VANDERBURGH COUNTY

BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS

SPECIAL MEETING

MARCH 14, 2011

The Vanderburgh County Board of Commissioners met in special session this 14^th day of March, 2011 at 5:30 p.m. in room 307 of the Civic Center Complex with President Lloyd Winnecke presiding. The sole purpose of this special meeting was to review and consider adopting an ordinance regarding Flood Hazard Protection.

President Winnecke: I would like to call to order the meeting, the March 14^th meeting of the Vanderburgh County Board of Commissioners. We’ll begin with attendance roll call please.

Madelyn Grayson: Commissioner Abell?

Commissioner Abell: Here.

Madelyn Grayson: Commissioner Melcher?

Commissioner Melcher: Here.

Madelyn Grayson: President Winnecke?

President Winnecke: Here.

President Winnecke: We’ll stand and do the Pledge please.

(The Pledge of Allegiance was given.)

President Winnecke: Okay, our first and only action item is the first and final reading of county ordinance CO.03-11-003 that is amending the floodplain, the flood hazard protection ordinance. The amendments bring the ordinance into compliance with new floodplain management regulations established by FEMA. Ben Miller, our Building Commissioner has been negotiating with FEMA and other stakeholders to ensure that the changes to this ordinance meet requirements of FEMA and the Homebuilders Association. The first, before we get into the discussion of the ordinance, first I would entertain a motion to waive the second reading.

Commissioner Abell: So moved.

Commissioner Melcher: Second.

President Winnecke: A motion and a second. Questions or discussion? All in favor say aye.

All Commissioners: Aye.

(Motion approved 3-0)

President Winnecke: Next, I would entertain a motion to approve the ordinance on the first and final reading.

Commissioner Melcher: So moved.

Commissioner Abell: Second.

President Winnecke: A motion and a second. Questions or comments? All in favor say aye.

All Commissioners: Aye.

President Winnecke: Opposed? Okay. Ben?

Ben Miller: Yes, sir.

President Winnecke: You’re on.

Ben Miller: Okay, this ordinance is an update to our flood hazard protection ordinance that we currently had. From time to time FEMA updates information through a floodplain insurance study. That’s reflective in here. It’s actually been, some of our firm rates are as old as 1981, some of them 1991, so, this encompasses that amendment. We were able to meet the NFIP requirement that, the federal government’s requirement, and the state requirements, as well as keep our current administrative structure in place for the floodplain management, and, additionally, keep all of our development standards exactly the same as they are now.

President Winnecke: If you could boil this down to a few sentences about what it means for our, the residents of Vanderburgh County, how would you describe it?

Ben Miller: Well, I think the biggest thing is that it’s the latest information that is out there. For our citizens, it, actually, from a number perspective, you know, in the city and county we have 78,000 parcels, roughly, it changes, you know, based on splits and such, we’re actually going to remove 4,245 parcels from the floodplain. So, I think that ‘s a big win for some of the folks that had, that were considered in the floodplain that are no longer considered in the floodplain. The other thing is, it has in there that any citizen that feels that they’re wrongly in the floodplain, there are steps that they can prove, through engineering analysis that they are no longer in the floodplain, and actually have FEMA take them out of the floodplain. So, there, I think it’s a good thing, again, it’s the most updated information that will help us in how we call out development approvals and that type of thing, but, yet, from a county’s perspective, and the city too, that all is encompassed here, we want to make sure that we make wise decisions in development in the floodplain in making sure that we’re not creating additional hazards. So, it has standards in there to regulate that to make sure that when we do develop in the floodplain we’re doing it wisely.

President Winnecke: Okay. Steve?

Commissioner Melcher: I might be getting confused on one topic versus another–

Ben Miller: It’s pretty complex.

Commissioner Melcher: –but I know there’s always been a lot of talk about the east side, about the work that we had to do out there with the Wabash-Eerie and going into Wesselman’s.

Ben Miller: Yes, sir.

Commissioner Melcher: Somehow that was going to affect the homeowner’s insurance and everything. Does that correct some of this?

Ben Miller: There are many cases that, you know, that the new insurance study took into account all of the studies that have been out there, the individual studies on particular areas and used that data as the latest information for where they basically are projecting where a flood would occur. So, that those are all encompassed in it, so, there is many cases within it that would be included.

Commissioner Melcher: Well, I wasn’t sure, because I know there was some talk about the state reducing the size of their pipe that went under Green River Road, which kind of hurt us, because they were supposed to build it bigger.

Ben Miller: That’s true, yeah.

