VIII. Mitigation Strategy
Some hazard mitigation strategies for the Town of Chapel Hill are currently ongoing, such as a Flood Mitigation Assistance grant for the acquisition of three repetitive loss structures on Dickerson Court, the Drainage Assistance program, the Capital Improvements Program, and the Storm Sewer Inventory. This plan makes the following recommendations for expanding and strengthening the Town’s resilience to natural hazards. After each recommendation, responsible departments and target completion dates are noted. Actual completion dates are dependant upon Council consideration and resource allocation.
Mitigation can be achieved by strengthening existing programs. These include:
1) The Town currently has a “Stormwater Maintenance Program” database underway that lists stormwater/flood problem areas in Chapel Hill. This database should be further developed and maintained with a ranking system to quickly and effectively prioritize capital improvements and drainage assistance projects to be completed as funding becomes available. Responsibility: Public Works and Engineering Departments. Target Establishment Date: June 2005, with ongoing updates.
2) Develop a more comprehensive Stormwater Management Program by implementing a Stormwater Utility to provide consistent and stable revenue for program enhancements. Responsibility: Currently under Council consideration. Target Establishment Date: Currently under Council consideration.
3) Enhance the existing right-of-way drainage maintenance and drainage assistance programs with sufficient resources to plan and implement improvement activities on public and private property. Responsibility: Public Works and Engineering Departments. Target Establishment Date: June 2005.
4) The developing Storm Sewer Inventory, which includes inlet and outlet locations and conditions and network of sewers, should be adequately completed and properly managed through a Geographic Information Systems (GIS) format. The inventory should be further utilized to carry out an effective storm sewer maintenance program, and should be updated periodically. Responsibility: Engineering Department. Target Establishment Date: preliminary inventory completion-August 2002, preliminary GIS completion-June 2005. (Required under NPDES Phase I).
5) At-risk repetitive loss commercial and residential structures have been preliminarily identified for possible future mitigation activities. This should database should be further established, managed, and maintained. Responsibility: Engineering Department. Target Establishment Date: June 2005.
6) Further develop cooperative efforts between the Town of Chapel Hill and other local units of government including Triangle J Council of Governments, the Town of Carrboro, UNC-Chapel Hill, and Orange County in floodplain mapping and mitigation activities. Cooperative efforts would be effective for watershed-wide planning and research such as the currently developing Research Triangle Project Impact and the Cooperative Technical Partnership with Carrboro. Responsibility: Engineering Department. Target Establishment Date: ongoing.
7) A database of granting sources, applications, and implementation programs should be actively maintained. This will facilitate applications for hazard mitigation funding and ensure that any monies received are used in the most efficient manner. North Carolina Emergency Management website has a list of these that may be useful: http://www.ncem.org/Mitigation/additional_funding.htm. Selected funding sources that may be useful are as follows (numbers refer to the ncem list):
10.902-Soil and Water Conservation
10.904-Watershed Protection and Flood Prevention
10.906-River Basin Surveys and Investigations
10.911-Watershed Surveys and Planning
15.921-Rivers, Trails, and Conservation Assistance
66.604-Environmental Justice-Small Community
83.505-State Disaster Preparedness Grants
15.919-Urban Park and Recreation Recovery Program
15.808-USGS Research and Data Acquisition
66.600-Environmental Protection Consolidated Grants
66.708-Pollution Prevention Grants Program
Flood Mitigation Assistance Grants
Further funding options can be found in the appendix, page 5.
Responsibility: Engineering Department. Target Establishment Date: June 2002.
8) The Town of Chapel Hill requires new developments to install electric, cable, and telephone wires underground. In older neighborhoods, utilities are overhead and services fail when trees or limbs fall and break the lines. If mitigation funds were made available, it would be beneficial to relocate these utilities underground since the Town has experienced lengthy power outages during ice storms or major storm events such as Hurricane Fran. Retrofitting above ground utilities by placing them underground is beyond the financial means of the Town, but could be accomplished with resources from state or federal assistance. Responsibility: Engineering Department in cooperation with utility companies. Target Establishment Date: dependent upon feasibility and available resources
9) Article 5 of the Development Ordinance (the Resource Conservation District Ordinance) provides substantial flood hazard mitigation. This ordinance is currently under revision, and changes that are made should take into account opportunities for flood mitigation. Responsibility: Engineering and Planning Departments. Target Establishment Date: June 2003.
10) The Town’s Open Space and Greenways Programs target tracts of open lands for acquisition to maintain the property as open space. Much of this land is located within the special flood hazard area. Acquiring and demolishing repetitively flooded structures could increase Town open space and enhance these programs. Responsibility: Parks and Recreation and Engineering Departments. Target Establishment Date: dependent upon available resources
Mitigation can also be achieved by creating new programs. These should include:
1) Produce new National Flood Plain Insurance Program (NFIP) flood maps. These should be detailed flood studies that include all main stems and many tributaries experiencing development pressure, particularly in basins draining less than one square mile. (Detailed FEMA maps will include only sub-basins of one square mile or more). Responsibility: Engineering Department. Target Establishment Date: dependent upon available resources
2) Applications for further Flood Mitigation Assistance funding should be completed to mitigate Chapel Hill’s most flood-prone structures, in accordance with #5 under existing programs. Priorities should be based on repetitive loss, depth of flooding, and Town open space considerations. Responsibility: Parks and Recreation and Engineering Departments. Target Establishment Date: dependent upon available resources
3) Produce elevation certificates for the highest priority at-risk structures and consult with property owners and FEMA. Responsibility: Engineering Department. Target Establishment Date: dependent upon available resources
4) Establish a public education program that would involve the community in learning about their watershed and natural hazards. Topics of discussion could include: watershed water quality, pollution, urban watershed hydrology and function, and what they can do to help keep natural hazards from becoming natural disasters, such as floodproofing. The underlying principles of this program should be that the public will be more receptive to hazard mitigation if they better understand the natural systems that create these hazards. Responsibility: Engineering Department, others. Target Establishment Date: June 2005 (required under NPDES Phase II)
5) A stormwater design manual to develop design standards for future development and to make modifications, repairs, or upgrades of existing stormwater infrastructure should be created. Responsibility: Engineering Department. Target Completion Date: dependent upon available resources
6) Enhance resources as necessary to efficiently carry out the multiple tasks described above. Responsibility: Engineering Department. Target Completion Date: dependent upon Council consideration
IV. Plan Evaluation
The preceding Hazard Mitigation plan is worthwhile only if we actively seek funding sources, work toward implementation, and modify the plan to changing hazards and data availability. Plan evaluation, review, and reassessment should occur as data and funding necessary to pursue mitigation strategies becomes available. This may be done in a piecemeal approach, but the majority of mitigation strategies should be reviewed and reassessed every two years or immediately following a natural disaster, whichever comes first. Plan evaluation, review, and reassessment will determine how far we have progressed and define the next steps toward making Chapel Hill a disaster resistant and resilient community.