Hurricanes have failed to spur flood insurance reform bill (SFGate/Bloomberg)

By Ari Natter Updated 6:32 pm PDT, Tuesday, September 11, 2018

WASHINGTON — U.S. taxpayers who spent billions of dollars after a trifecta of hurricanes last year are poised to do so again after a fix to the nation’s troubled flood insurance program remains stalled in Congress — and as a dangerous new storm barrels toward the southern Atlantic coast.

The program, administered through the Federal Emergency Management Agency, is the primary source of flood insurance in the U.S., with about 5 million policy holders across the country. But it remains more than $20 billion in debt and some experts say it must be reformed in an era of very powerful storms like Harvey and Irma.

“They have not dealt with the gorilla in the room which is proactively addressing these types of disasters for the future,” said Rob Moore, a senior policy analyst at the Natural Resources Defense Council. “Too much of the U.S.’s response to natural disaster is completely reactionary, we throw a bunch of money after it happens.”

The debate has taken on greater urgency in the 2018 storm season as Hurricane Florence gathers strength in the Atlantic Ocean. Florence, which was declared a Category 4 hurricane on Monday, has taken aim at a vast stretch of the southeast coast from South Carolina to Maryland. It is poised to become the strongest hurricane in almost 30 years to threaten the Carolinas. The National Weather Service says more than 5.4 million people are under hurricane warnings or watches.
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more: https://www.sfgate.com/nation/article/Hurricanes-have-failed-to-spur-flood-insurance-13221971.php




Just one more thing Congress isn't acting on because they're too busy cutting taxes for the rich and diverting emergency funds to baby kidnappers.