submitted by Goldie Rosenberg

water.epa.gov

Federal Agency Name: U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Office of Water, Office of Wetlands, Oceans, and Watersheds

Funding Opportunity Title: FY 2014 and FY 2015 National Wetland Program Development Grants

Announcement Type: Request for Proposals

Funding Opportunity Number: EPA-OW-OWOW-14-02

Catalog of Federal Domestic Assistance (CFDA) Number: 66.462

Dates: Hard copy proposals must be received by EPA (See Sections IV and VII of this RFP) by 5:00 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time (EDT) April 17, 2014. Proposals submitted electronically via Grants.gov must be received by11:59 P.M. EDT April 17, 2014. Late proposals will not be considered for funding. Questions must be submitted in writing via e-mail and must be received by the Agency Contact identified in Section VII before April 11, 2014.

CLICK HERE FOR DETAILS (22 page .PDF file)

http://water.epa.gov/grants_funding/wetlands/grantguidelines/

President Barack Obama signs flood insurance bill into law.
(AP Photo/Charles Dharapak)

nola.com - by Bruce Alpert - March 21, 2014

WASHINGTON -- President Barack Obama Friday signed into law hard-fought legislation that will limit flood insurance premium increases to no more than 18 percent a year.

White House officials called Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., shortly after 1 p.m. CT to say the bill is now law.

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(CLICK HERE - H.R. 3370)

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie takes questions at a town hall meeting last week in Toms River, N.J. “I never promised you, nor would I, that this was going to be mistake-free,” he said of delivering aid after Superstorm Sandy. (Mel Evans / Associated Press / March 4, 2014)

With many homeowners still waiting for help, officials including Gov. Chris Christie – already battered by the George Washington Bridge scandal – have been accused of incompetence or even favoritism in delivering federal recovery money.

latimes.com - by Joseph Tanfani - March 12, 2014

POMONA, N.J. — His state wrecked and reeling from Superstorm Sandy, Chris Christie made himself the face of New Jersey's comeback effort with a take-charge tour de force that became a cornerstone of an expected run for president.

greenbiz.com - by John Finnigan - March 10, 2014

Two seemingly unrelated announcements drew much attention in the electric utility industry recently. First, the Edison Electric Institute, the trade group for the U.S. electric utility industry, and the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) jointly recommended (PDF) changing how utilities should be regulated. Second, Duke Energy announced it will sell 13 Midwest merchant power plants.

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After high water from Hurricane Katrina inundated their nursing home, residents waited for assistance in New Orleans in 2005. Federal officials are trying to avoid these types of situations with new requirements for health care providers ahead of emergencies. Credit Mario Tama/Getty Images

nytimes.com - by Sheri Fink - March 11, 2014

Federal officials are proposing sweeping new requirements for American health care facilities — from large hospitals to small group homes for the mentally disabled — intended to ensure their readiness to care for patients during disasters.

A Christie administration plan would allow tons of contaminated soil to be dumped on private land along the Rahway River. Credit Richard Perry/The New York Times

nytimes.com - by Michael Powell - February 24, 2014

. . . Decades ago, American Cyanamid ruined this wetlands expanse, once home to rich oyster beds, with cyanide-contaminated sludge, the chemical detritus of the past century.

Years ago, it was partially cleaned and covered with a few feet of topsoil. . .

. . . The Christie administration has another idea for this land. It appears poised to let a company, Soil Safe, truck in millions of tons of petroleum-contaminated soils and dump it on this site, which lies directly west of Staten Island and the Arthur Kill.

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Manuel Sanchez takes in the view of his flooded home and property on September 14, 2013 in La Salle, Colorado. Photographer: Marc Piscotty/Getty Images

businessweek.com- by James Rowley - March 4, 2014

The U.S. House passed legislation trimming premiums for government-sponsored flood insurance

The measure would limit premium increases to 18 percent per policy or 15 percent of an average of premiums in a particular flood zone.

