Solar Villages Initiative Act

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of H.R. 3307, the Homeowner Flood Insurance Affordability Act.

Today, I am pleased to lead the Democratic Party in delivering this message to the thousands of Americans who are facing unaffordable flood insurance premiums: relief is on the way.

As we committed to many months ago, Democrats have worked to fix this problem from the moment we heard about the unintended consequences of the Biggert-Waters Flood Insurance Reform Act.

Mr. Speaker, because I am the Waters of the Biggert-Waters Flood Insurance Reform Act, I felt a responsibility to make sure that we deal with the concerns that were coming to us from our constituents all over this country. The rate increases were unimaginable. So Democratic lawmakers in the House and the Senate took action, spearheading bipartisan legislation that passed the Senate and garnered the support of a majority of the House of Representatives.

Today, we have worked in good faith with Republican leadership to achieve a measure that isn't perfect but that will provide real relief to the thousands of families currently facing unaffordable premiums.

I believe this House measure strikes an important balance, addressing affordability concerns, bringing accountability to FEMA, and protecting the stability of the National Flood Insurance Program. The legislation ends dramatic increases caused by events such as property sales and restores grandfathered rates for those who played by the rules and built their properties according to code.

For families hit by unaffordable premium increases, this bill provides important relief in the form of a refund.

I am proud of the dramatic improvements to this bill that were made by the Democratic Caucus. These include reasonable limitations on rate increases that one property can experience, including those newly mapped into flood zones. We have ensured that when FEMA engages in the process of remapping, it actually works with communities to make sure it is being done accurately. We have made FEMA more accountable by requiring it provide clear and accurate information to anyone who may be affected by a change in policy.

Mr. Speaker, this bill would not have come together without strong support and participation from the Democratic Party. I would like to thank Leader Pelosi and Whip Hoyer, as well as Senator Mary Landrieu and Representative Cedric Richmond for their leadership, and the leadership of so many Democratic Members across the country, which was critical to taking this bill over the finish line. I applaud them. I strongly urge my colleagues to support this bill.

Let me just say a word of thanks to someone very special on this, Mr. Eric Cantor, who weighed in and did everything possible to work this out in a way that we could all be comfortable with. I am pleased for the opportunity I have had to work with him. I also thank Mr. Grimm. We started this out when others believed that we could not do anything about it. Having said all of that, we have come together to do something good for the people of this country.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Meeks) who has worked so hard on this bill, who serves on the Financial Services Committee and has been intimately involved with it.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Richmond), one of the coauthors of the bill that we put together to deal with this issue who has been working very hard on it.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Capuano), who has spent

an awful lot of time working on this issue with all of us.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentlelady from New York, Representative Maloney, the ranking member of the Subcommittee on Capital Markets, Insurance and Government Sponsored Enterprises.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Massachusetts, Representative Lynch, who is a member of the Financial Services Committee and is also the ranking member on the Subcommittee on Federal Workforce, U.S. Postal Service and the Census, and I thank him for his hard work in putting this bill together.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from New Jersey, Representative Pascrell, and I thank him for his input on this bill.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from Florida (Ms. Castor).

The Florida delegation, both Democrats and Republicans, has been absolutely magnificent in helping to get us to this point, and I thank Representatives Castor, Hastings, Buchanan, and all of those from the Florida delegation for all of the work they have done.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from California, Representative Garamendi, who has been advising us that we really do have to make changes to the National Flood Insurance Program, and I thank him for his work.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Oregon, Representative Blumenauer.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from New York, Ms. Nydia Velazquez, a member of the Financial Services Committee.

(Ms. VELAZQUEZ asked and was given permission to revise and extend her remarks.)

I yield myself the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker and Members, I am very proud and very pleased about this bipartisan effort to fix a serious problem in this country. As a matter of fact, we should all be pleased because it is said by the media and others that we cannot work together. This is a time when we can demonstrate that we really do care about the citizens of this country and we recognize the problems that were created by the Biggert-Waters bill.

I said earlier that my name was on that Biggert-Waters legislation, and I certainly worked in a bipartisan effort to try and do the right thing, and, of course, some day we would like to move all of these subsidies to actuarial rates.

We have unintended consequences in Biggert-Waters, and we have set out to fix them. So I want you to know that Mr. Grimm, Mr. Richmond, Mr. Cassidy, and Mrs. Capito all have worked very hard to make sure that we addressed the concerns of our constituencies.

Let me tell you, with this bill we are removing certain rate increase triggers, the reinstating of grandfathering, lower rate increases, refund of excess premium charges to homeowners, affordability study and framework; added to that, working with the bill that the Republicans brought to the floor and Democrats added to it, individual property rate increase caps, affordability goal, rate increase protection for newly mapped properties, mapping protections, consumer protections, protections of small businesses, nonprofits, houses of worship, and residences.

