Landrieu offers bill to delay increases in flood insurance premiums

Mary Landrieu offers bill to delay increases in flood insurance premiums

Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La. introduced legislation Tuesday (May 21) to block flood insurance premium increases.

 (J. Scott Applewhite, The Associated Press)

By Bruce Alpert, NOLA.com | Times-Picayune 

May 2, 2013

WASHINGTON -- As promised, Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., introduced legislation Tuesday that would delay flood insurance premium increases authorized in 2012 legislation. The increases would be blocked until six months after the Federal Emergency Management Agency conducts an affordability study on the higher premiums. The study is mandated under the 2012 legislation.

Landrieu aides said the delay, along with the completed study, would provide Congress with the information it needs to develop a law that helps make the flood insurance program more sustainable without putting insurance out of the price range of homeowners and businesses.

In addition, the Landrieu bill would repeal provisions in the 2012 federal flood insurance bill that ended subsidized flood insurance rates when a parcel in a high risk area is sold. That would make many Louisiana homes unsellable, she said.

Her bill would also strike a provision blocking the rebuilding of community facilities destroyed in a disaster when the location is in a high-risk area.

The 2012 flood insurance bill, sponsored by Reps. Judy Biggert, R-Ill., and Maxine Waters, D-Caif., was added to a transportation bill that also included the RESTORE Act, legislation allocating 85 percent of Clean Water Act fines for the 2010 BP spill to the Gulf Coast. Biggert is now out of Congress. Waters has promised to work with Louisiana lawmakers to avoid unaffordable rate increases for residents and businesses.

Landrieu, who tried unsuccessfully to amend a Senate water resources bill with a provision delaying implementation of the higher premiums, is calling for quick consideration of her new stand-alone bill.

"Flood insurance must be affordable, accessible and self-sustainable. Biggert-Waters only addressed self-sustainability at the cost of homeowners in Louisiana and across the country living around water," Landrieu said.

But she's likely to run into opposition from lawmakers who believe that the 2012 law, which authorizes increases of 20 to 25 percent per year, was needed to make the program more fiscally sound.

Landrieu said that there's nothing smart about raising rates so high as to make the program unaffordable. 

She's calling her bill the Strengthen, Modernize and Reform the National Flood Insurance Program (SMART NFIP) Act .

"Flood insurance is not just about business and commerce," Landrieu said. "It is about culture; it is about a way of life; it is about preserving coastal communities; and it is about being resilient in storms."

Two weeks ago, 20 parish leaders from South Louisiana traveled to Washington to urge Landrieu and others to take steps to block the higher flood insurance premiums they said would make the program unaffordable for many homeowners and businesses.