The House bill, H.R. 3370, must be reconciled with legislation passed by the Democratic-controlled Senate that House Republican leaders said would roll back too many of the 2012 law’s changes. The Senate bill is S. 1926.

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Credit: dakine kane/flickr

greentechmedia.com - by Bobby Magill - October 31, 2013

New York City’s Rockaway Peninsula took the brunt of Hurricane Sandy when the storm blew ashore a year ago, leaving the Rockaways in Queens devastated from flooding and 34,000 without electricity for weeks.

In the ensuing twelve months, the city has suggested many ways to make itself more able to withstand such storms. As part of New York City’s climate change response plan, “A Stronger, More Resilient New York,” issued earlier this year, one of the city’s suggestions to help the Rockaways survive the next hurricane is for the peninsula to become the site of a microgrid pilot project that will help keep the lights on at hospitals, schools and other critical infrastructure during and after a storm.

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submitted by Seth Golbey - January 21, 2014
Voluntary Agencies Group Supervisor
FEMA-4085-DR-NY

(TO DOWNLOAD FLYER - CLICK ON ATTACHMENT BELOW)

insurancejournal.com - by Andrew G. Simpson - January 7, 2014

The U.S. Senate is expected to take a key vote soon on a bill that would delay some of the flood insurance rate hikes triggered by the Biggert-Waters Flood Insurance Reform Act of 2012. . .

. . . The procedural vote on S.1846 was originally planned for Wednesday, but the Senate is still dealing with an extension of federal unemployment benefits, delaying consideration of the flood bill. U.S. Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.), a major advocate for the bill, told USA Today that  “next week is more realistic” for any vote on the flood bill.

(READ COMPLETE ARTICLE)

elitedaily.com - by Christian La Du - October 28, 2013

One year ago, the east coast was ravaged by SuperStorm Sandy, a freak occurrence combining a hurricane, Nor’easter, high tide, and a full moon, which wrought particular destruction on the tri-state area.

Although the enduring legacy of Sandy is not measured in tallies of destruction, numbers like 8.6 million homes and businesses without power, gas and water, 650,000 destroyed houses, 200,000 damaged businesses, and 286 deaths afflicted over 13 states. Approximately 50 million people felt the effects of the storm over 800 mile stretch, and an estimated $65 billion in economic damages were incurred.

The real, lasting effect of Hurricane Sandy, however, is in the radical life shifts that people forcibly underwent.

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A man walks through flooded streets in Hoboken, New Jersey, after Superstorm Sandy | Emile Wamsteker/Bloomberg via Getty Images

As subsidized rates of federal flood insurance rise, property owners along the coasts get angry. But we need insurance that reflects the risks of a changing planet

time.com - by Bryan Walsh - October 1, 2013

Thousands of homeowners in flood-prone parts of the country are going to be in for a rude awakening.  On Oct. 1, new changes to the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP), which offers government-subsidized policies for households and businesses threatened by floods, mean that businesses in flood zones and homes that have been severely or repeatedly flooded will start going up 25% a year until rates reach levels that would reflect the actual risk from flooding. (Higher rates for second or vacation homes went into effect at the start of 2013.) That means that property owners in flood-prone areas who might have once been paying around $500 a year—rates that were well below what the market would charge, given the threat from flooding—will go up by thousands of dollars over the next decade.

Julio and Belinda Ramos, who were hit with a power outage, hold their eight-year-old son Charles as they stand in line to pick up food supplies at a grocery store after Hurricane Sandy in 2012. (Adrees Latif/Reuters)

theatlanticcities.com - by Siddhartha Mahanta - October 21, 2013

In New York City, locating a bite to eat is rarely a difficult task. The city is a food paradise or, depending on your mood, a place of overwhelming glut.

But when Superstorm Sandy pummeled New York last fall, it revealed the terrifying potential for sudden food shortages.

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