After being flooded twice since 2005, courtesy of a swollen Sweetwater Creek, Janet Taylor of Austell and Jim Skelton of Lithia Springs moved to higher ground. Both rebuilt after the first encounter (Hurricane Dennis in 2005) and then got soaked the second time around (September 2009), when they had to leave those renovated homes.
Initially, neither home was in a recognized flood zone. Now they both are.
Taylor and Skelton are intimate with a flood’s disastrous effects so, in the wake of the Federal Emergency Management Agency redrawing the local flood maps, I sought their best homeowner advice.
“Even though we’re in a drought right now, looking at the flood maps would be the No. 1 thing [to do],” said Taylor, 48, an assistant vice president at Community Bank of the South. “I would say that if there’s a creek anywhere in your vicinity I would get flood insurance. People don’t want to spend any more money nowadays than they have to, but the weather has changed so drastically over the years. Right now it’s not raining, but back in 2009 it was raining so much look what it did.”
For residents susceptible to water damage, Skelton is more succinct: “I would tell them that if they’re not willing to move and they don’t buy flood insurance, they’re stupid. And the government oughtn’t to pay them in these government giveaways that come.”
Although many flood victims were not in flood zones, Skelton, 69, said a little homework may have told them they were in danger of going under water. Before the flooding, he learned that was the case with his own home. “I had water in the backyard and it got to my furnace, which is underneath the house; I called my insurance company up and they said, ‘Uh, guess what, you don’t have insurance for that. That’s flood.’”
Skelton underlines the “homework” part — make sure your insurance agent has done his or hers. He cited a neighbor who suffered a $100,000 flood loss, after being told inaccurately that he was not eligible for insurance.
“There’s a lot of misinformation out there,” Skelton said, “and not to beat up on insurance guys, but they’re part of the problem.”
Taylor pays approximately $300 a year for flood insurance for her new house. It’s not in a flood zone but, after two floodings, she has insurance for peace of mind. The new house is located up a hill from the childhood home that she lost, along with all her belongings.
She describes its location this way: “The floor in my new house is 7 feet above the roof of the old house.”
Taylor’s new home sits about 80 feet higher than his old house, which he still owns. But now it’s in a newly designated flood zone.
“It will probably never flood again,” he said of his former home. “But that’s what we thought after the first flood. Rebuilding doesn’t even bother me, but having all my stuff out in the front yard drying again, that’s not fun anymore.”
As for FEMA updating the flood maps, Skelton added, “I think it’s about 20 years overdue.”
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