The Rhody Runnel

The Rhody Runnel
Volume 2, Issue 2
Message from the New Chair
Fall 2008
Inside this issue:
I am grateful to the members
for giving me the chance to
serve as the Chair for the
Rhode Island Flood Mitigation
Association (RIFMA) for 20082009 membership year. We
have many challenges and
exciting opportunities before
us. Our mission is to advocate
for sound floodplain management practices well before the
storm, through educational
opportunities and dissemination of information to the public on floodplain issues. It is
equally important for RIFMA to
promote hurricane awareness
and the steps for people to
take that will lead to safely
weathering the storm (see
hurricane story).
gressive state in terms of
coastal, environmental and
community planning. Many
regulations already in effect
have the potential for racking
up CRS points. CRS credits are
given for erosion hazards
mapping. These maps have
been completed for the state
and can be accessed at the
Coastal Resources Management Council (CRMC) website
(http://www.crmc.ri.gov/maps
/shoreline.html). Communities
may only need to link to the
website to obtain up to 50
points in CRS credit. On top of
that a community can earn up
to 370 points through the
Coastal Erosion Regulations.
Communities should take advantage of RI Coastal Program’s beach and dune setback regulations that are
among the most stringent in
the country.
Sea levels are rising and they
are rising at a faster rate than
we have seen in the past.
CRMC, RIEMA and the State
Building Official are working
collaboratively to develop new
regulations to reduce risks
from future storms. Freeboard
elevations and Coastal A Zone
delineations are being
planned. These strategies for
sea level rise mitigating will
not only make new properties
more resilient, but they will
also translate into substantial
savings on flood insurance for
the individual and CRS credits
for the community.
Finally, there will be many
opportunities for earning Certified Floodplain Manager
An important focus for the
(CFM) credits. There will be a
coming year is to encourage
refresher course on October
the participation of all Rhode
14, 2008 followed by the CFM
Island in the Community Ratexam on October 15, 2008.
ing System (CRS). The CRS is
The next opportunity to take
a FEMA program that rewards Other overlooked CRS credits the exam will be at the RIFMA
sources for Rhode Island com- Annual Meeting in the spring
communities that go beyond
munities include; open space of 2009. We will also be hostthe minimum National Flood
Insurance Program (NFIP) re- preservation within the flood ing evening seminars and
hazard areas; stormwater
quirements with discounted
workshops throughout the
flood insurance rates. Credits management using buffer
year. Keep an eye out for the
are given for maintaining Ele- zones and low impact develschedule.
opment; compensatory flood
vation Certificates, providing
water storage requirements; a
Flood Insurance Rate Map
(FIRM) information and post- dam safety plan; drainage
Janet Freedmen is a Coastal
system maintenance, and
ing evacuation routes.
Geologist for the Rhode
flood coverage in GIS format. Island Coastal Resources
Rhode Island is a very proManagement Council
1
Message from
the Chair
1
RIFMA 2008
Annual Conference Highlights
2
RI’s New NFIP
2
State Coordinator
Rain Gardens
Plants for
Cleaner Waters
3
FEMA’s Unified
Hazard Mitigation Act (UHMA)
3
Iowa Flooding
4
CFM
4
Preparing for
Hurricane
Season
5
FEMA Map
Mod Update
5
SMARTVENT:
5
Building Green
ASFPM 2008 5
Annual Conference
Upcoming Con- 6
ferences and
Trainings
RIFMA 2008- 6
2009 Board of
Directors
Page 2
The Rhody Runnel
2008-2009 RIFMA Annual Meeting
Picture of the 2008-2009
RIFMA
Board
Many thanks
to Wayne
Barnes Secretary of RIFMA.
Wayne pulled much of the
conference together despite
his very busy schedule
RIFMA would like to
thank the Sponsors of
this year’s
conference for their
generous support!
CDM
Dewberry & Davis
FEMA, Region I
SERVPRO
SMARTVENT
URS
Michelle Burnett
can be reached at
(401) 462-7048.
Mchelle.F.Burnett@
us.army.mil
2
The RIFMA annual meeting got off to a very late
start and was single handedly saved for many
months by Wayne Barnes.
