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Pre'face Loss of lives and damage to prope'iy due to floods continue to increase in the United States in spite of all investment of billions of dollars In flood con. trol structures. Colorado's experience echoes this national trend. Since the turn-oHhe-century several hundred Coloradoans have been killed by floods, and pr<merty damages in excess of $1.6 billion have been incurred. Flooding has been going on since long before settlement of Colorado. The lands inundated by floodwaters, or toe floodplains, have and always will attract settlement. Flooel control structures and disaster relief programs were intended to relieve floodplain residents and/or communities near floodplains of the severe financial and emotional impacts of ffooding, Today, however, costs of projects and disaster relief are mounting, as is the cost of flooding damages. Lawmakers have begun pursuing programs of mitigation that would make floodplain regulation possible and so provide a range of manag- ment alternatives to floodplain managers and communities in the floodplain. In 19~17, the Colorado General Assembly created thEl Colorado Water Con- servation Board (CWCB) and charged It with. among other things, the respon. sibility for "the utmost prevention of floods." fn 1966, the Legislature passed H.B. '1007 providing for designation of floodplains by the CWCS so that local govelT ments could regulate and control land uses in flood hazard areas under "police powers:' In 1974, the L.egislature passed H.B. 1041 providing that floodplains are a matter of state interest, and that after a public hearing, a local government may regulate matters of state interest. In 19138 Congress passed the National Flood Insurance Act providing for flood hazard insurance and amended it in 1969 to indude mudslides (mud. flOWS). The Congress strengUlened the program by passing the Flood Disas- ter Prctection Act of 1973 The intent of the 1937, t !)66, and 1974 acts of the Colorado General Assembly and the intent of the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) was to reduce hazardous occupation of tile floodplains and themby reduce flood damages and disaster mlief costs.- The cJncept of floodplain management stated simply is to achieve the optimal use of the floodplain while reducing flood damages. Implementation of a floodplain management pmgram, however, is not simple in any respect. A Floodplain Managemen.LMan~allor L.ocal Governments was prepared to pro' vide 10Gal government officials with basic information on flood-related pre- cedenfs, procedures, and programs, it is a revision of a document publiShed in June, 1976 by the CWCB titled, Manual for L.ocal Governments -- Flood- plain Management, Flooq.sonlro/, and Flood Disaster Programs. . The revised manual is or9anized into six chapters, a resource section, and a glossary, The chapters, Historic Flood Damages and Caus..s of Fh)ods, Legal Aspects of Floodplain Mana~lement, Identifi<:atiol1 of the Floodplain, Floodplain Management Alternatives, Adminis;lration of Floodpfain Regulations, Implementing a Floodplain Manag,ement Program, can either be read one after another to obtain a complete picture of the elements involved in a floodplain management program. or they can be read individually if only a portion of the information is neecled, A "resources" sec. tion was compiled to supplement the text if some of the information is either not exactly what the floodplain manager needed or if there i~; information that is missing and a floodplain manager needs to pursue It. The reader will find references to the resources section in the text indicated by@ The mader will also be directed to a "glossary" of technical or jargon terms for definition when a word appears in the text that is in italics..