City of Watsonville Community Rating System Program and Local Hazard Mitigation Plan

Taking proactive steps to improving resilience, City of Watsonville officials enlisted Harris to help develop a Community Rating System Program (CRS) and a Local Hazard Mitigation Plan (LHMP).

According to FEMA, the CRS “recognizes and encourages community floodplain management activities that exceed the minimum National Flood Insurance Program’s standards.” CRS-related activities can help reduce the City’s flood insurance premium rates by as much as 45%.

Similarly, the City’s LHMP identifies local hazards along with strategies for addressing them. By adopting a LHMP, and having the LHMP approved by FEMA, the City could become eligible for grant funding to address future local hazard projects.

Core Elements

Harris is assisting the City with enhancing their Community Rating System (CRS) program by:

• Providing recommendations for improvements to current CRS-creditable activities under the four categories within the CRS program including public information, mapping and regulations, flood damage reduction, and warning and response
• Collaboration with City staff on the adoption of new, practical CRS activities geared towards addressing community-specific flood threats
• Enhancing public safety and awareness through improvements to the City’s Floodplain Management program

To help the City develop a meaningful yet streamlined LHMP, Harris is: 

• Reviewing the City’s initial draft and rewriting certain sections
• Providing insight on enhancing and updating applicable sections
• Performing hazard impact analyses on infrastructure through the use of Hazus and other geospatial datasets
• Identifying and prioritizing sustainable mitigation actions