I 
113TH CONGRESS 
1ST SESSION H. R. 3315 
To amend the National Flood Insurance Act of 1968 to allow the repair, 
expansion, and construction, without elevation, of agricultural structures 
located in special flood hazard zones, and for other purposes. 
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 
OCTOBER 23, 2013 
Mr. LAMALFA (for himself, Mr. GARAMENDI, Ms. MATSUI, Mr. MCNERNEY, 
and Mr. DENHAM) introduced the following bill; which was referred to 
the Committee on Financial Services 
A BILL 
To amend the National Flood Insurance Act of 1968 to 
allow the repair, expansion, and construction, without 
elevation, of agricultural structures located in special 
flood hazard zones, and for other purposes. 
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-
tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 
This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Agricultural Structures 
Building Act of 2013’’. 
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SEC. 2. REQUIREMENTS FOR STATE AND LOCAL LAND USE 
CONTROLS. 
Subsection (a) of section 1315 of the National Flood 
Insurance Act of 1968 (42 U.S.C. 4022(a)) is amended 
by adding at the end the following new paragraph: 
‘‘(3) ALLOWABLE LOCAL VARIANCES FOR CER-
TAIN AGRICULTURAL STRUCTURES.— 
‘‘(A) 
REQUIREMENT.—Notwithstanding 
any other provision of this Act, the land use 
and control measures adopted pursuant to 
paragraph (1) may not, for purposes of such 
paragraph, be considered to be inadequate or 
inconsistent with the comprehensive criteria for 
land management and use under section 1361 
because such measures provide that, in the case 
of any agricultural structure that is located in 
an area having special flood hazards, a variance 
in accordance with subparagraph (B) may be 
granted, and the Administrator may not sus-
pend a community from participation in the na-
tional flood insurance program, or place such a 
community on probation under such program, 
because such land use and control measures 
provide for such a variance. 
‘‘(B) 
VARIANCE; 
CONSIDERATIONS.—A 
variance in accordance with this subparagraph 
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is a variance, granted by an appropriate official 
of the community, from compliance with such 
land use and control measures that allows for 
the repair, expansion, or construction of such 
agricultural structure without elevation of the 
structure, but only after a determination by 
such appropriate official that— 
‘‘(i) in the case of new construction, 
the agricultural structure is subject to base 
flood elevations of at least three feet; 
‘‘(ii) in the case of existing structures, 
it is not practicable to elevate the repaired 
or expanded structure to the base flood ele-
vation; 
‘‘(iii) the structure is located within 5 
miles of active agricultural operations; and 
‘‘(iv) not more than one claim pay-
ment exceeding $1,000 has been made for 
the structure under flood insurance cov-
erage under this title within any period of 
10 consecutive years. 
‘‘(C) 
DEFINITION
OF
AGRICULTURAL 
STRUCTURE.—For purposes of this paragraph, 
the term ‘agricultural structure’ means any ag-
ricultural product processing facility, agricul-
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