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[Congressional Bills 113th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 3013 Introduced in House (IH)]

113th CONGRESS
  1st Session
                                H. R. 3013

To reform the National Flood Insurance Program, and for other purposes.

_______________________________________________________________________

                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                             August 2, 2013

Mr. Cassidy (for himself, Mr. Palazzo, Mr. Alexander, Mr. Boustany, Mr. 
    Scalise, Mr. Nunnelee, Mr. Jones, and Mr. Grimm) introduced the 
   following bill; which was referred to the Committee on Financial 
                                Services

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL

 
To reform the National Flood Insurance Program, and for other purposes.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

    This Act may be cited as the ``Home Protection Act of 2013''.

SEC. 2. MAPPING OF NON-STRUCTURAL FLOOD MITIGATION FEATURES.

    Section 100216 of the Biggert-Waters Flood Insurance Reform Act of 
2012 (42 U.S.C. 4101b) is amended--
            (1) in subsection (b)(1)(A)--
                    (A) in clause (iv), by striking ``and'' at the end;
                    (B) by redesignating clause (v) as clause (vi);
                    (C) by inserting after clause (iv) the following 
                new clause:
                            ``(v) areas that are protected by pumping 
                        stations, decertified levees, or non-Federal or 
                        non-structural flood protection measures; 
                        and''; and
                    (D) in clause (vi) (as so redesignated), by 
                striking ``flood control structures'' and inserting 
                ``flood control structures, pumping stations, 
                decertified levees, or non-Federal or non-structural 
                flood mitigation measures''; and
            (2) in subsection (d)(1)--
                    (A) by redesignating subparagraphs (A) through (C) 
                as subparagraphs (B) through (D), respectively; and
                    (B) by inserting before subparagraph (B) (as so 
                redesignated) the following new subparagraph:
                    ``(A) work with States, local communities, and 
                property owners to identify areas and measures 
                described in subsection (b)(1)(A)(v);''.

SEC. 3. APPLYING CIRCULAR WIND MODELS TO FLOOD INSURANCE RATE MAPS.

    Section 100216(b)(3) of the Biggert-Waters Flood Insurance Reform 
Act of 2012 (42 U.S.C. 4101b(b)(3)) is amended--
            (1) in subparagraph (D), by striking ``and'' at the end;
            (2) by redesignating subparagraph (E) as subparagraph (F); 
        and
            (3) by inserting after subparagraph (D) the following new 
        subparagraph:
                    ``(E) in consultation with the Secretary of the 
                Army, acting through the Chief of Engineers, any 
                relevant information that leads to the appropriate use 
                of circular wind models for the application of 
                stillwater elevation calculations; and''.

SEC. 4. HOME IMPROVEMENT FAIRNESS.

    Section 1307(a)(2)(E)(ii) of the National Flood Insurance Act of 
1968 (42 U.S.C. 4014(a)(2)(E)(ii)) is amended by striking ``30 
percent'' and inserting ``50 percent''.

SEC. 5. CONSTRUCTION AND RESTORATION OF FLOOD PROTECTION SYSTEMS.

    (a) Adequate Progress on Construction of Flood Protection 
Systems.--Section 1307(e) of the National Flood Insurance Act of 1968 
(42 U.S.C. 4014(e)) is amended--
            (1) in the first sentence, by inserting ``or 
        reconstruction'' after ``construction'';
            (2) in the second sentence, by striking ``construction of a 
        flood protection system as required herein has been only if'' 
        and inserting ``construction or reconstruction of a flood 
        protection system has been made only if, based on the present 
        value of the completed system''; and
            (3) by adding at the end the following new sentence: ``The 
        Administrator shall not consider the level of Federal funding 
        of or participation in the construction or reconstruction of a 
        flood protection system in determining whether adequate 
        progress on such construction has been made.''.
    (b) Communities Restoring Disaccredited Flood Protection Systems.--
Section 1307(f) of the National Flood Insurance Act of 1968 (42 U.S.C. 
4014(f)) is amended in the first sentence by striking ``no longer does 
so.'' and inserting the following: ``no longer does so, and shall apply 
without regard to the level of Federal funding of or participation in 
the restoration of the flood protection system.''.

SEC. 6. STATE AND LOCAL GOVERNMENT FLEXIBILITY.

    The National Flood Insurance Act of 1968 (42 U.S.C. 4001 et seq.) 
is amended by inserting after section 1308 the following:

``SEC. 1308A. STATE AND LOCAL GOVERNMENT FLEXIBILITY.

    ``(a) In General.--The Administrator shall issue regulations to 
establish a means by which a State or local government may, on its own 
accord or in conjunction with other State or local governments, submit 
such payments to the Administrator as are necessary to cover part or 
all of the cost of any premium for any property within the jurisdiction 
of the State or local government.
    ``(b) Risk Premium Rate.--The Administrator shall, under the 
regulations issued under subsection (a), require that the amount of any 
payment from a State or local government under such regulations be 
consistent with sections 1307 and 1308.''.

SEC. 7. APPROPRIATE CREDIT FOR FLOOD CONTROL STRUCTURES.

