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From Jan. 7-8, 2014, C.A. Shields and David Braun of the Bay Area Houston Economic Partnership represented BAHEP in Washington, D.C., as part of a delegation speaking to members of Congress about the importance of making major changes to the Biggert-Waters Flood Insurance Reform Act of 2012 (BW-12) and the National Flood Insurance Program.
Posted: Monday, January 13, 2014 12:13 pm | Updated: 10:43 am, Tue Jan 14, 2014.
From Jan. 7-8, 2014, C.A. Shields and David Braun of the Bay Area Houston Economic Partnership represented BAHEP in Washington, D.C., as part of a delegation speaking to members of Congress about the importance of making major changes to the Biggert-Waters Flood Insurance Reform Act of 2012 (BW-12) and the National Flood Insurance Program.
The trip was organized by Caitlin Berni with the Coalition for Sustainable Flood Insurance (CSFI) and Greater New Orleans, Inc. It was in conjunction with a vote on Senate Bill 1846 that was to have taken place in the Senate on Jan. 8. If passed, the bill would delay implementation of many portions of BW-12 for several years. However, the Senate vote on BW-12 was rescheduled for early next week, since the Senate unexpectedly had the votes to pass unemployment insurance. It was decided to complete that legislation before taking up legislation on flood insurance.
Shields and Braun had scheduled meetings on Tuesday, Jan. 7, with representatives in both Sen. John Cornyn and Sen. Ted Cruz’s offices to share with them the need to change BW-12, which impacts over 645,000 Texans, by voting for SB 1846. On Wednesday, Jan. 8, they visited all 36 Texas representatives in the House and gave each office information packets on House Bill 3370, a companion bill to that in the Senate. They also left other information about the impact of BW-12 on Texans.
The CSFI delegation knows that the fight to fix BW-12 is an uphill battle. The group found widespread support for changing BW-12; however, members of Congress have differing opinions on what that fix should be. Several stated that they would rather see changes made to BW-12 NOW rather than just postponing things for a number of years. Most congressional offices indicated that making changes to BW-12 is a top priority for them as they returned to work this week from their Christmas break.
BAHEP, together with the CSFI coalition, will continue to keep this issue on the front burner and push for a final resolution. Both groups encourage everyone to write or call their representatives in Congress and ask them to make much needed changes to BW-12.
More information can be found atwww.bayareahouston.com/content/flood_insurance/flood_insurance
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