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Ithaca council approves $50,000 from stormwater fund to pursue FEMA map revisions
Summary
The council voted unanimously to allocate $50,000 from the city's stormwater fund to pay consultants analyzing FEMA flood models and preparing a Letter of Map Revision; officials said the work is needed to avoid an overly conservative federal flood map that could expand the city's regulated floodplain to about 1,200 properties.
The Ithaca Common Council on April 2 voted unanimously to transfer $50,000 from the city's stormwater fund to pay consultants working to revise federal flood-mapping models that officials say overstate local flood risk.
City officials said the work will support a Letter of Map Revision (LOMR) request to the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). The move is part of a broader response after FEMA issued preliminary flood maps that, city consultants have said, are more conservative than University of the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) modeling the city commissioned.
The council's authorization came after a detailed briefing from Mike Thorne, superintendent of public works, and Tim Logue, director of engineering, who described a multiyear sequence of studies, FEMA draft maps and grant work. Thorne traced the history: Ithaca began a local flood-hazard analysis in 2015, hired USGS for field-based modeling, then contracted engineering firm Barton & Loguidice to analyze mitigation options. FEMA issued draft maps in 2022 and…
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