U.S. Representative Trey Radel (R-Ft. Myers) has co-sponsored a bill that would delay flood insurance rate increases.
Rates jumped significantly for most property owners as the result of a 2012 law passed after billions of dollars in claims were paid following Hurricane Sandy and other major flood events.
H.R. 3218: Flood Insurance Fairness Act of 2013 would delay the increases until an affordability study, which is included in the bill, is completed.
Radel said the measure has broad bi-partisan support.
“Our entire Florida delegation supports this delay, the delegations out of Mississippi, Louisiana are supporting this,” he said. “So we have the not only among Democrats and Republicans, but we talking in the House and Senate. All of us are working together to this done.”
Radel says he would welcome private insurers into the flood insurance market, which he says has been poorly managed by the federal government.