Mr. Speaker and Members, again, this is a bill that will address the concerns and the outcry of our constituents, some of whom were experiencing 500 and 600 percent rate increases. I tried to work with the chairman, and I was disappointed that Mr. Hensarling saw differently. He does not support this bill, and he said so. Mr. Neugebauer and Mr. Hensarling said they had come up with other ways to deal with it. I never saw any of that. Nobody ever tried to relate to the fact that I was outreaching to try and get Mr. Hensarling, Mr. Neugebauer, and others who had a different opinion to come and work this out and do what we could for our constituents.

So, I am very pleased that we had Members on the opposite side of the aisle who insisted that their constituents deserved protection and that they

deserved support. Working with their leadership and Mr. Cantor working with our leadership, with the Democrats on this side of the aisle, we have come up with something that is extremely important and effective.

Now, I must say to both sides of the aisle, we have continuing work to do. This is not a permanent fix on this. What I discovered was none of us knew enough about FEMA. We have been crying for years about remapping. We don't really know how it works. We don't know the discretion that they have in making some of these decisions. We have got to spend the next few years really learning FEMA, how it works and how it makes decisions. We should never get into this kind of a situation again because we simply have allowed them to do what they do without us being involved. They don't report to us on a yearly basis, as I would like to have them do.

So this is an opportunity for us not only to fix this problem at this time but to focus on the fact that we have got oversight responsibility that we have got to carry out to make sure that we are dealing with these issues in a way that makes good sense.

So, again, I am very proud, and I am very pleased with this bipartisan effort. I welcome the opportunity to have been able to work with some Members from the opposite side of the aisle that I had not worked with before. I think I learned a lot about them, and they learned a lot about me. I am so thankful that our leadership gave me the latitude to say go and do everything possible working with the opposite side of the aisle to get this problem fixed. So they have not only supported me, but they have supported all of the Members on our side of the aisle who have said to them that this may be one of the most important fixes that we will do this year.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 3370) to delay the implementation of certain provisions of the Biggert-Waters Flood Insurance Reform Act of 2012, and for other purposes, as amended.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks and submit extraneous materials for the Record on H.R. 3370, as amended, currently under consideration.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 1\1/2\ minutes.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong support of the Homeowner Flood Insurance Affordability Act.

Last Congress, overwhelming majorities in the House and Senate, including all of my colleagues from West Virginia, voted for the passage of Biggert-Waters. There was near unanimous agreement that significant reforms were needed for the program, but when the new flood insurance rates were published last fall, I began to hear from, and met with, many West Virginians who were shocked by the increases in their flood insurance bills that had far exceeded the worst-case scenario in CBO's projection. In some cases, their only choice was to spend their life's savings on their flood insurance bills or walk away from their house, ruining their credit.

The bill before us today will make sure the people who purchased a home after the passage of Biggert-Waters, only to see their premiums skyrocket, can stay in their homes. Under this bill, homeowners will see their premiums rise towards an actuarially sound rate, but on a path that is much more affordable.

Additionally, we are taking steps to fix some of the mapping issues in the flood program. Many of my constituents have told me that they are in a Special Flood Hazard Area, despite no evidence of the area ever flooding. These two issues address the core problems of the flood insurance program: unaffordable rates and incorrect mapping.

There is no question that the NFIP is broken. We need to take steps to put it

on solid financial footing, but immediately hitting people with crushing increases in their premiums just because they bought a new home is not the way to do it, and that was never the original intent of Biggert-Waters.

I urge all of my colleagues to support this bill, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Grimm), the author of this legislation and someone without whose hard work we wouldn't be here today.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Hensarling), the chairman of the full committee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Neugebauer), the chairman of the Housing and Insurance Subcommittee on the Financial Services Committee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from New York (Mr. King), a member of the Financial Services Committee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Mississippi (Mr. Palazzo).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. LoBiondo).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Louisiana, Dr. Cassidy, one of the champions of this bill.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Bilirakis), a great advocate for this bill.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Buchanan) for his hard work.

Mr. Speaker, next I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Scalise), a great advocate for this bill and for his State.

Mr. Speaker, can you tell me how much time is remaining on both sides?

Mr. Speaker, I am prepared to close, but I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the ranking member, Ms. Waters, for her hard work on this and Mr. Grimm, Dr. Cassidy, and all the speakers we have had today here on both sides. We can work together to fix a definite problem, but I think we need to kind of reflect back on how did we get to this problem. We were trying to fix a bigger problem, the $24 billion hole that the Flood Insurance Program has created because of mismanagement and not looking at it correctly.

