During the first week of May, I traveled to Washington D.C. with several other parish presidents, representatives from around the state, and members of the Greater New Orleans Incorporated (GNO Inc.) Regional Economic Alliance, to meet with our congressional delegation. Our purposes was simple, to urge our delegation to devise and support legislation that will address imbalances within the Biggart-Waters Act Flood Insurance Reform Act of 2012.

As it currently stands, this act—designed to bring the National Flood Insurance Program into solvency—will raise the rates of current policyholders in special flood hazard areas to rates above and beyond the scope of affordability. Add to this that despite the fact that these homeowners built their homes in compliance with previous flood elevation maps; many are now facing new elevation rates because of remapping by FEMA, but their previous rates will not be grandfathered...    -  Continue