Lawmakers aim to delay

flood insurance program

A bipartisan group of lawmakers Tuesday unveiled legislation that would delay for about four years several changes to the federal government’s flood insurance program that are threatening to sock thousands of people with unaffordable premium hikes. The move comes as the government is beginning to implement a significant overhaul of the much-criticized program. That overhaul passed last year with sweeping support. The revamped program was backed by both liberals and tea party conservatives but has caused a panic in places like Staten Island, N.Y., and the New Jersey coast and in flood-prone areas of Louisiana, Mississippi and Florida, where higher rates threaten to push some people out of their homes. Some of the most ardent supporters of delaying the premium increases are conservative Republicans from Southern states, where the new rules have sent some home values plummeting because of uncertainty over insurance rates and because subsidized rates can’t be passed along to buyers. New flood maps threaten to saddle some homeowners who are paying a few hundred dollars a year now with annual premiums of more than $20,000.

A year after Superstorm Sandy inundated the East Coast with record flooding that left at least 182 people dead in the U.S., residents of hard-hit New Jersey and New York shore communities still have a ways to go in rebuilding their damaged homes.

New Jersey governor, Chris Christie, began his day at the beach town of Seaside Park, where homes were flooded by two to three feet of water when the storm roared ashore a year ago.

It was hit again by disaster in September when wiring damaged by the flooding sparked an enormous fire that destroyed several blocks of boardwalk that had been rebuilt after Sandy.

Christie recalled how, in the immediate aftermath of the storm that damaged about 650,000 homes along the coast — with New Jersey, New York and Connecticut the hardest hit — he had estimated it could take two years to recover.

“We’re about halfway there,” Christie told town firefighters and local officials on Tuesday. “We all have to acknowledge that there are still thousands of people out of their homes.”

Throughout the U.S. northeast, residents in storm-hit shore communities are still coping with damaged homes and waiting for $48 billion in federal aid pledged for rebuilding, which officials have acknowledged has been paid out slowly.

Federal officials on Monday unveiled plans to release a second $5 billion round of funding from the Sandy relief fund, for New York State and City, New Jersey, Connecticut, Maryland and Rhode Island. The money is aimed at rebuilding and repairing homes damaged by the storm.

Many people say they still can’t believe they’re not back in their homes. Others are thankful for small victories in the long, arduous recovery process.

The devastated residents on Tuesday recalled the help they got from strangers in the days and months after Sandy. Some have mostly recovered from the storm, while others are still homeless or living without heat. In one touching moment, mothers sang “Happy birthday” to their 1-year-old babies who were rescued from darkened hospitals at Sandy’s peak.

Sandy, a rare, late-season tropical storm, made landfall at slightly below hurricane strength but its winds extended over 1,000 miles, causing a storm surge that sent floodwaters pouring across densely populated barriers islands of Long Island and long stretches of the New Jersey shore, leaving millions in the dark, some for weeks. In New York City, the storm surge hit nearly 14 feet, swamping the city’s subway and commuter rail tunnels for almost a week and knocking out power to the southern third of Manhattan.

Many residents struggled for weeks to find adequate supplies of gasoline as power outages left homes dark and cold and filling stations closed.

Sandy prompted officials across the region to rethink storm preparedness.

While this year’s Atlantic hurricane season has been the quietest in 45 years, with only two storms reaching hurricane strength, regional leaders said shore communities need to remain ready for similar high-powered storms.

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg in June proposed a $20 billion plan to prepare the city to better handle future storms, with measures ranging from new flood walls to building up beaches, which can be natural barriers.

“As we continue working to help families recover from Hurricane Sandy, we’re also working to make New York climate-ready so we can protect our most vulnerable communities and strengthen our economic future for generations to come,” Bloomberg said on Tuesday.