We all owe a debt of gratitude to Wayne. I also want
to thank my Board, as with
the final weeks closing in
on us all, everyone
pitched in and worked
very hard despite their
personal work schedule
deadlines. Well this year’s
meeting had some great
speakers and very timely
topics. The single most
common complaint was in
trying to select the concurrent session. The session
on Rain Gardens was terrific (see article in this issue) and of course every
time the Weather Service
comes, everyone is always
interested to hear this
years forecast. I was very
encouraged to hear one of
our own local officials receive such high reviews on
the Community rating System—so let’s do it!!
Next year’s annual meeting date is set!!!
Tuesday, April 28th, 2009.
If you have any ideas for
topics and/or are interested in presenting,
please contact Pam
Pogue, Conference Program Chair at
pamela_pogue
@urscorp.com.
I can promise you a very
prestigious national
speaker that will challenge us all to think beyond the box! We all look
forward to seeing you.
RI’s New State Flood Program Coordinator
Michelle Burnett recently
joined the Rhode Island Emergency Management Agency
(RIEMA) as the new State
Floodplain Coordinator. She
joined RIEMA with over eight
years of experience dealing
with environmental issues. She
began her career at the Rhode
Island Department of Health
administering the Bathing
Beaches Program. In 2001 she
moved over to the Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management where
she worked in the Office of Water Resources focusing her efforts on water quality standards
and regulations. Michelle recently became the seventh
Certified Floodplain Manager in
Rhode Island.
Originally from New York,
Michelle received her Bachelors in Marine Biology and
Masters Degree in Marine
Affairs, both from the University of Rhode Island.
visited in 2008. Michelle participated in the CRS Task Force
Meeting in Boston to help facilitate this. Currently only three
Rhode Island communities participate in the Community Rating System and Michelle is hopIn the upcoming months
ing to conjure additional particiMichelle is looking to focus
pation for the program in the
her attention on a number of upcoming year.
important issues including
local ordinance adoption for Michelle is also looking to asProvidence County communi- sist cities and towns within
ties, conducting a number of Providence County to review
Community Assistance Visits and adopt their ordinance to
(CAVs), and increasing parensure they comply with the
ticipation in the Community National Flood Insurance ProRating System (CRS). Migram requirements. Since
chelle had already performed there is no automatic adoption
six CAVs .
process in the State, each ordinance change or map adoption
The CRS is a program in
must go before the local town
which residents with flood
council for approval. It is imMost recently she worked for
insurance benefit by lowering perative that all communities in
the Rhode Island Division of
their flood insurance preProvidence County adopt their
Fish and Wildlife, Office of Ma- mium based upon points
ordinance before their new
rine Fisheries where she was a earned by the community.
Flood Insurance Rate Maps
Principal Marine Biologist. She Since CAVs are a prerequisite become effective.
oversaw a variety of projects
for participation in the CRS
including two Sportfish Restora- Program, she is hoping to
Michelle just became a CFM.
tion Projects, fish kill response spark interest in a number of Congrats Michelle!
efforts, and habitat issues.
the communities that will be
Fall 2008
Page 3
RAIN GARDENS: Plants for Cleaner RI Waters
During a rainstorm, rainwater that falls on roofs,
parking lots, streets and sidewalks will collect
and run downhill. On the way, rainwater picks
up all kinds of debris such as auto fluids, animal waste, fertilizers etc. This polluted water
eventually enters the nearest body of water,
polluting the water. A significant amount of
local water pollution is caused by stormwater
runoff.
A Rain Garden is designed to catch stormwater
runoff from parking lots, driveways, and roofs.
Rain gardens can catch stormwater coming
from a roof downspout and prevent it from flowing on to the street. Cellar waters discharged
from a sump pump can also be intercepted by a
rain garden. This stormwater runoff flows to the
lowest part of the garden, in the center, and
soaks down into the soil. Soil and plant roots
filter out pollutants. Thereby, allowing cleaner
water to continue down into the groundwater.
To build your rain garden, consider size, site
location and maintenance. A rain garden
should be 5% - 10% of the size of the area supplying the stormwater runoff. The center of the
garden should be four to eight inches deeper
than the rest of the garden’s level. The ideal soil
composition is 50% sand, 30% compost and
20% topsoil.
