Jim Davis / arizona daily star

Related articles:

Giffords: Marana needs more time to address flood plain labelGiffords to announce FEMA legislation in Marana Giffords' target: Marana 'flood plain'

Other articles by Brian J. Pedersen:

Painstaking restoration of mission tower done Ring in New Year's with family Oro Valley's Ventana Medical sues parts manufacturerOro Valley's Ventana Medical sues parts manufacturer Agents spent $1K in probe of poker club Giving Tree branching even more this year Fliers into Tucson could face delays Auto dealer Click gives $50,000 for Marine, Salvation Army toys Tucson car dealer Jim Click gives toy drives $50,000 boost N. Side poker club folds in deal to end Yaqui suit

General
MEDLEY COMMUNICATIONS
INSTALLATION PROFESSIONAL Part Time Employment
AVIVA Children's Services
Monitor: Parent-Child Visits General
Drexel Height Fire District
Firefighter

Marana officials have enlisted the aid of U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords in their effort to prevent much of the town from being put into a high-risk flood zone.

"This is unnecessarily snaring homeowners who aren't at risk," the Democrat said Wednesday afternoon during a videoconference with representatives from Marana, Oro Valley and Pima County, area developers and the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

FEMA released draft maps last month that will put 10 square miles of Marana into a flood plain, a result of FEMA's ongoing Flood Map Modernization Program that included identification of all levees and leveelike structures throughout the country.

FEMA has determined that the Central Arizona Project canal, the Union Pacific Railroad tracks and Interstate 10 act like levees, but since they don't meet official levee standards, they can't be used to prevent flooding.

Consequently, areas that are perceived as being protected by these structures will be put into a Zone A flood plain as of Sept. 30, 2008. All homeowners with federally backed mortgages in Zone A would then be required to buy flood insurance.

FEMA senior engineer Ray Lenaburg said the levee accreditation process began a week before Hurricane Katrina devastated the Gulf Coast region in August 2005, and it's meant to paint a more clear picture of where the flood risk is greatest.

"Our mission is to protect people's lives and property," Lenaburg said.

But Giffords, who wrote a letter to FEMA last month on behalf of Marana, said she was concerned that FEMA is being too arbitrary with its flood-zone designations and is not taking into account specific conditions for individual areas.

"You cannot have a one-size-fits-all approach to the entire country," Giffords said. "We have to take into effect that the Southwest is not the same as a coastal plain."

Already feeling the effects of a slowdown in the housing market, Marana could become a development wasteland, officials said, if flood insurance were to become necessary to live or build there.

"There is nobody that wants to buy property in a flood zone," said Dean Wingert, senior vice president of Forest City Land Group, which is developing the Gladden Farms master-planned community in Marana.

Wingert said that within a week of FEMA releasing its draft maps, a $6 million development deal fell through with Richmond American for that home builder to construct its fourth neighborhood in Gladden Farms.

Also at risk are Marana's plans to master-plan a 100-home affordable-housing subdivision, community development director T. VanHook said, because access to federal programs that provide assistance for affordable housing would not apply to projects in a flood plain.

"Just the inference of a Zone A flood plain has been devastating to this town," Marana Mayor Ed Honea said.

Michael Racy, a lobbyist who represents several landowners and developers with interests in Marana, said the private sector is willing to work with town officials to pay for and conduct hydrological studies proving much of the area in question is not at risk of flooding.

FEMA needs to allow more time — beyond the September 2008 deadline — for these studies to be conducted, Racy said. Otherwise, the pending move into a flood plain could kill growth in the area, he added.

"Within days, there are national companies that are going to pull out of Pima County," Racy said.