Title
Consider and take action on an ordinance amending Chapter 50 of the Code of Ordinances of the City of League City entitled, “Floods” regarding engineering standards for the minimization of flood losses (Director of Engineering)
Staff requests approval on first and final reading.
Background:
The “Flood Ordinance” contains requirements for sub-dividers, developers, applicants, engineers, surveyors, realtors and other persons interested and involved in the subdivision and development of land within areas of the FEMA recognized special flood hazard areas (100-yr floodplain) and within the Zone X (shaded) areas (500-yr floodplain).
This ordinance was last updated in 2018. This amendment provides some minor updates to the 2018 approved ordinance. The changes are as follows: (1) update to include direction for “in-fill lots”, (2) a clarification on how to determine the 500-yr flood elevation, and (3) removes the reference to permits and related conditions issued prior to October 1, 2018. The reasons these minor changes and updates were needed are provided below:
· The 2018 ordinance did not specifically address how in-fill lots were to be handled. For clarification in the ordinance, in-fill lots will be defined as “undeveloped residential lots within an area platted prior to July 1, 2018.” With the August 2019 revised FEMA Flood Insurance Rate Map (FIRM), the base flood elevation and 500-yr flood elevation were updated. These updated elevations when coupled with our requirement that residential homes should be a minimum of 3” above the 500-yr elevation has caused some problems in subdivisions that were constructed prior to July 2018. For these areas, the development was graded, and homes constructed to meet the City’s older requirement standards and when in-fill homes are being constructed, the 3” above the 500-yr requirement can mean that a home is several feet higher than their neighbors. This increase in height causes some concerns with lot grading which i...
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