Commissioner Melcher: They went cheaper.

Ben Miller: That’s correct, yeah.

Commissioner Melcher: And when they went cheaper that handled a bunch of properties.

Ben Miller: And that, if that would have occurred, then they would have took that into account, and the additional areas out there may not have been added in that effect, absolutely.

Commissioner Melcher: Okay, thank you.

Commissioner Abell: I have a couple of questions.

Ben Miller: Yes, ma’am.

Commissioner Abell: Do you, you mentioned the number of parcels that had been removed from the floodplain.

Ben Miller: Correct.

Commissioner Abell: Do you have any idea how many went into the floodplain?

Ben Miller: We got, I apologize there, there were 1,863 parcels added to the floodplain that were not previously in there. As far as how that would affect a citizen is, it would very much vary. These numbers are not saying there’s actually a structure on there. Right now, currently, there’s 591 policies in the county that, for floodplain protection. So, I don’t see that there’s going to be much of a shift. We’ve been flooded with folks that have been coming out, because FEMA sends them a letter and says, hey, if you come in to your floodplain administrator office, our office, we can actually sign for them, and they are moved down to preferred risk coverage. So, the average house may be $1,800 for floodplain insurance, if you’re in a floodplain, it would be knocked down to about maybe $300.

Commissioner Abell: Okay.

Ben Miller: So, we’ve been working with all of those.

Commissioner Abell: So, the people were advised? It wasn’t, it’s not just going to be–

Ben Miller: Yeah, they were noticed, FEMA noticed everybody that was being added, these 1,800 parcels back in July of 2009. It was in the newspaper, it was on t.v., and they invited everybody in to come and explain it all to them. Actually, FEMA and DNR hosted that and explained everything to them. Then, additionally, once these new maps were becoming close to effective, FEMA would notice the ones that were coming out, by having them come in and we actually sign for them to have their insurance changed.

Commissioner Abell: If someone is, has a, I’m just going to use a for instance–

Ben Miller: Sure.

Commissioner Abell: –let’s say I have five acres–

Ben Miller: Uh-huh.

Commissioner Abell: –my house sits on the front four acres, and a half of the acre at the back is in the floodplain–

Ben Miller: Yes.

Commissioner Abell: –is there a remedy for me to be able to get my house excluded from that particular–

Ben Miller: Absolutely. That’s a scenario we run into everyday. Depending on your mortgage holder, which some of them have different requirements, but from the basic federal requirement, that house is not considered in the floodplain. Now, what, if it’s closer than, you know, four acres or so, FEMA requires us to mandate to the homeowner that if you’re going to add on or build a new structure, that they provide us an engineered surveyed layout of the lot and actually show exactly where the floodplain line is from survey quality, and then we make that....so, if the structure is beyond that line, then they can build without any regulation.

Commissioner Abell: Okay.

Ben Miller: Most mortgage companies will accept a letter from us, which we do all the time for citizens, that say, hey, here’s exactly where the floodplain line is and we’re certifying to them that the building is not in there.

Commissioner Abell: Okay, and the only other question I have then is you mentioned that they can be removed from the floodplain.

Ben Miller: Yes, absolutely.

Commissioner Abell: Is that a hard process? Do they have to get an attorney and go through a lot of–

Ben Miller: You don’t have to get an attorney. Many times they’ll have to hire a surveyor to confirm the elevation of their home.

Commissioner Abell: Okay.

Ben Miller: Because FEMA has limited resources and a big task to map these floodplains, they don’t always study exactly to the property. So, there may be properties that are shown in that are actually elevated higher and would not be in there, so they have a free letter of map amendment, they call it, is a process they go through. It’s free from a fee side, but there’s some stuff, and we get involved there as the community, we actually authorize them. So, we work with the citizens on that, and then they would have to hire a surveyor to shoot the elevation–

Commissioner Abell: Okay.

Ben Miller: –of their home to prove that they’re higher, and then FEMA can accept that. They call that a letter of map amendment. What, another benefit of these maps is that they were able to take the many letter of map amendments that have been out there over the last 30 years or so and include those on the new maps.

Commissioner Melcher: So, they know where some of the elevations have been shot and are higher?

Ben Miller: Absolutely.

Commissioner Abell: Okay.

Ben Miller: Absolutely.

Commissioner Abell: Okay, thank you.

President Winnecke: Ben, so these new base flood elevations become effective later this week on the 17^th?

Ben Miller: That’s correct.

President Winnecke: And, part of what we’re doing tonight is adopting, or amending our ordinance to set in place regulations that adhere to that.

