Flood Insurance Reform and Modernization Act of 2006
FLOOD INSURANCE REFORM AND MODERNIZATION ACT OF 2006
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Mr. HENSARLING. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding, and I thank him for his leadership on this issue. I also want to thank Chairman Oxley and Chairman Baker for all of their good work in bringing this bill to the floor, because it addresses a very, very serious challenge that we have.
We all know that Hurricanes Katrina and Rita represented a great physical catastrophe for this generation. I think it is incumbent upon us to make sure that it does not turn into a great fiscal tragedy for the next.
I remember speaking to a factory worker at the Pepsi plant in my district in Mesquite, Texas. He said, Congressman, I want to do everything I can to help those people on the gulf coast, but tell me you are going to do a few things differently so I don't have to do it again.
We know that the National Flood Insurance Program is not actuarially sound. It is not fiscally solvent. Congress is having to bail it out. Yet if you look at the legislative history, since 1981 it was supposed to be fiscally solvent. So the underlying bill takes a number of steps to start taking us in that direction.
But if we are going to have a National Flood Insurance Program, we should not be subsidizing people and incenting them to live in places that, frankly, put them in harm's way, especially at the taxpayers' expense. If they are going to put themselves in harm's way, that is the decision they need to make, but we should not be a party to incenting them to do it.
So I think that the gentleman from New Jersey, his amendment takes a very, very reasonable small step towards helping make this program a little bit more fiscally solvent, and I think it is fair.
It is one thing to say on the pre-FIRM properties when we were trying to incent people to get into the program, okay, to some extent you are grandfathered. But new people who are coming in, if we are going to save this program for new future generations, I believe we need to take more steps toward fiscal responsibility, and the gentleman from New Jersey, his amendment is a very reasoned amendment that takes us in that direction, and I believe the House should support it.
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