How Much Do You Really Know About Your Flood Or Wildfire Risk?
Consider This from NPR
NPR
4.2 • 6.2K Ratings
🗓️ 23 October 2020
⏱️ 15 minutes
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Summary
But what many never learn, until it's too late, is that their homes are in areas that are increasingly prone to flooding or wildfires.
This episode contains elements from a special reporting project by NPR's Rebecca Hersher and Lauren Sommer. You can read an overview of their reporting here. They also have advice for questions to ask about your property when it comes to wildfire and flood risk in a changing climate.
In participating regions, you'll also hear a local news segment that will help you make sense of what's going on in your community.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hey, this is Kelly McEvers, and before we get started, I just want to say a quick goodbye. |
| 0:05.9 | This is the last time I'm going to be hosting the show. As you probably know, we started this thing |
| 0:10.9 | back in March as a daily podcast about the pandemic. Since then, we've obviously expanded the focus |
| 0:17.6 | of the show, and in doing that, we've been handing it over to our colleagues who make the NPR |
| 0:23.2 | radio show, all things considered. Thus, the new name, consider this. As for me, I'm going to go |
| 0:29.7 | back full-time to the other NPR podcast I host. It's called Embedded. We actually have a new episode |
| 0:35.6 | about Mitch McConnell coming soon. It's this weirdly personal episode. You should check it out. There's |
| 0:40.4 | a link to that show in this show's episode notes. But I just wanted to say thank you for sticking with us. |
| 0:47.1 | Know that this show will keep on keeping on and that you are in very good hands. Okay, here we go. |
| 1:00.7 | Wow. Today is May 27, 2018, and this is some flash flooding in Baltimore City. |
| 1:08.8 | Scott Harris took this video from his front porch a couple years back. The water's running so far, |
| 1:15.1 | fast. It's going up the corner and down the alley. Within hours, his neighborhood was flooded, |
| 1:22.0 | and it wasn't the first time. This had happened at least six times, starting in the mid-70s. |
| 1:28.0 | The thing is, local reports and federal maps both show that there is significant flood risk |
| 1:34.8 | on Harris's block. But no one told Harris anything about it. And he and his wife bought their house |
| 1:41.5 | in 2005. We had no idea at all that there was even a concern about a floodplain. |
| 1:51.2 | Now he has to pay 1200 bucks a year for flood insurance. I got to do what I got to do. I've |
| 1:56.1 | been overbent over a barrel. I can't do anything else about it. It's not just people who own their homes |
| 2:02.4 | and it's not just floods. Every year millions of Americans get no information about the risk of flood |
| 2:10.4 | or wildfire when they're deciding to rent or buy a place to live. No information about risk, no warning. |
| 2:18.9 | Not from a landlord, real estate agent, not from any seller, a praiser or home inspector. |
| 2:24.4 | And the reason, according to a new NPR analysis, is that in many places, no one has to tell you. |
... |
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