From this Week's FORUM...Special Opinion Piece

RAISING THE ROOF ON FLOOD INSURANCE — SPECIAL OPINiON PIECE

APRIL 4, 2013

This past week, The Forum received an unusual request from one of our colleagues at The Wave which publishes and circulates largely on the Rockaway Peninsula.

The request came from the paper’s editor, Kevin Boyle. It was for us to consider taking an editorial stance similar to that which his newspaper took in relation to what he terms a coming disaster.

The editorial focuses on the subject of impending threats to communities already devastated by Sandy after the  issuance of new advisory flood maps by FEMA as well as the threat of astronomical flood insurance premiums in the absence of government subsidy.

In addition to those factors, there remains the distinct possibility of some of us spending upwards of $80-100K to raise our homes in order to protect them against the possibility of another flood.

On and on the list goes, as does Kevin’s editorial and while Kevin and I may have our editorial differences as all editors do, I certainly respect him enough to have made every consideration of his request to have community newspapers stand together in the hopes of being noticed by the mainstream media and elected officials, in order that we might bring about the type of action necessary to bring about the changes in laws that protect our homes, businesses and our communities instead of having them remain at risk of virtual extinction.

So while I didn’t get a chance to call Kevin back in response to his inquiry, I will answer him here. YES KEVIN. I WILL JOIN WITH YOU AND THE WAVE IN SUPPORT OF SAVING OUR COMMUNITIES FROM WHAT I TOO SEE AS A POTENTIAL FUTURE DISASTER.

Having said that, I must also admit that after reading the Wave piece I realize that I am presently ill-qualified to offer my community all of the details that can help those affected residents in Howard Beach, Hamilton Beach and Broad Channel.

Since reading Kevin’s piece and understanding the enormity of the situation and all the variables that will come into play on so many different fronts, I would like instead to take excerpts from the Wave editorial and present it to you here in case you missed it and also supply you with this link, should you wish to read the entire piece.

To that end, I have already taken steps to gather as much information that is pertinent to our communities as possible for our next edition on April 11.

At that time we will have commentary from architectural professionals, government officials and a complete list of resources to guide you through answering questions about the critical issues we face ahead.

The one thing I can undoubtedly say, even after having just scratched the surface of this massive undertaking, is that it appears that our elected officials, FEMA and other agencies involved seem to be posturing themselves to ask the public to take it on their shoulders to do individual construction projects while failing to address the large scale projects that should be undertaken by the federal government to secure our communities, e.g.  the creation of seawalls, rock jetties, giant gates, raising the wetlands  into high dunes all along the coastline of 165th Avenue. The list of possibilities is endless.

So please read that which was presented in excellent detail by Mr. Boyle in The Wave and even if you find yourself frustrated at the amount of confusing detail, the one thing that remains on the top of the priority list is making the calls to our elected officials and demanding them to act on our behalf. We put them there to work for us, not to abandon our needs in what is certainly the darkest hour we have faced as a community.

http://theforumnewsgroup.com/2013/04/04/raising-the-roof-on-flood-insurance-special-opinon-piece/