Rep. Jeb Hensarling (R-TX) recently urged Congress to pass a bill that would extend the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) through Nov. 30, 2018.
While the House advanced the bipartisan legislation more than eight months ago, the NFIP is set to expire at the end of July without Congressional action.
The NFIP Extension and Enhanced Consumer and Community Protections Act of 2018 (H.R. 6402), sponsored by Reps. Ed Royce (R-CA) and Earl Blumenauer (D-OR), also includes eight reforms that have all been passed by the House. The reforms include having at-risk communities develop and implement a local plan to reduce their flood risk. It would also make available an additional $60,000 in insurance coverage to help homeowners cover the cost of new mitigation measures. Further, it would allow policyholders to pay their bills in monthly installments.
“Flooding in the United States killed over 115 people last year, and more than 550 since the last time Congress enacted a long-term NFIP reform bill. Yet 38 of the last 41 short-term extensions of the NFIP have contained zero reforms whatsoever — something which has to change if we want to help keep people safe,” Hensarling, chairman of the Financial Services Committee, said regarding the reauthorization of NFIP.
Hensarling said that he believes the Royce-Blumenauer bill is the best option right now even though a long-term solution is still needed.
“The right thing to do here would have been for Congress to enact a long-term reauthorization bill with reforms before this deadline,” Hensarling said. “However, given where we are, I think that the [NFIP Extension and Enhanced Consumer and Community Protections Act] represents the best option right now to keep the NFIP open and adopt some commonsense reforms to help policyholders and at-risk communities while we continue to work on a long-term solution.”