Protecting Your Home
Many homes in Marshall County are located with in the flood plains of the Wheeling Creek Watershed and its tributaries and the Ohio River. As Marshall County has experienced many floods throughout its history, a way of protecting your home is through the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s National Flood Insurance Program.
The National Flood Insurance Program Nearly 20,000 communities across the United States and its territories participate in the NFIP by adopting and enforcing floodplain management ordinances to reduce future flood damage. In exchange, the NFIP makes Federally backed flood insurance available to homeowners, renters, and business owners in these communities. Community participation in the NFIP is voluntary.
Flood insurance is designed to provide an alternative to disaster assistance to reduce the escalating costs of repairing damage to buildings and their contents caused by floods. Flood damage is reduced by nearly $1 billion a year through communities implementing sound floodplain management requirements and property owners purchasing of flood insurance. Additionally, buildings constructed in compliance with NFIP building standards suffer approximately 80 percent less damage annually than those not built in compliance.
In addition to providing flood insurance and reducing flood damages through floodplain management regulations, the NFIP identifies and maps the Nation’s floodplains. Mapping flood hazards creates broad-based awareness of the flood hazards and provides the data needed for floodplain management programs and to actuarially rate new construction for flood insurance.
Also, the West Virginia Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Management oversees the West Virginia Flood Insurance Program. A Guide to Flood Plain Management is available through their office on the link on the left side of this page. A tool to assist you is available at: www.mapwv.gov/flood