FEMA Taking Another Look at Lafourche Levees in Louisiana

Officials in Louisiana’s Lafourche Parish say the Federal Emergency Management Agency is reconsidering a levee policy that would create higher flood-insurance rates and elevation requirements.

FEMA won’t acknowledge some Lafourche levees exist because the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers says they are too low for hurricane protection.

FEMA now says it will take a second look at those areas before finalizing new flood-risk maps.

“It’s absolutely the best news we could hear,” Parish President Charlotte Randolph said. “We have been fighting one of the most difficult fights that I’ve experienced.”

Parish officials argued FEMA’s policy is unfair and doesn’t accurately reflect the actual flood risk in the area.

FEMA’s flood maps, which are undergoing the first update since the 1980s, serve as an official estimate of flood risk and are used to determine insurance rates and elevation heights for new construction in flood-prone areas. The maps must be adopted before parishes enrolling in the National Flood Insurance Program, the only local supplier of flood insurance.

Though the Larose-to-Golden Meadow levee system is a federal levee, the corps decertified it after Hurricane Katrina, citing its height. Many other area systems were never federally built, meaning they also went uncertified.

New construction in areas protected by the Larose-to-Golden Meadow levee must be built to an elevation of two to three feet. Under the new maps, those buildings would have to be elevated up to eight feet in Larose and 14 feet in Golden Meadow.

In addition, premiums on new flood-insurance policies were expected to increase dramatically under the new maps.

Information from: The Courier