Over 400 of us voted for that bill. So we did not realize at the time the data that we were given by FEMA gave us a certain ceiling that certain folks' premiums could rise, and as we have heard today from everybody, Republicans and Democrats, no matter where you live in the country, some of the premium escalation has just been incredible. So I am proud that we are working together.

I mentioned West Virginia. We flood a lot in West Virginia. We have got a lot of hills and hollows. Richard in St. Albans came to me in October of last year. He had just bought a home before they put the new FEMA rates into effect. He thought he was going to be paying a little over $1,000 in his flood insurance program on a $150,000 house. Guess what? $14,000 was the rate that he was going to have to pay. He said:

I am just going to walk away. I will get foreclosed on.

This is my dream home.

So for Richard, that is why I think all of this is important today, and for all the other Richards out there across the country who have had sticker shock, who haven't been able to cope, who have been very upset about this and wondering, Is anybody really going to help me here?

So what I think we have learned today is whatever the scenario is, whether you are in a mountain situation by a river or if you are in an urban area in New York or if you are in Florida, that these problems were deep, expensive, and discouraging, and people were unable to understand a way out. I think that is what we are giving them today.

Many of the reforms that were built into the first Biggert-Waters bill still remain. We are refining those to make sure they make common sense. We are making sure that folks around the country can afford the homes that they have bought with the flood insurance and then get them on a glide path towards the sustainability of not just their home but also the program in general.

So I am proud of the efforts that all of us working together have had here today. I would like to encourage the other body to pass this. It is not going to work unless we get the Presidential signature that we need to make sure that we get the real relief that people need and deserve.

So with that, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, our Nation is, tragically, going broke. Our national debt, which has skyrocketed under this President, is clearly, by any measure, on a dangerous and unsustainable path, a path that, if unaltered, will leave our children with less freedom, fewer opportunities, and a lower standard of living. That is beyond unfair. That is immoral.

One reason America is going broke is because of poorly designed and costly government-run insurance programs. The National Flood Insurance Program is one such program.

Its chief administrator has already testified that ``the NFIP was, by statute and design, not actuarially sound.'' In fact, the program charges only 70 percent of what its administrators believe they actually need. Perhaps that is why the program is currently $24 billion in the red to taxpayers and has no way to ever repay them.

The NFIP is not financially sound because pretty much every policyholder receives taxpayer subsidies. Some get explicit subsidies because the law prohibits the program from charging a full and fair rate based upon their calculated actuarial risk.

Others receive implicit subsidies because, according to the GAO, the program uses a faulty model that under-measures flood risk.

At the end of the day, the program forces roughly 96 percent of all Americans to subsidize the remaining 4 percent, regardless of income or need. That means a single mom in Dallas, where I live, who is working hard as a cashier at the Albertsons grocery store may be forced to subsidize the flood insurance for some millionaire's beachfront vacation home. If that is not the definition of unfair, I don't know what is.

To its credit, in 2012, Congress recognized that the government-run flood insurance program was fundamentally broken and unfair. We passed, almost unanimously, the Biggert-Waters Act. It phases out most of the explicit subsidies over the next few years and requires rates to be more closely based on a property's actuarial degree of flood risk.

Now, the first premiums under Biggert-Waters are starting to come due. There is sticker shock, some based on fact, some based on fear.

Clearly, there are many, many, across our Nation who have been unaware of their taxpayer-funded subsidies. There are some who simply can't afford the new premiums, and others who are now having trouble attempting to sell their homes.

This should be addressed by Congress, and that is why, over the last 8 weeks, Chairman Neugebauer and myself have put four different plans on the tables for Members who approached us about making modifications to the Biggert-Waters Act.

We agreed to go slower on reforms and to temporarily cap payments as long as the program would eventually require all property owners to pay the fair amount that they owe and, overall, the program would begin to bring in more income so taxpayers could avoid yet another bailout.

Regrettably, that is not the approach we are debating today. The House bill before us, although technically PAYGO compliant, would postpone actuarially sound rates for perhaps a generation. It would kill off a key element of risk-based pricing permanently, which is necessary if we are to ever transition to market competition.

Finally, it creates brand new subsidies for a program that is already bailout broke.

Mr. Speaker, the Senate bill isn't any better. It essentially represents a 4-year freeze that is not PAYGO compliant. My fear is that either bill represents a big step backwards from reform and leaves us just a few hurricanes or a few short years away from the next taxpayer bailout.

Either bill will make it incredibly difficult to do what Congress must do, and that is phase out this unneeded, government-run insurance program that fundamentally represents both an unfair and unsustainable middle-income entitlement.

I respect my colleagues who have a different view. I respect my leadership for bringing a bill that may not be optimum to the floor.

But, Mr. Speaker, if we don't protect taxpayers today, how will we ever reform the gargantuan middle-income entitlements that put us on the precipice of a debt crisis?

