Critics charge that the maps are outdated and inaccurate.
"It's not just New Orleans," said Steve Kanstoroom, a pattern-recognition expert who has brought FEMA problems to Congress's attention and organized a Web site on the issue, http:/
