The Association of State Floodplain Managers (ASFPM) has selected Mike DePue, PE, senior program manager with PBS&J, to chair its newly formed Cost Savings and Leverage Subcommittee. With anticipated participation from many leaders in the floodplain mapping community, this subcommittee will help identify and address key issues emerging from FEMA's Map Modernization Program.

Begun in 2001, the seven-year, over $1 billion Map Modernization Program is a nationwide effort to upgrade FEMA's entire 100,000-plus flood panel map inventory as well as provide enhancements to related products, processes, and services. As this program enters its final years, budgets will become ever tighter, and mapping partners will need to be as efficient as possible. ASFPM is supporting its constituents by providing an independent review of mapping standards and costs, and offering proposals to FEMA for potential cost savings and quality improvements.

As part of this effort, the newly formed ASFPM subcommittee will evaluate ways to leverage the FEMA inventory in alternative ways. This might include decreasing the number of DFIRM panels, creating online print-on-demand functionality, improving map maintenance and base mapping updating, and migrating toward local ownership of Letters of Map Change - to name just a few of the expected topics.

DePue is an acknowledged leader in the floodplain mapping arena. Since early inception, he has worked intimately with FEMA's Map Modernization Program, managing hundreds of FEMA flood map revisions in as many as 17 states in his work. He is a certified flood plain manager and registered professional engineer.

The first meeting of the Cost Savings and Leverage Sub-Committee was held at the ASFPM Conference in Madison, Wisconsin on June 13, 2005.

Source: PBS&J, June 30, 2005