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Answers to Frequently Asked Questions about the Colorado 2013 Flood Event Therefore, communities should keep the long-term recovery requirements in mind as they move through the initial construction stages of emergency protective measures. Alb (long-term recovery): If a "waterway" has an identified SFHA on an effective FEMA Flood Insurance Rate Map (FIRM) and the community participates in the National Flood Insurance Program, then a floodplain development permit must be obtained for any proposed manmade activity in the SFHA before work begins. This applies even if the proposed work is funded by FEMA or completed by the community (or its contractor), with or without a loan requiring the mandatory purchase of flood insurance. Due to the recent flood events, new channels and streams may or may not be delineated on the FIRM. If the community is able to obtain and use better data that displays a higher or changed risk profile for a certain area, it is in the community's best interest to regulate construction in that area to the more conservative risk profile or larger floodplain. Any changes in floodplain development requirements (such as using better data) must be approved and adopted by the community. As always, residents should contact their local floodplain administrator for specific rules and locally adopted ordinances pertaining to fill and construction in the floodplain. A community may be regulating construction in additional areas not shown as SFHAs on the effective FIRM. Q2: How should a community regulate floodplain development now? Should it be based on the high-water marks from this event, the mapped Special Flood Hazard Areas (SFHAs) shown on the effective Flood Insurance Rate MAP (FIRM), or the new stream and river channels? A2: Communities are required to use the information shown on the effective FIRM for floodplain management purposes, or to use State and local regulations if they are more restrictive. However, the effective FIRMS will not reflect recently realigned stream and river channels. If the high-water mark is greater or more conservative than the Base (1 -percent -annual -chance) Flood Elevation (BFE) on the effective FIRM, it is advised and would be beneficial for a community to use this information as a point for consideration in regulating rebuilding efforts. Thus, communities are advised to use all available risk information for redevelopment purposes. This risk information could include high-water marks, new topography/LiDAR, Advisory Base Flood Elevations, and local information and knowledge, and it can be used to regulate construction until the FIRMS are updated. New topographic data and risk assessment calculations (hydrology and hydraulics) can be used to update community's FIRM, although the information being used by a community during the rebuilding process (such as high-water marks) may or may not be incorporated into an updated study produced by FEMA. Note that FEMA's process to produce a new Flood Insurance Study and FIRM takes, on average, 3 to 5 years from start to finish. Interim advisory maps, whether they are produced by the community, the State, FEMA, or other Federal agencies, are just that - advisory. However, until FEMA can produce updated flood maps that formally identify new or modified SFHAs, advisory maps allow the community to