Rain Gardens result in decreasing the amount
of flooding caused by overloaded storm drains,
cleaner water entering nearby bodies of water,
trapping water that replenishes low levels of
water for local groundwater supply.
To learn more, visit www.uri.edu/ce/
healthylandscapes or contact the Northern
Rhode Island Conservation District at 401-9491480.
You may order plants for your rain garden through the New
England Wildflower Society at 508-877-7630
www.newfs.org
FEMA’s New Unified Hazard Mitigation Program
The FEMA Unified Hazard
Mitigation Assistance (UHMA)
Program under FEMA’s
Mitigation Directorate unifies
the pre-disaster grant
programs to better support the
overall goal of reducing the
loss of life and property due to
natural hazards. Recently released June 19, 2008, the
guidance combines FEMA’s
hazard mitigation programs:
Pre-Disaster Mitigation (PDM);
Flood Mitigation Assistance
(FMA), Repetitive Flood Claims
(RFC) and the Severe Repetitive Flood Loss (SRL) programs
are all authorized by the National Flood Insurance Act
(NFIA), and focus on reducing
claims against the National
Flood Insurance Fund (NFIF).
complishes the HMA objectives
of efficiency and ease of use.
First, it consolidates each program’s eligibility information
under one cover. Second, it
outlines both the common elements and spells out unique
requirements among the programs so that Federal, State
and local officials can easily
identify key similarities and
differences between the various programs. Third, the combined guidance creates a platform for future updating and
refinements of program policies and practices to make
them more unified and user
friendly. The Hazard Mitigation
Grant Program (HMGP) will be
integrated into the HMA Guidance, providing a single source
of reference for combined pre–
Combing the eligibility into one and post-disaster hazard miticomprehensive document
gation assistance.
(Hazard Mitigation Program
What does this mean for you
Guidance, June 19, 2008) ac- as a potential applicant?
3
More time to apply: One
source of information; and
combined guidance on specific
policies among the programs
including: Grants Application
Guidance; Management Costs;
Mitigation Project Sub application Guidance and Mitigation
Planning and Sub application
guidance.
More reasonable timelines
for grant submission: The
FEMA grant cycle for all HMA
programs opened on June
19, 2008 and the application
period will close on
December 19, 2008.
If you are interested in information on the FEMA Mitigation
grant programs contact Larry
Macedo or Michelle Burnette
at (401) 946-9996.
Gina DeMarco, NRICD,
delivering presentation on Rain Gardens
at the RIFMA annual
conference, June
2008
“You may order plants foryour rain garden through
the New England Wildflower Society
at 508-8777630 or
www.newfs.org
Deadlines for
submitting
FEMA Hazard
Mitigation
Grants is
December
19, 2008
Page 4
The Rhody Runnel
Iowa Flooding Could be an Act of Man, Experts Say
“We've done
numerous things to
the landscape that
took away these
water-absorbing
functions," he said.
"Agriculture must
respected.”
Kamyar Enshayan,
Cedar Rapids City
Council
Next CFM Refresher
Course is Tuesday,
October 14, 2008
from 8:30 a.m. to
4:30 p.m. at East
Providence City Hall
Please register with
Pam Pogue at pamela_pogue@urscorp.
com
CFM Exam to be
given Wednesday,
October 15, 2008
from 9:00 a.m. to
12:00 p.m.
Please register
directly with ASFPM
at www.floods.org
4
As the Cedar River rose
higher and higher, and as he
stacked sandbags along the
levee protecting downtown
Cedar Falls, Kamyar Enshayan, a college professor and
City Council member, kept
asking himself the same
question: "What is going on?"
The river would eventually
rise six feet higher than any
flood on record. Farther
downstream, in Cedar Rapids, the river would break the
record by more than 11 feet.
Enshayan, director of an environmental center at the
University of Northern Iowa,
suspects that this natural
disaster wasn't really all that
natural. He points out that
the heavy rains fell on a landscape radically reengineered
by humans. Plowed fields
have replaced tall grass prairies. Fields have been meticulously drained with underground pipes. Streams and
creeks have been straightened. Most of the wetlands
are gone. Flood plains have
been filled and developed.
