INDIANAPOLIS – Members of the Indiana Drainage Task Force questioned a representative of the state’s Department of Natural Resources (DNR) about the agency’s floodplain map during a December meeting.

David Knipe, director of the Indiana DNR’s Division of Water, also responded to concerns from task force members about the implementation of the state map and its accuracy. The meeting was Dec. 21.

The task force was created last year under legislation from Sen. Jean Leising (R-42nd district), who is serving as co-chair of the group. The committee is responsible for reviewing drainage laws, making determinations and recommendations concerning drainage and regulatory matters, and determining whether the balance between state and local authority over agricultural land drainage favors state authority more in Indiana than in neighboring states, according to the senator.

Knipe is a member of the task force. The 19-member bipartisan group includes senators and representatives, and seven people appointed by Gov. Eric Holcomb.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) developed a floodplain map for the National Flood Insurance Program, Knipe said. The federal map depicts the regulatory floodplain, which he described as the 1 percent annual chance flood (100-year flood) and the 0.2 percent chance flood (500-year flood) and the floodway. The federal maps are required to be evaluated every five years.

The FEMA map doesn’t reach everywhere the state would like it to reach, Knipe said, so Indiana DNR created the Best Available Floodplain Layer (BAFL). The BAFL has more comprehensive coverage of flood zones than the federal map, he said. To develop the BAFL, 18,500 miles of streams were studied and floodway limits determined, providing a regulatory certainty, Knipe said. The process was completed in 2018.

“One of the big reasons we did this is we know that there are risks out there that are not mapped,” he explained. “Just because they’re not mapped does not mean that it can’t flood, that there’s not a risk. We wanted to make sure we mapped everything that we could. We’re negligent in our job at the Division of Water if we’re not informing residents of where there’s flood risks.”

The Division of Water manages the FEMA mapping process on the federal agency’s behalf, Knipe stated. Updating the FEMA maps is a longer and more involved process than working on the BAFL, he said, noting that FEMA funds the process of updating its maps in pieces.

“It’s very complex and convoluted (to update the FEMA maps),” Knipe said. “Eventually, we’d like to get everything up to date in the FEMA maps, but by the time we get to that point, a lot of our data is going to be outdated anyway, so then what do you do with that? We’re always going to be chasing our tail.”

The BAFL, meanwhile, can be modified at any time, he said.

After Knipe’s presentation, Leising asked him why DNR felt compelled to create a map that is more expansive than the FEMA maps.

Knipe responded, “because we realized the FEMA maps do not cover all the flood risk that’s out there and FEMA would admit that.”

Leising then asked if Indiana DNR wanted the state to be more restrictive than the federal government. “I would say it’s more protective,” Knipe answered. The BAFL covers more area, he said.

Task force member Rep. David Abbott (R-18th district) questioned the accuracy of the state map. As an example, he said the city of Woodburn in Allen County was initially designated to be in a floodplain after the BAFL was released. That designation was later challenged and found to be in error, he noted. He asked Knipe how the state map can be depended on “if the accuracy’s not that good?”

Knipe said, “I think the accuracy is that good. We’ve certainly had areas we’ve had questions with. That’s one reason we put the process in place for review. We can’t say that we’re perfect but we do think we’re doing a good job with this. We do think that we’re following all the different standards that FEMA would follow.”

The state gets about 10-12 review requests a month, he said. The large majority of those reviews don’t pan out to be anything, he stated.

The Division of Water processes about 900 permit applications a year for construction in a floodway, Knipe said. The most common application types include ditch maintenance and construction, bank stabilization, and excavation and dredging.

On average, it takes about 135 days for the permitting process, Knipe said. The process is in DNR control about 73 days. The rest of the time, DNR might be waiting for an applicant to respond to a request for more information before the permit can be issued, he said.

Steve Slonaker, a member of the task force, an appraiser and owner of Slonaker Farm Management, questioned Knipe about the process of implementing the BAFL and asked if landowners were notified of the map. He said landowners and officials in some counties were not aware of the BAFL after its release in 2019. In Wayne County, he noted, enforcement action was taken against property owners before officials had seen the map, according to the county commissioners.

Last year, Gordon Moore, Wayne County surveyor, told Farm World the Indiana DNR maps were released with no public notification. In 2015, FEMA approved new flood maps, which were released after public hearings and notifications, he added.

Knipe said DNR had 50 meetings across the state. He said individual property owners weren’t notified about the map. Knipe said DNR felt it would be better to notify the communities, adding it wouldn’t be practical to notify every property owner. “We try to reach out to everyone that we feel that needs it, but we can’t talk to six million people at once.”

The task force is required to submit a report, including any recommendations, to Holcomb and legislators by Dec. 1, 2023.