I, for one, will vote ``no'' on this well-intended but misguided bill.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong support of the Homeowner Flood Insurance Affordability Act (HR 3370), and would like to thank Mr. Grimm and Mr. LoBiondo, all our colleagues from New Jersey, and the Republican leadership for working together to bring this much-needed legislation to the Floor.

After Superstorm Sandy devastated the Northeast, our communities rallied, coming together to help friends and neighbors recover and rebuild. While progress has been made, some shore towns and the families who live along our coast are still struggling. Thousands of homeowners are working to rebuild their properties, and their lives-- and the difficulties they continue to face cannot be overstated.

The coming rate hikes will have a chilling and dramatic impact on these communities, and mitigating the consequences for homeowners along the shore is a necessary step in the recovery effort.

At the start of this year, over 80,000 flood insurance policies were in force in Monmouth, Ocean and Mercer Counties in my Congressional District. The exploding cost of flood insurance--a program that many have paid into for years--threatens to roll back much of the progress made, and once again leave homeowners looking for answers.

The bill on the floor today makes targeted and necessary reforms and will prevent massive premium increases from hitting homeowners who simply cannot afford them--and cannot find a buyer to take them on, leaving them stranded and without a solution. Many cannot afford the recommended mitigation measures that may or may not reduce their premiums, creating a further environment of uncertainty.

Accordingly, the Homeowner Flood Insurance Affordability Act slows the rate of increase that was included in the 2012 Biggert-Waters reform bill, allowing homeowners to remain in their homes and plan accordingly to continue flood insurance policies.

While not perfect, this bill will provide relief and stability to these homeowners and their communities while bringing reform to the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP). It also provides a mechanism for enhanced community participation in the flood mapping process and increases transparency by making information publicly available to impacted parties.

Further, HR 3370 will provide individualized assistance by establishing a flood insurance advocate to help homeowners and towns obtain information and fair treatment during the mapping process. After hearing from hundreds of families, particularly in Monmouth and Ocean Counties, who are simply looking for information on how they will be impacted by changes to the flood mapping process, I am pleased that this important provision was retained in the final bill.

Mr. Speaker, there are NFIP-related issues that still must be resolved--such as ensuring proper and accurate flood mapping--but this bill is an important step in the right direction and will help mitigate the rate shock that many of my constituents are facing.

I urge my colleagues to support it.

I thank the gentlewoman.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition today to H.R. 3370. The National Flood Insurance Program is in trouble. It is in deep debt, and it is putting taxpayers at risk for another government bailout.

The program was added to the GAO's ``high-risk list'' in 2006 and remains there today because of the financial exposure it represents to the American taxpayers. Today, it is over $24 billion in debt, and this number will continue to rise.

Recognizing this, Congress passed the Biggert-Waters Act in July of 2012. The act authorized the flood insurance program for 5 years and included important reforms to get it back on sound financial footing. One of these reforms was the gradual elimination of outdated rate subsidies.

In a rare display of bipartisanship, Republicans and Democrats overwhelmingly supported the notion that risk-based premiums were needed for the program to be self-sufficient and to protect the taxpayers from further bailouts. Over 400 Members of Congress voted for that.

Since then, we have heard concerns from homeowners facing sticker shock from the higher rates. I am sympathetic to those concerns, but I believe there are more responsible ways to address this bill than the bill before us today.

The Financial Services Committee put together four different proposals to address these concerns. The last one included an 8- to 10- year phase-in for rates and nearly a 2-year affordability cap of $5,000. Unfortunately, each one of these proposals were rejected because they fell short of maintaining subsidies indefinitely.

That is unfortunate because maintaining these subsidies hurts everyone in the long run. It hurts taxpayers by putting them on the hook for billions of dollars in subsidies. It hurts the Flood Insurance Program by easing its path toward insolvency. It hurts homeowners by encouraging them to build in areas that jeopardize their lives and their properties.

After more than a decade, if I have learned anything in Congress, it is that the Federal Government does a terrible job of underwriting and pricing risk. Whether it is through subsidies or failures to price risk due to political considerations, the American taxpayers, unfortunately, end up footing the bill.

What is even worse under H.R. 3370 is that the taxpayers will be subsidizing rates that benefit only 1 percent of households. More than 20 percent of the programs policies are heavily subsidized, regardless of need, and of those policyholders, 70 percent go to homes in counties with the highest property values.

While H.R. 3370 may help homeowners facing high rates in the short run, it does them a disservice by not promoting a healthy, stable financial program in the future.

For taxpayers, for homeowners and, ultimately, for the future of the flood insurance, I think we can do better. I urge my colleagues to vote against H.R. 3370.

Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.