Title: Mitigation Planning Series: Open Pacific Coast and Bay Area Coastal Study Activities
Address HMP Stakeholder/Public Involvement and Hazard Profile Requirements
Author: Wynne Kwan, AICP, LEED AP, Senior Planner
Short Story:
A community’s hazard mitigation plan (HMP) must include a number of elements to attain FEMA
approval, required as a condition for receiving certain types of non-emergency disaster assistance.
Stakeholder and public involvement during the planning process, as well as specific requirements to
profile hazards, are two of the important elements in this process. Meeting activities associated with
FEMA Region IX’s coastal studies as well as mapping-related products resulting from the Open Pacific
Coast and Bay Area Coastal Studies will provide documentation and data to incorporate in community
HMPs to meet stakeholder/public involvement and hazard profile requirements. –continue reading-Long Story:
The inaugural installment of the Mitigation Planning Series began with a definition of hazard mitigation
and a summary of how HMPs fit into FEMA’s Risk Mapping, Assessment, and Planning (Risk MAP) life
cycle. This installment will discuss how your community’s outreach and communication efforts
associated with the Open Pacific Coast (OPC) and Bay Area Coastal (BAC) Studies can assist with
stakeholder and public involvement HMP requirements. Additionally, this installment will address how
the newly-developed Flood Insurance Rate Maps (FIRMs) resulting from the CCAMP OPC and BAC
Studies meet Coastal Flood Hazard Profile requirements in an HMP.
OPC and BAC Public Meetings and HMP Stakeholder/Public Involvement Requirements
Stakeholder and public involvement during the hazard mitigation planning process is key to getting
community support and is a required element for HMP approval. HMPs must document all the
stakeholders involved, as well as how the public was given the opportunity to be involved in the
planning process and how their feedback was incorporated into the plan. For communities, it is
important to maintain supporting documentation of stakeholder and public involvement activities for
inclusion in the HMP and follow-on updates. Communities are required to update their HMPs every five
years in the state of California.
Throughout the OPC and BAC Study process, the study teams are implementing a consistent outreach
strategy, which includes formal Risk MAP meetings; communication tools, templates, and messaging;
and roles and responsibilities related to specific actions when coordinating with communities during the
development of Community Outreach Plans. With respect to hazard mitigation planning, three of the
four Risk MAP outreach meetings (as delineated in FEMA’s Operating Guidance No. 04-11: Risk MAP
Meetings Guidance) will be useful in meeting stakeholder and public involvement requirements of the
HMP.
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The Flood Risk Review (FRR) Meeting, during the Data Development and Sharing Phase, provides
community officials with the opportunity to review a draft work map that shows the updated
boundaries of the high and moderate risk flood zones, as determined from the results of the
coastal flood hazard engineering analyses.
The Resilience Meeting, during the Risk Awareness and Mitigation Outreach Phase, provides a
forum for communities to understand their flood risk and the comprehensive view of mitigation
planning and available mitigation options, as well as to share success stories and potential
mitigation actions that communities can identify for implementation.
The Community Coordination Officer (CCO) (or Preliminary FIRM) Meeting and Flood Map Open
House are conducted during the Preliminary Map Release and Mitigation Planning phase and are
held after the release of the new preliminary FIRMs. These are two distinct meetings: the CCO
Meeting presents the preliminary FIRM panels and data to identified stakeholders, including
community officials, before presenting the information to the public. The Open House is a
separate meeting that provides an opportunity for community officials and other stakeholders,
with FEMA’s technical support, to relay Special Flood Hazard Area changes and helpful
information to the public.
Use of New FIRMs to Meet Flood Hazard Profile Requirements
Communities preparing a HMP need to identify and profile the hazards that have the potential to affect
their jurisdictions. The hazard profile must include a description of the hazard, as well as information on
location, extent, previous occurrences, and the probability of future occurrences. The new FIRMs
inclusive of the OPC and BAC study results will illustrate the locations of the VE and AE zones, where
flood waters include wave heights greater than or equal to 3 feet and less than 3 feet, respectively. The
Base Flood Elevations (BFEs), which show the elevations associated with the 100-year flood (flood with a
1-percent chance of occurrence in any given year), will also be included in the new FIRMs. Incorporating
the new FIRMs into a HMP would provide an updated graphic representation of the severity and extent
of current coastal flood hazards.
The HMP must also describe the potential impacts of coastal flooding on a jurisdiction, as well as
provide an overall summary of a jurisdiction’s vulnerability to coastal flooding. Impacts are the
consequence or effect on the community and its assets, and can be described by referencing historical
disaster impacts and/or an estimate of potential future losses. A vulnerability assessment identifies
structures, systems, populations, or other community assets susceptible to damage and loss from
coastal flooding.
At the conclusion of the data development phase for the coastal studies, communities will receive
updated FIRM panels and a digital database in preliminary format. The digital data can be used to
develop the vulnerability assessment and be overlaid onto base maps to identify susceptible assets and
populations within a jurisdiction. The easiest way to do this is through the use of Geographic
Information Systems (GIS) and/or Hazards-United States (Hazus), a nationally applicable standardized
methodology that contains models for estimating potential losses from earthquakes, floods, and
hurricanes. Hazus uses GIS technology to estimate physical, economic, and social impacts of disasters. It
graphically illustrates the limits of identified high-risk locations due to coastal flood risks (as well as
other hazards). Users can then visualize the spatial relationships between populations and other more
permanently fixed geographic assets or resources. Thus, it is important that community GIS
analysts/technicians participate in the OPC and BAC Studies, as well as in hazard mitigation planning
activities.
If there is a specific hazard mitigation planning topic you’d like the Mitigation Planning Series to
address, please submit your suggestions to Wynne Kwan at wkwan@mbakercorp.com.
Online Resources
www.fema.gov/plan/prevent/hazus
www.ushazus.com