Flood Damage Prevention
The purpose of the Flood Damage Prevention section of the Unified Development Ordinance is to promote the public health, safety, and general welfare and to minimize public and private losses due to flood conditions within flood prone areas by provisions designed to:
Restrict or prohibit uses that are dangerous to health, safety, and property due to water or erosion hazards or that result in damaging increases in erosion, flood heights or velocities;
Require that uses vulnerable to floods, including facilities that serve such uses, be protected against flood damage at the time of initial construction;
Control the alteration of natural floodplains, stream channels, and natural protective barriers, which are involved in the accommodation of floodwaters;
Control filling, grading, dredging, and all other development that may increase erosion or flood damage; and
Prevent or regulate the construction of flood barriers that will unnaturally divert flood waters or which may increase flood hazards to other lands.
These regulations are located located in Chapter 12 of the Wake Forest Unified Development Ordinance.
Objectives
To protect human life and health;
To minimize expenditure of public money for costly flood control projects;
To minimize the need for rescue and relief efforts associated with flooding and generally undertaken at the expense of the general public;
To minimize prolonged business losses and interruptions;
To minimize damage to public facilities and utilities (i.e. water and gas mains, electric, telephone, cable and sewer lines, streets, and bridges) that are located in flood prone areas;
To help maintain a stable tax base by providing for the sound use and development of flood prone areas; and
To ensure that potential buyers are aware that property is in a Special Flood Hazard Area or Future Conditions Flood Hazard Area.
National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP)
The Town of Wake Forest is a participant in the administered by the Department of Homeland Security. The U.S. Congress established the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) with the passage of the National Flood Insurance Act of 1968. The NFIP is a Federal program enabling property owners in participating communities to purchase insurance as a protection against flood losses in exchange for State and community floodplain management regulations that reduce future flood damages. Participation in the NFIP is based on an agreement between communities and the Federal Government. If a community adopts and enforces a floodplain management ordinance to reduce future flood risk to new construction in floodplains, the Federal Government will make flood insurance available within the community as a financial protection against flood losses. This insurance is designed to provide an insurance alternative to disaster assistance to reduce the escalating costs of repairing damage to buildings and their contents caused by floods.
Preliminary revisions to the Flood Insurance Rate Maps (FIRMs) for Wake County are available to be viewed at the NCFMP's new webpage (http://rfris.nc.gov/fris/). The posted preliminary flood hazard data reflect restudies for portion of various flooding sources in Wake County. In the near future the NCFMP will be arranging a meeting in the Wake Forest area for official public participation on the new information. Questions on the revised preliminary flood hazard data may be directed to the FEMA Map Information eXchange toll-free at (877) 336-2627 or email at [email protected].