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ORANGE COUNTY <br />BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS <br />ACTION AGENDA ITEM ABSTRACT <br />Meeting Date: June 2, 2009 <br />Action Agenda <br />Item No. ~ - 2e <br />SUBJECT: Authorization to Pursue Stimulus Fundin for aPre-disaster Miti ation Grant <br />DEPARTMENT: Planning & Inspections PUBLIC HEARING: (Y/N) No <br />ATTACHMENTS: <br />1. Aerial Photograph of the Heritage Hills <br />Subdivision Showing the Floodway, <br />Floodplain and County-acquired <br />Properties <br />2. FEMA Announcement <br />INFORMATION CONTACT: <br />Craig N. Benedict, Planning Director <br />245-2592 <br />Tara Fikes, Housing & Community <br />Development Director 245-2490 <br />Glenn Bowles, Floodplain Manager <br />245-2577 <br />PURPOSE: To authorize County staff members to pursue Stimulus Funding for aPre-disaster <br />Mitigation Grant and other appropriate grant programs to purchase asingle-family residential <br />structure and relocate the building for an affordable housing opportunity. <br />BACKGROUND: Planning staff has identified a property in need of acquisition. The property <br />is one of the seventy-eight (78) properties surveyed by Greenhorne and O'Mara, Inc. as part of <br />the County funded Elevation Certificate Surveying Program. The Elevation Certificate for the <br />property documents the base flood elevation (BFE) is 4.3 feet above the lowest adjacent grade <br />of the house and 0.9 feet above the first floor of the residence. The GIS mapping confirms the <br />house is located within the regulated floodway of East Price Creek. The property has been <br />flooded three (3) times this past summer. <br />This property is a prime candidate for acquisition and relocation because: <br />1. The house is less than five hundred (500) feet downstream from two (2) properties which <br />Orange County acquired and relocated one of the houses in 2003 through a Federal <br />Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) pre-disaster mitigation grant because of <br />recurrent flooding; <br />2. There is significant regulated floodway involvement on the property; <br />3. The owner realizes the obligation to disclose the severity of the flooding should be sold; <br />and <br />4. The Owner, by her own account, is now ready to move into a retirement community and <br />would voluntarily sell the house and property to Orange County. <br />Staff is requesting the BOCC give staff authorization to pursue a FEMA pre-disaster grant to <br />acquire the property and improvements. The FEMA pre-disaster grant program will provide all <br />of the acquisition costs. Tara Fikes, Director of the County's Housing and Community <br />Development Department, has been contacted regarding moving the residence to another site <br />