Hurricane Season Revealed Lack Of Resiliency In The U.S.

Hurricanes Harvey, Irma and Maria laid bare fundamental inadequacies of the current flood insurance program in the U.S. Too few homeowners had flood insurance in place. Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) flood maps were inadequate to encompass actual flood risks and, even more importantly, outreach programs by FEMA and the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) were inadequate to properly communicate risks to the market. The current hurricane season revealed an astounding lack of resiliency in the U.S. on many levels: (1) lack of insurance coverages; (2) inadequate mapping of flood risks; (3) failure to properly educate homeowners about their actual flood risks; and, (4) gross under-investment in resilient infrastructure by all levels of U.S. governments.