    Section 1360 of the National Flood Insurance Act of 1968 (42 U.S.C. 
4101) is amended by adding at the end the following:
    ``(k) Actual Protection Provided by Levee Systems.--The 
Administrator may not publish a flood insurance rate map or an update 
to a flood insurance rate map for an area unless--
            ``(1) the flood insurance rate map or update adequately 
        reflects the level of protection provided by any flood 
        protection system for such area, including a pumping station, 
        decertified levee, or non-Federal or non-structural flood 
        mitigation measure, against the 100-year frequency flood, 
        regardless of the accreditation status of the flood protection 
        system; or
            ``(2) the community for which a flood protection system 
        provides protection elects not to provide the data necessary 
        for the Administrator to publish a flood insurance rate map or 
        update that adequately reflects the protection provided by the 
        flood protection system against the 100-year frequency 
        flood.''.

SEC. 8. INTEGRATION OF REVISED LEVEE ANALYSIS AND MAPPING PROCEDURES.

    Notwithstanding any other provision of law, paragraphs (1) and (2) 
of section 1307(g) of the National Flood Insurance Act of 1968 (42 
U.S.C. 4014(g)) shall have no force or effect with respect to a 
property until--
            (1) the Administrator of the Federal Emergency Management 
        Agency publishes or updates a flood insurance rate map for the 
        area in which the property is located that adequately reflects 
        the protection provided by any flood protection system for such 
        area, including a pumping station, decertified levee, or non-
        Federal or non-structural flood mitigation measure, against the 
        100-year frequency flood, without regard to the accreditation 
        status of the flood protection system; or
            (2) the community in which such property is located elects 
        not to provide the data necessary for the Administrator to 
        publish a flood insurance rate map or update that adequately 
        reflects the protection provided by any flood protection 
        system, including a pumping station, decertified levee, or non-
        Federal or non-structural flood mitigation measure.

SEC. 9. ALTERNATIVE APPROACH FOR ASSESSING AND PRICING FLOOD RISK.

    It is the sense of the House of Representatives that--
            (1) there should be established in the House of 
        Representatives a Bipartisan Task Force on Innovation in 
        Financing Flood Risk with the primary purpose of compiling data 
        and information on innovative market-based solutions to make 
        flood insurance more accessible and affordable for all 
        Americans; and
            (2) such Task Force should--
                    (A) consult with flood risk management stakeholder 
                groups, insurers, reinsurers, State regulators, and 
                financial experts knowledgeable and interested in 
                finding innovative new rate methodologies and 
                approaches to financing flood risk, including insurance 
                risk securitization;
                    (B) compile information on existing risk assessment 
                methodologies that--
                            (i) identify and standardize broader types 
                        of risks, hazards, structures, and losses, at a 
                        granular level, faced by property owners and 
                        communities, that helps investors, buyers, 
                        regulators, and policymakers finding a 
                        methodology to facilitate transparency and 
                        liquidity while reducing risk and increasing 
                        asset value through the clear reduction of risk 
                        uncertainty;
                            (ii) encourage transparency in the 
                        development of Flood Insurance Rate Maps that 
                        the Federal Emergency Management Agency uses to 
                        assign risk in flood-risk zones;
                            (iii) introduce financial or non-financial 
                        risk determination, analysis, and valuation of 
                        individual mortgages and housing transactions 
                        in a unified approach that includes engineering 
                        structures and environmental risks in the 
                        pricing by risk elements of catastrophe-linked 
                        products;
                            (iv) integrate different approaches 
                        (financial, actuarial, and engineering) into 
                        one pricing framework that complements modern 
                        flood risk analysis and captures potential 
                        losses as accurately as possible;
                            (v) granulate the risks and value and offer 
                        risk-differentiated and risk-specific solutions 
                        so that any differentiated risk can be 
                        redistributed and diversified in numerous ways;
                            (vi) explore transparency indexes that link 
                        monetary value to risk disclosure; and
                            (vii) average national catastrophic insured 
                        losses and appropriately assign weights and 
                        risk values to equitably distribute 
                        catastrophic, all-peril insurance risk;
                    (C) consider the relationship between new 
                transparent, benchmark pricing of flood insurance-
                linked securitization and structured catastrophe 
                derivatives that integrates engineering, financial, and 
                actuarial parameters to reduce the cost of mitigating 
                financial losses due to floods;
                    (D) evaluate options for--
                            (i) educating policyholders on methods for 
                        risk mitigation;
                            (ii) integrating policyholder and capital 
                        market participants, including investors, in 
                        the entire risk-financing process to 
                        demonstrate or feature specific system measures 
                        that increase asset value; and
                            (iii) expressing different ways to 
                        incentivize both the financial markets and the 
                        individual market participant to update all 
                        risk disclosures and risk-remediating actions 
                        on an individual basis; and
                    (E) not later than 180 days after the date of the 
                enactment of this Act, report findings, options, and 
                recommendations to the House of Representatives with 
                regard to the consideration of future flood-risk 
                analysis and risk innovation in pricing.
                                 <all>
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