March 09, 2010
“It is the responsibility of the federal government and local elected officials to work together to assess the threat of flooding in the Metro East region,” said Durbin. “It is essential that residents, families and businesses understand their risk, but a lack of complete and publicly available information has plagued the region’s remapping process up to this point. That stops today. Both FEMA and the Army Corps of Engineers understand that we need to find a solution that will both protect property owners in the event of a flood and not burden them with unreasonable flood insurance rates.”
“I believe we made progress today. We need to have a transparent process and that has not been the case to this point,” said Costello. “My first priority has always been to make sure that the levees get fixed without an undue economic burden on the region. Local governments should sufficient time to fix the levees, and I will continue to work for my bill or any other legislative solution that accomplishes this goal.”
Durbin, Costello: Time for Federal Government to Take Responsibility and Fully Assess Risk of Metro East Flood
[WASHINGTON, D.C.] – U.S. Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL) and U.S. Congressman Jerry Costello (D-IL) today called on the Administrator of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), Craig Fugate, and the Assistant Secretary of the Army, Jo-Ellen Darcy to produce information that led to the determination that levees in the Metro East area could not be certified. Both Fugate and Darcy pledged to investigate the recent lack of information, work with local officials to assemble an adequate amount of information and report back to Durbin and Costello with their findings.“It is the responsibility of the federal government and local elected officials to work together to assess the threat of flooding in the Metro East region,” said Durbin. “It is essential that residents, families and businesses understand their risk, but a lack of complete and publicly available information has plagued the region’s remapping process up to this point. That stops today. Both FEMA and the Army Corps of Engineers understand that we need to find a solution that will both protect property owners in the event of a flood and not burden them with unreasonable flood insurance rates.”
“I believe we made progress today. We need to have a transparent process and that has not been the case to this point,” said Costello. “My first priority has always been to make sure that the levees get fixed without an undue economic burden on the region. Local governments should sufficient time to fix the levees, and I will continue to work for my bill or any other legislative solution that accomplishes this goal.”