PUBLIC NOTICE

Public notification is hereby given by the Department of Homeland Security, Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) of the intent to reimburse eligible local governments and State agencies for eligible costs incurred for debris removal, repair of publicly owned facilities, and construction of new facilities due to damage resulting from storms and flooding that occurred between July 12 and July 23, 2004. This notice applies to the Public Assistance and Hazard Mitigation Grant Programs.

The areas affected are Burlington and Camden Counties in the State of New Jersey, which were declared major disaster areas by the President on July 16, 2004, for all categories of Public Assistance (categories A-G).

This assistance is granted under the authority of Public Law 93-288, as amended, the Robert T. Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act, 42 US.C. Sections 5121-5206 (Stafford Act). This notice applies to projects and facilities located in the 100-year floodplain (areas that have been determined to have a one percent probability of flooding in any given year), or critical actions within the 500-year floodplain. These projects and facilities or critical actions may be vulnerable to damage by flooding if they are restored to pre-disaster condition in pre-disaster locations.

Critical actions include, but are not limited to, those actions which create or extend the useful life of structures or facilities such as:

• Structures and facilities which produce, use or store highly volatile, flammable, explosive, toxic or water-reactive materials;
• Hospitals, nursing homes, and housing for the elderly, which are likely to contain occupants who may not be sufficiently mobile to avoid the loss of life or injury during flood and storm events;
• Emergency operation centers, or data storage centers which contain records or services that may become lost or inoperative during flood and storm events; and,
• Generating plants, and other principle points of utility lines.

These projects and facilities include, but are not limited to, the following:

• Non-emergency debris removal;
• Non-emergency repair to protective flood control facilities, including dams, reservoirs and channels;
• Damage to roads, including streets, culverts and bridges;
• Damage to water control facilities, pipes and distribution systems.
• Damage to public buildings and related equipment;
• Damage to public utilities, including sewage treatment plants and sewers, and electrical power distribution systems;
• Damage to private non-profit facilities (hospitals, educational centers, emergency and custodial care services, etc.);
• Construction of a hazard mitigation project designed to reduce the impact of future flooding.

The President’s Executive Order 11988 (Floodplain Management) and Executive Order 11990 (Protection of Wetlands) require that all Federal actions in or affecting a 100-year floodplain or a wetland be reviewed for opportunities to relocate projects and facilities out of the floodplain or wetland in order to minimize harm to the floodplain or wetland.

But, when there is no opportunity to relocate out of a floodplain or wetland:

• FEMA is required to undertake a detailed review to determine what measures can be taken to minimize future harm to the floodplain or wetland.
• FEMA intends to assist the restoration work in the floodplain or wetland, and may require flood hazard mitigation, if all of the following criteria are met:
  
  
  1. The FEMA-estimated cost of repairs is less than $100,000 and is less than
  50% of the facility’s replacement cost;
  2. The facility is not located in a floodway;
  3. The facility has not sustained major structural damage in a previous
  Presidentially declared flooding major disaster or emergency; and
  4. The facility is not a critical one (i.e. hospital, generating plant, contains
  dangerous materials, emergency operations center, etc.)
  
  
• FEMA is also required to examine another option: the possible effects of not relocating a facility. This examination may disclose, for example, an overriding public need for the facility to remain in its present location and that this need clearly outweighs the directives of Executive Orders 11988 and 11990 to avoid locating facilities and structures in floodplains and wetlands. When the examination results in such findings, FEMA consults with State and local officials to assure that restoration work will not violate either State or local floodplain management or wetland protection standards. And FEMA may incorporate certain measures designed to mitigate the effects of future flood and/or storm damage.

If all of the four criteria listed above in paragraph “B” are not met and the project or facility needs to be relocated, the proposed work must undergo detailed review including study of alternative locations and flood hazard mitigation. The public will be invited to participate in the process of identifying alternatives and analyzing their impacts.

Another fact situation may occur: Based on an urgent need to restore a facility that cannot be relocated, an applicant may have begun restoration of a facility before a Federal inspector visited the site. Some of this restoration work may require examination of alternative locations. Nevertheless, assistance will be provided to restore such a facility in its original location if at least one of the following situations applies:

1. The facility is functionally dependent on its floodplain location (bridges and flood control facilities, for example).
2. The project facilitates an open space use (a park, for example). This type of use represents sound floodplain management; therefore there is no need to relocate it.
3. The facility is an integral part of a system that would be uneconomical or impractical to relocate (a utility, for example).

Additionally, notice is given to the public of FEMA’s intent to contribute to the cost of hazard mitigation projects within the State of New Jersey under Section 404 of the Stafford Act (Hazard Mitigation Grant Program). The Hazard Mitigation Grant Program is available to all New Jersey counties. Examples of projects likely to be undertaken in the 100-year floodplains of the State include structural retrofit of essential facilities such as shelters or emergency operations buildings; construction of new facilities such as detention ponds or debris dams; modification of an existing, undamaged facility such as improving waterway openings of bridges or culverts; voluntary acquisition of flood-damaged property; removal of structures out of the floodplain which may include demolition; elevation of flood-damaged property; minimal structural flood control measures; or other types of projects to limit the effects of future disaster damages. In the course of developing project proposals, subsequent notices will provide more specific information, as it becomes available.

Interested persons may obtain information about these actions and the locations at the FEMA-New Jersey Disaster Field Office, located at 530 Fellowship Road, Mt. Laurel, NJ 08054-3405, or by calling (856) 231-5100, between 8:00 a.m. and 5:00 p.m., Monday through Friday. Comments about specific projects and the application to them of the Floodplain Management Executive Order 11988 and the Protection of Wetlands Executive Order 11990 should be submitted in writing to Mr. Peter Martinasco, Federal Coordinating Officer, at the above address by August 31, 2004.