"We've done numerous
things to the landscape that
took away these water-
absorbing functions," he
said. "Agriculture must respect the limits of nature."
Officials are still trying to
understand all the factors
that contributed to Iowa's
flooding, and not everyone
has the same suspicions as
Enshayan. For them, the
cause was obvious: It rained
buckets and buckets for days
on end. They say the
changes in land use were
lesser factors in what was
really just a case of meteorological bad luck. But some
Iowans who study the environment suspect that
changes in the land, both
recently and over the past
century or so, have made
Iowa's terrain not only highly
profitable but also highly
vulnerable to flooding. They
know it's a hard case to
prove, but they hope to get
Iowans thinking about how to
reduce the chances of a repeat calamity. "I sense that
the flooding is not the result
of a 500-year event," said
Jerry DeWitt, director of the
Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture at Iowa State
University. "We're farming
closer to creeks, farming
closer to rivers. Without adequate buffer strips, the water
moves rapidly from the field
directly to the surface water."
Corn alone will cover more
than a third of the state's
land surface this year. The
ethanol boom that began two
years ago encouraged still
more cultivation. Between
2007 and 2008, farmers
took 106,000 acres of Iowa
land out of the Conservation
Reserve Program, which pays
farmers to keep farmland
uncultivated, according to
Lyle Asell, a special assistant
for agriculture and environment.
Contributed By
Joel Achenbach
Washington Post Staff Writer
Published June 19, 2008
Certified Floodplain Management (CFM)
The Certified Floodplain
Manager Program (CFM
Program) has two primary
goals: to help reduce the
nation's flood losses and
protect and enhance the
natural resources and
functions of its floodplains by improving the
knowledge and abilities
of floodplain managers,
increase the prominence
of floodplain management in decision-making
by local officials and the
public.
The CFM program used
by RIFMA was developed
by and is administered by
the Association of State
Floodplain Managers
(www.floods.org). A complete discussion of the
CFM program can be
read by visiting the
ASFPM web site and
clicking under CFM.
IMPORTANT THINGS TO KNOW:
You will need to contact them to apply for the exam, and will need to pay
ASFPM directly. Contact ASFPM for
the current pricing structure. You will
need to acquire 16 CFM credits over
a two year period, RIFMA will offer
ample outreach opportunities to receive those credits (the annual conference offers 12 credits alone!)
Contact the RIFMA point of Contact
Wayne Barnes should you have
questions wbrnes@cityof east
prov.com.
Page 5
Fall 2008
2008 Hurricane Season: Are You Prepared?
We have been fortunate to
have experienced few severe
flood events in recent years.
But whenever the tropics become active, the question lingers; “Will this be the year?” It
has been seventy years since
the Great New England Hurricane of 1938 devastated the
southern New England coastal
communities. Are we ready for
another storm of that magnitude?
New England hurricanes pose
unique risks. The “Big One” for
Rhode Island will be a hurricane that moves rapidly up the
coastline, and makes landfall
in Connecticut or western
Rhode Island. The velocity from
the forward motion of the
storm combined with the hurricane force winds creates a
more severe storm than is indicated by its Saffir-Simpson
classification. Lands on the
east side of the hurricane eye,
the northeast quadrant, will
experience the highest winds
speeds and maximum storm
surge. A second consequence
of the rapid forward movement
of the storm is that there will be
very little time to evacuate. Due
to the varied topography in
Rhode Island, homeowners,
vacationers, and visitors do
not need to go far to get out
of the flood zone, but they do
need to go fast. There are
simple steps that will be crucial for saving lives when the
storm is heading this way.
First is to know if you are in a
flood zone. Flood zone maps
can be accessed at the Federal Emergency Management
Agency (FEMA) Map Center
and searched by street address or by community
(http://msc.fema.gov/webap
p/wcs/stores/servlet/Catego
ryDisplay?catalogId=10001&
storeId=10001&categoryId=
12001&langId=1&userType=G&type=1). The
Rhode Island Flood Insurance Rate Maps (NFIP) are
being updated, so it is important to err on the side of caution. If you are located close
to a flood zone, assume that
you are in a flood zone. If you
are in a flood zone, be prepared to evacuate. Evacuation route maps can be
found on the RI Emergency
Management Agency (RIEMA)
website
(http://www.riema.ri.gov/haz
ards/hurricane_evac.php).
