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December 24, 2008 THE VILLADOM TIMES IV • Page 3
Mahwah Township may change flood insurance rate map
by Frank J. McMahon
The Mahwah Township Council is expected to fund the
cost of revising the Federal Emergency Management Agen-
cy’s flood insurance rate map for the area around North
Railroad Avenue, which is near the New Jersey Transit
train station on East Ramapo Avenue at Old Station Lane.
One of the residents of that street, Barbara Alberts,
recently advised the township council that when she
attempted to refinance her home she was told by her bank
that she had to purchase flood insurance. But she claims
that Steven Koestner, an engineer she hired to review the
map, has told her that the flood insurance rate map is wrong
and needs to be changed.
“We need the map changed so FEMA can take me out of
the flood area,” Alberts told the council.
Koestner wrote to Boswell McClave Engineering, the
township’s engineering firm and asked that firm to submit
a letter of map revision to FEMA on behalf of the township
in order to authorize a revision to the flood insurance rate
map. Koestner claims the FEMA map depicts a railroad
crossing over the Masonicus Brook that appears to act as
an obstruction in the channel, causing water to build up to
a flood elevation. That crossing was removed some time
ago, according to Koestner, yet the latest flood study still
includes the impact of that controlling structure.
“The removal (of that structure) should have a signifi-
cant effect on lowering the flood elevation and the antici-
pated flood water damage to (Albert’s property) and the
upstream vicinity,” Koestner wrote.
The FEMA map has not been revised, however, to reflect
the existing site conditions and, therefore, it does not cor-
rectly reflect the flood elevations of the brook, according
to Michael Kelly, the Boswell representative for the town-
ship. “This adversely affects properties located along the
brook between Railroad Avenue and the location where
the railroad crossing was removed,” Kelly told the council,
“requiring some property owners to be required to pur-
chase flood insurance.”
Kelly told the council certain things would be needed
to correctly delineate the floodplain limits of the Masoni-
cus Brook and to submit an application for a letter of map
revision to FEMA, including topographic survey informa-
tion and a review of FEMA’s stream cross section data with
the existing current topographic survey information. Data
would then have to be revised and the FEMA flood panel
and flood profile of the Masonicus Brook would have to
be amended to depict the revised floodplain and floodway
limits along with flood elevations for this area. Then, cer-
tain forms would have to be completed and submitted to
FEMA along with certain computations, topographical
data, photographs, and an annotated flood map and pro-
file. The township would then have to file a request for a
letter of map revision and coordinate the review process
with FEMA.
Kelly estimated the fee for his firm to perform these
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application fees, which could be about $800.
Kelly emphasized that the township has not made any
error in this matter, but the map was just not updated by
FEMA even though the bridge was removed 15 to 20 years
ago. He explained, however, that FEMA has a policy that
requires an engineer to prove that the map is wrong and to
show how it should be before it will be updated.
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