Ben Miller: That’s correct. As they require for our continued participation in that program.

President Winnecke: Right, and one of the large, aside from, are there changes in the regulations that we’re adopting that are....I’m trying to remember. The base elevations are different, we know that. The maps have changed.

Ben Miller: In some instances, yeah.

President Winnecke: But, what about the regulations?

Ben Miller: The regulations have been kept the same. I think that was big part of our discussion with DNR is they wanted us to change the way we administered the floodplain. It’s a little bit complex from, they’re used to working with, you know, the City of Evansville or Vanderburgh County separately, and we kind of have a different form of government. So, that had to be worked through as far as how we administrate it. The requirement of, you know, we have sub review that reviews proposed developments, you know, that is not typical in other jurisdictions, everybody kind of has their own thing. So, that was kept in there. The requirements that developers would have to meet is exactly the same as what they have to do now. So, we were able to keep everything the same, adopt the new maps as the latest data, and then continue to provide, I mean, we also have an appeals process that any developer can go through if they feel that we’ve misinterpreted.

President Winnecke: Okay.

Commissioner Abell: I just would like to put on the record–

Ben Miller: Yes, ma’am.

Commissioner Abell: –that I’ve talked to Bill Pedtke, and I think probably the rest of us have, with the Builders Association, and they don’t have any disagreement with this.

Ben Miller: That’s true. We worked very closely with them and the other stakeholders on this, absolutely.

President Winnecke: Any other questions? Hearing none, I would entertain a motion to approve on first and final reading county ordinance CO.03-11-003.

Commissioner Abell: So moved.

Commissioner Melcher: Second.

President Winnecke: A motion and a second. Questions or further discussion? I’m sorry, Bill, is there anything you wanted to add relative to this? I meant to ask you that earlier.

Bill Jeffers: First, I think the 1,863 parcels that were added are mostly south of Boonville Highway, Morgan Avenue, and are not small parcels. Not necessarily a lot of residential, I think it’s a lot of commercial that are large, very expensive parcels and the insurance policies will be very high. They won’t be these little three and six hundred dollar residential policies, they will be like for Wal-Mart or Sam’s Club or whatever. Next, I have not heard anyone tell me they’ve been able, for the last ten years, to get a letter from the Building Commissioner saying that the floodplain does not impact the structure on their lot, and it’s been my experience for the past ten years that if there is the slightest blue line across a parcel, no matter how big it is, a single parcel, if there’s the slightest bit of zone A floodplain, FEMA will not exempt the structure from floodplain insurance until the owner gets a LOMA, letter of map amendment, or letter of map revision, LOMR, completed. That is not free. I have never seen one cost less than $750, and they mostly run over $1,000 to $2,000, because the surveyor has to complete it. I don’t know who charges the fees or what have you, a surveyor, obviously, charges $150 an hour, but DNR, I believe, charges something whatever. These base map changes, that, to my recollection the County Surveyor and the Drainage Board was not notified of the public hearing for those maps. At road school last week, the lady from DNR said that FEMA and DNR want input from the locals, as much input as possible, but I would like to point out that never have they set foot in our office. They never asked for any data. They never asked us to look at any of the drainage plans for the east side that we’ve done since 1979. They were using data from prior to 1979 that showed the wrong points of concentration for the ditches. They still show drainage going north to Pigeon Creek that for the past 30 years has gone due west to Pigeon Creek there at Romain Buick, the old Romain Buick. So, the data they’re operating on was faulty to begin with, and when we did spend a half a million dollars correcting all that, half of it was Building Commissioner money, half of it was Drainage Board money, County Surveyor money, they did accept that, but I would like to point out the things we have done since then, since 2002. That’s the last data they have is 2002. They haven’t updated the data since 2002, to my knowledge, because they don’t communicate with us. So, they may have, but I don’t know about it. Since then we have done many things on the Wabash and Eerie Canal and we plan on doing more that I will tell you has lowered the floodplain. So, after you adopt this, which you have to do. I mean, they have told you, you know, if you don’t adopt this, you’re out of the program, you know. So, I understand that the adoption has to take place. I’m not appealing that. I’m not arguing against it. You should adopt it, but once you have adopted it you need to continue to feed them data that will continue to lower our floodplain on the east side, as much as possible to help that commercial property come out of the floodplain, where that’s possible. For example, you’re going to build a bridge on Old Boonville Highway, and that bridge is going to be built well above the floodplain. It’s down in the floodway now, and when you do build that new bridge, it will allow more water to flow northward through Crawford Brandeis extension, and it will lower the floodplain. The railroad has taken a pipe out that Commissioner Melcher had mentioned, or alluded to, and that pipe was identified by FEMA as an obstruction, and had raised the floodplain, I believe, six or eight inches, and now that pipe is gone. We should have that analyzed, and hopefully lower the floodplain. The pipe he was talking about at Green River Road, while it wasn’t made any larger, we did get the state to put in a headwall, and that increases the head pressure, allows the water to accumulate above the pipe and caused more pressure, forced more water through the pipe more quickly, and that has lowered the floodplain a little bit. We need to analyze that and turn that into them. So, as you go forward and approve this ordinance, just keep in mind that there is still things left to do that we can help ourselves and our community move forward with lowering the floodplain on the east side.

