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by Terry Duffy
Porter Town Board members briefly reviewed and adopted an updated Federal Emergency Management Agency floodplain prevention law - new guidelines of which impact limited areas and property owners - at its regular meeting on July 12.
The session led off with a public hearing that saw few comments on the updated FEMA guidelines that were first released in 2008. The new criteria, which determines a property owner's need to obtain costly flood insurance protection, was seen as having limited impact for Porter property owners, unlike those in other communities such as Wheatfield which had scores affected, said Town Building Inspector Roy Rogers.
"There were more taken off than added," said Rogers, of the 12 Porter property owners affected, mostly in the Twelve Mile Creek floodplain. He said the changes came about due to updates in elevation numbers on maps of individual properties, which were updated from older topographical maps last done in the 1980s. He said there were two appeals that were unsuccessful.
Following the hearing, the board went on to repeal Local Law of 1987 on floodplain prevention and adopt the new version 4-0. Council member Larry White was absent. Town Attorney Mike Dowd said without adopting, the town would be unable to participate in government flood insurance protection programs availed to affected property owners.
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