HR138SEP15

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Week Ending September 15, 2006

H.R.138 To revise the boundaries of John H. Chafee Coastal Barrier Resources System Jekyll Island Unit GA-06P.

The U.S. coastline is mapped and the maps define areas that are and are not included in the John H. Chaffee Coastal Barrier Resources System. (CBRS) The CBRS has 186 Units comprising 666 miles of coastline and 452,834 acres of undeveloped and unprotected coastal barriers in the gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic coast, the bill report noted. Those lands included in the CBRS are not subject to federal assistance, flood insurance in particular. Only Congress can add or remove land from a Unit. This bill would both add and subtract acreage in the Unit GA-06P on Jekyll Island, Georgia.

The bill’s explanation for this change is based on a 1990 act that created 271 Otherwise Protected Areas (OPA) totaling 1.786 million acres. OPA include ‘national wildlife refuges, national and state parks, military bases and conservation land owned by private organizations’. The bill report said that the mapping of the OPAs was inexact and had flaws and inaccuracies.

Jekyll Island is owned by the State of Georgia and occupied by 867 structures, privately owned. Each is allowed by a 99 year lease due to expire in 2049. Recently, homeowners attempting to remodel and rebuild their homes were advised that they would not be eligible for flood insurance because of their inclusion in the System. This bill solves the problem of those homeowners by removing from the System about 100 to 125 acres of undeveloped land and a total of 1,282 acres of other land while adding 1,157 acres of other land including wetlands and open water. The removed land would then be eligible for flood insurance and so the acres not developed could also be developed with the added value of federal flood insurance as it is that banks won’t mortgage homes in such areas without flood insurance.

Only 35 percent of the Island can be developed under current State law and this bill would free up enough land to meet that limitation. Federal governance of coastal waters includes the land under water out to a certain point so part of the lands added to the System is actually under water.

If a home with federal flood insurance is damaged by floods the flood insurance program will pay to repair and, in some cases replace the structure. The CBO estimates that the premiums paid for the now insurance-eligible structures and future structures would be less than $500,000 yearly. The value of the homes is likely to be far greater.

The National Flood Insurance program became over-extended due to payouts for damages from Hurricane Katrina in particular. Congress appropriated several billion dollars last year to further fund the program.

Sponsor: Rep. Jack Kingston (R-GA-1^st)

Vote: Passed House by voice vote September 12, 2006

Cost to the taxpayers: “CBO expects that at least 100 additional acres of land would be eligible for flood insurance, and annual premium collections would total less than $500,000 a year. CBO estimates that enacting H.R. 138 would have no significant impact on the federal budget. The bill could affect direct spending, but we expect that any net change would be negligible. Enacting the bill would not affect revenues.”

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