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Sugar Land city council fighting mandatory flood insurance requirments

By
Commercial Real Estate Agent with Keller Williams Realty Southwest 0576394

Sugar Land City Council has approved a resolution that encourages members of Congress to change their flood insurance mandate. Ths is an effort to keep higher insurance costs off of Sugar Land home and business owners.

The $45 million the county and levee districts have invested in improvements were designed to exceed FEMA guidelines. When the requirement for all FEMA guidelines came out, all levee districts in Fort Bend County got together and raised their levees to the standard and one foot above. Now they come back and say the insurance is mandatory. It could impact some neighborhoods up to $2,500 per household.

Currently there are two bills, one passed by the House, the other by the Senate, that conference committees will meet on to get one bill both bodies can agree on passed. House Bill 3121 is the one Sugar Land leaders object to because in spite of the millions spent to upgrade levees in Fort Bend to more than FEMA requirements, it mandates that property owners in areas subject to flooding if they were not protected by levees, dams, etc. to buy flood insurance.

The House bill was introduced last year and is important because it reauthorizes money for the National Flood Insurance Program, which impacts all who live in coastal areas. The current authorization expires Sept. 30. Council believes that the current bill not only mandates flood insurance but allows premiums to increase from 10 to 15 percent. FEMA will set the rate. 

Sugar Land has nine levees in its extraterritorial jurisdiction and city limits and currently homeowners do not have to have flood insurance protection because the levees meet all federal guidelines.

House Bill 3121 would not only require property owners kept from harm's way by levees to buy flood insurance and provides that flood insurance would cover windstorm damage.

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