Have an evacuation plan that
includes a destination; a
friend’s or relative’s house
that is located outside of the
flood zone, a hotel or an
emergency shelter; accommodations for your pets; a
contact outside of the disaster area who can act as a
clearing house on the status
of family members. Tips for
developing a disaster plan
can be found on the Red
Cross website
(http://www.redcross.org/ser
vices/disaster/0,1082,0_60
1_,00.html).
There is no room for complacency or hesitation when the
hurricane watch, then warning is sounded. The first order of business is safety for
you and your family.
Contributed by Janet
Freedman, Rhode Island
Flood Mitigation Association
Chair
“There is no
room for complacency or
hesitation when
the hurricane
watch, then
warning is
sounded. The
first order of
business is
safety for you
and your
family.”
Janet Freedman, RIFMA
Chair
FEMA Mapping and Modernization Program
Under Map Modernization,
FEMA is utilizing state-of-theart technology to increase
quality, reliability, and availability of flood hazard maps
and data in the 19,000 communities which are participants in the National Flood
Insurance Program (NFIP). In
Rhode Island, updated studies
have been performed or are
underway for multiple
5
communities. As a result of
part of this work, a Digital
Flood Insurance Rate Map
(DFIRM) is anticipated to become effective for Providence
County in Spring of 2009.
Last year the Bristol County
DFIRM was released. Other
work currently underway includes Washington and Kent
counties.
Mike Goetz,
FEMA Region I
Hazards Risk
Branch Chief
giving update
on the
MAPMOD
program
ASFPM Annual Conference 2008
Items for publication and other
editorial matters should be
directed to:
Pamela Pogue, CFM
Editor, Rhody Runnel
Pamela_pogue@urscorp.com
For This Issue:
Editor in Chief: Emily Pogue
Assistant Editor: Pam
Pogue, CFM
The 32nd annual conference of the Association of
State Floodplain Managers
again exceeded all expectations, with over 1,300
professionals gathering in
Reno, Nevada, from May
18-23, 2008. Expertise
from an astonishingly wide
array of disciplines and
perspectives contributed
to a thorough examination
of the holistic theme, “A
Living River Approach to
Floodplain Management.”
Plenary sessions with distinguished speakers,
small-group panels and
subsequent discussions,
training, technical field
trips, exhibits, and networking filled the week.
The opening plenary session looked ahead to the
future and how we will
need to be managing
floods in the decades
ahead. Presentations at
the plenary sessions included: discussion of the
shifts in population and
climate that have the potential to dramatically alter
the future, emphasizing
that we still have time to
influence decisions and
markets to favor sustainable approaches. Also presented was some of the
latest research and climate modeling of regional
and localized shifts in climate and climate impacts,
stressing that future surprises are inevitable and
that they may be pleasant
or grim. Finally unveiled
“principles for alternative
insurance programs” that
it would behoove decision
makers to adopt in designing future indemnification
schemes.
Photographs showing
many of the week’s activities, an updated participant list, and other
information about the
Reno conference are being
posted at
http://www.floods.org. The
technical papers
presented at the conference will be released as
proceedings this fall.
SMARTVENT: Building Green
Pam Pogue, CFM RIFMA Past Chair
Pater LaPolla, Cranston City Planner
6
One of the biggest
trends in construction
today is “Green Building”. We see references to it everywhere,
we see it, hear it, and
embrace it as a concept. However questions have arisen, ’what
is green?’ ’can you
really build green in a
flood plain?’
First of all, SMARTVENT
products have always
been green. They are
manufactured from
steel, one of the most
recycled products available. Contribute very
little waste, low lifecycle cost, and are engineered to contribute
to the sustainability of a
building.
Next, can you build
green in a flood plain?’
Of course you can! To
build green requires
that you plan properly
before actually building,
whether renovation or
new construction. The
building site selection
must be adjacent to a
flood plain, because
today’s adjacent site
will be IN the floodplain
of tomorrow. If you’d
like to build on a site
that happens to be on a
flood plain? Simple,...
elevation.
