Sarasota County rolls out searchable flood risk maps (North Port, Englewood: 2015, renter)

[SoFLGal]

Sarasota County rolls out searchable flood risk maps | HeraldTribune.com

[Macgregorsailor51]

Is this going to be happening for Charlotte CO.?

[SoFLGal]

I haven't heard anything about Charlotte Co.

User - friendly flood maps released
North Port Sun (FL) - Tuesday, February 10, 2015
Author: ALLISON SHIRK ; Staff Writer

NORTH PORT — Sarasota County officials have answered the request of county residents to make a more user - friendly version of the preliminary flood maps created by the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

With a simple address search on the county’s website, scginternet.scgov.net/floodmaps, residents can now easily locate their homes on the updated floodplain maps to see whether they fall into a high flood -risk zone, which can dramatically affect a property owner’s insurance rate.

“This is a huge relief,” said Shannon Moore of North Port, a Realtor at Green Lion Realty. “What would take us hours to look up before now only takes about 10 minutes.”

The new floodplain maps , which haven’t been updated since 1981, target about 42,000 properties affected in Sarasota County. About 22,600 parcels of North Port’s 60,000 platted lots will be affected. Unincorporated Sarasota County, including Englewood and the Warm Mineral Springs community, has 10,500 parcels added to the new maps .

However, North Port officials said only about 700 homes total, including the 200 homes already within the flood zone, will be affected by the new maps because those 700 have structures on the land parcels touching the flood line. Julie Bellia, city project administrator, said insurance coverage is usually based on whether that flood -risk zone touches structures on the land parcel, like homes, pools and/or sheds.

When looking at the interactive maps online, areas marked in dark blue are considered to be in high-risk flood zones and areas in moderate-risk flood zones are in dotted gray areas. Other areas of low risk have no indicators, according to a statement from the city.

Moore said the new maps are much easier and “very impressive.” She said she has looked up about 20 different homes of potential clients looking to buy in North Port since the user -friendly maps were published online by the county last week.

“Before we were trying to pinpoint homes on these archaic maps ,” Moore said. “It was like it was 1980 again, and we were using the (library) Dewey Decimal System.”

Moore said so far, nearly all the homes she looked up haven’t been in a high flood -risk zone.
But city officials said last month at public meetings in the county to discuss the new FEMA maps that even if a resident isn’t in a high- flood risk zone, he should buy flood insurance.

According to the official site of the FEMA National Flood Insurance Program, www.floodsmart.gov, homes and businesses may qualify for the preferred-risk policy, with premiums starting as low as $129 annually for a home and its contents and $643 annually for a commercial building and its contents.

Bruce Bender, an independent insurance consultant hired by the Southwest Florida Water Management District, said at the January meetings that almost one-third of disaster insurance claims he sees come from low-risk areas.

Bender said he encourages people to get flood insurance as quickly as possible, so they can get it at a lower rate for a longer period of time. He said that flood insurance rates will increase 15 to 18 percent starting next year, and if residents buy it now, then they can keep that low rate in a “grace” period through 2016 and into 2017.

He also said at the public meeting in January that all the older homes in the city built before FEMA flood maps were created in 1981 should get insurance coverage even if they don’t have a lender for their mortgage. He said if owners of those homes want to sell in the future then they can transfer their flood insurance policy with a better rate to the new homeowners. To get more information about how flood insurance policies work, residents may call the NFIP toll-free at 1-888-379-95311-888-379-9531 FREE.

FEMA also initiated a 90-day public appeal period on Jan. 30 that will end April 30. During that. any owner or renter of property in the community affected by the newly proposed flood zones may file a written appeal based on “evidence” that the proposed changes by FEMA are scientifically or technically incorrect.

There will be open-house meetings to discuss any ongoing questions about the appeal process and preliminary map changes at the end of February and through all of March at various locations in the county. City and county officials said the FEMA map changes will be finalized and go into effect early next year.