President Winnecke: Thanks, Bill.

Bill Jeffers: Thank you.

President Winnecke: Any questions of the County Surveyor?

Bill Jeffers: I just wanted that on record.

President Winnecke: Sure, I appreciate that.

Commissioner Abell: I have a question. So, you’re saying that FEMA sort of dropped the ball? I mean, I’m just trying to follow what’s going on here.

Bill Jeffers: No, FEMA does things their way.

Commissioner Abell: But, they didn’t work with you?

Bill Jeffers: FEMA hired a contractor from Virginia I think it was, to come here and analyze floodplain and never came down to this building and asked for any, what they called latest, best available data.

Commissioner Abell: Uh-huh.

Bill Jeffers: They just went on their own, and had they come and sought more recent data, they would have found that you and the city, the Drainage Board and the city had spent millions of dollars redoing east side drainage between 1979 and 19, you know, and 2000, and that we were still working on the future at that point. We were still working into the future improving our drainage. And, at that time, I heard this has been corrected, at that time, they stopped their study at the county line. They didn’t go into Warrick County, even though our drainage, when it gets to a certain height flows backwards into Warrick County, thence through Cypress Ditch to the Ohio River. It doesn’t even come back this way. So, there was a standing wall of two and half foot deep water at the county line, they didn’t, I mean, it was like Noah, I mean, excuse me, Moses was standing at the county line with his staff holding the water back. It doesn’t work that way. I’m just saying they didn’t use good data, they didn’t use the most advanced data.

Commissioner Abell: Okay.

Bill Jeffers: And, now I just heard at road school they intend to do that. There was a huge comment period at our road school class where County Surveyors have experienced this very same thing, that they go to the floodplain management, floodplain manager, which in most cases is the Building Commissioner, but they do not come to the County Surveyor, and yet it’s the County Surveyor who’s working with the Drainage Board on all of these projects in all of these different counties. Now, they say they’re going to start doing that, and I hope they do. So, I just kind of wanted to go on record.

Commissioner Abell: Okay.

President Winnecke: Any other thing, comments, questions? Hearing none, we have a motion on the floor and a second. Roll call vote please.

Madelyn Grayson: Commissioner Abell?

Commissioner Abell: Yes.

Madelyn Grayson: Commissioner Melcher?

Commissioner Melcher: Yes.

Madelyn Grayson: President Winnecke?

President Winnecke: Yes.

(Motion approved 3-0)

President Winnecke: Any other public comment to come before the Commissioners at this time?

Commissioner Melcher: I’ve got one.

President Winnecke: Yes, sir.

Commissioner Melcher: I’m going to get a hold of David Rector and tell him to put the flag on the right. It’s on the wrong side.

Commissioner Abell: It is on the wrong side.

Commissioner Melcher: The American flag.

President Winnecke: It is indeed.

Commissioner Melcher: So, that’s kind of an insult. So, we need to put it on this side. It’s always on the right hand–

Commissioner Abell: That’s kind of pet peeve of yours.

Commissioner Melcher: That is a pet peeve of mine.

President Winnecke: Understand.

Commissioner Melcher: Thank you.

President Winnecke: Any other business? We stand adjourned.

(The meeting was adjourned at 5:49 p.m.)

Those in Attendance:

Lloyd Winnecke                        Marsha Abell                            Stephen Melcher

Joe Gries                                  Ted C. Ziemer, Jr.                    Madelyn Grayson

Ben Miller                                 Bill Jeffers                                 Others Unidentified

Members of Media

VANDERBURGH COUNTY

BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS

Lloyd Winnecke, President

Marsha Abell, Vice President

Stephen Melcher, Member

(Recorded and transcribed by Madelyn Grayson.)