So you see, it is easy to
build green even in a
flood plain, using
SMARTVENT and these
tips. For more information visit
www.smartvent.com
**Taken from the July
2008 SMART
Times
Upcoming Conferences and Trainings
September 21–23, 2008: MANY WATERS, MANY LANDS: 2008 SYMPOSIUM ON RIVER MANAGEMENT AND
ECOSYSTEM SERVICES, Chicago, Illinois. Sponsored by the University of Illinois at UrbanaChampaign. Contact Michelle Chappell at (217) 333-2880 or conferences@uiuc.edu or see
http://www.conferences.uiuc.edu/conferences/conference.asp?ID=423.
October 7–9, 2008: FLOW 2008: INTERDISCIPLINARY SOLUTIONS TO INSTREAM FLOW PROBLEMS, San Antonio,
Texas. Sponsored by the Instream Flow Council, Texas Parks and Wildlife, and others. See
http://www.instreamflowcouncil.org/flow2008/index.htm.
October 11–15, 2008: CREATING SOLUTIONS THROUGH COLLABORATIVE PARTNERSHIPS: FOURTH ANNUAL
COASTAL AND ESTUARINE HABITAT RESTORATION CONFERENCE, Providence, Rhode Island. Sponsored by Restore
America’s Estuaries America’s Estuaries. See http://www.estuaries.org/?id=4.
October 13–16, 2008: ADVANCED FLOODPLAIN MANAGEMENT CONCEPTS II (E282), Emergency Management
Institute, Emmitsburg, Maryland. Contact (800) 238-3358 or see http://www.training.fema.gov/EMIweb/.
October 14, 2008: CFM Refresher Course, East Providence City Hall, East Providence. Contact Pam Pogue at pamela_pogue@urscorp.com
October 15, 2008: CFM Exam. East Providence City Hall, East Providence. Register at www.floods.org
November 11-14, 2008: GULF COAST HURRICANE PREPAREDNESS, RESPONSE, RECOVERY, AND REBUILDING CONFERENCE , Mobile, AL www.pianc.iwr.usace.army.mil/2008_gulfcoast_conf.htm
November 13-14, 2008: THE INSTITUTE FOR BUSINESS AND HOME SAFETY (IBHS) ANNUAL PROPERTY LOSS REDUCTION CONFERENCE: BUILDING SOLUTIONS THROUGH SCIENCE, Tampa, FL www.disastersafety.org/conference/
November 16-20, 2008: ASFPM NATIONAL FLOODPROOFING CONFERENCE, New Orleans, LA. Contact Diane Brown
at diane.@floods.org
November 19-20, 2008: WORKSHOP TOWARDS REGIONAL COASTAL HAZARDS RESILLIENCY, New London, CT
www.gomoos.org/news/hazardsworkshop.html
Save the Date: April 28, 2009: RIFMA ANNUAL CONFERENCE
RIFMA 2008-2009 BOARD OF DIRECTORS
CHAIR
Janet Freedman
Coastal Geologist
RI Coastal Resources Management
Council
4808 Tower Hill Road
Wakefield, RI 02879
(401) 783-3370
jfreedman@crmc.ri.gov
TREASURER
Ron Miner, P.E.
Associate
CDM Inc.
One Cambridge Place
50 Hampshire Street
Cambridge, MA 02139
(617) 452-6088
MinerRD@cdm.com
VICE CHAIR
Lenny Cook, CFM
Storm Solutions
25 Stoney Run Lane
Marion, MA 02738
(508) 748-9589
lenny@smartvent.com
VICE-TREASURER
Buvana Ramaswamy
Environmental Scientist
CDM Inc.
One Cambridge Place
50 Hampshire Street
Cambridge, MA 02139
(617) 452-6249
Ramaswamyb@cdm.com
SECRETARY
Wayne Barnes, CFM
Planner I
145 Taunton Avenue
East Providence, RI 02914
(401) 435-7537
wbarnes@cityofeastprov.com
7
AT LARGE MEMBERS
Michelle Burnett, CFM
Dennis Charland
Pamela Pogue, CFM
Erik Skadberg, P.E.
RIFMA Vice Chair, Lenny Cook and Secretary Wayne
Barnes at the 2008 Annual Meeting
Newly elected RIFMA Chair, Janet Freedman