My uncle was attempting to save a historic theater in Alabama. The floods last week destroyed the building. Ya'll are not alone!
I lived in Guerneville for 8 years and endured regular floods. They aren't surprising, or unpredictable. It's a beautiful place, built originally as a vacation destination with flimsy houses and seasonal facilities. The cost of living in Northern CA has forced many to turn these into year-round shelter. There are fine people there who will go on, but the cost of maintaining places that flood over and over again, as wonderful as they are, should fall to property owners. As a taxpayer, I don't want to support the resources it takes to 'recover' just to be flooded again. Anyone willing to buy in the flood plain gets ample warnings and paperwork to sign, but it will happen again and again. Why not focus on the stories of homeowners who spent the $$$, raised their houses, and just have to hose off the parking pad? Nice drawings though!
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Stilts. Go up and let the water flow under.
Reading the comments, it seems that flooding is a common occurrence. In older times people used to get together and address such problems as a community, a city, a state or a national government. I was going to wonder why these people did not have some state or national project to protect their area.
But Northern California is all about self reliance, anti-government, low tax, low regulation. So, no large, long term water project. Just the way it is.
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Yea it'd be heart-breaking to have your business flood. But it simply doesn't make sense for flood insurance (heavily government subsidized) to pay for flood damage at the same sites over and over and over. Ms. MacNaughton acknowledges that the area has repeatedly flooded, but apparently every time national flood insurance paid for damages, nothing was done to the property to make it less prone to flooding.
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For sure my flood insurance premium is crazy high. The flood insurance cost MUST be calculated into “Is it worth it?” Running on luck is just not useful.
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Seems like this (foolishly romantic?) ownership group made a poor calculation. The insurance pricing and flood history of the area should have been a strong motivator to liquidate years ago.
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When I moved to California in the early 60s, the headline of the day was "Russian River Floods" and the stories depicted Guerneville and other communities' devastation. This has been going on almost since the area was settled and one has to ask why people do not adapt to what are obvious natural and physical features that cause the flooding. Climate change now adds an additional risk of super-deluges. Yes the Russian River Valley is a delight, but at what point do the residents not conclude that living there right next to the River is unsustainable? That if this historic theater was worth saving, they should not pay to move it higher and out of harm's way?
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This story leaves out some information that would be important for readers. See the story in the Bay Area newspaper The Mercury News just last week:
"Guerneville floods more than anywhere in the Bay Area. Why can’t it be fixed?"
"Since 1940, the Russian River has flooded Guerneville 38 times, the result of history, geology and no cheap solutions"
www.mercurynews.com/2019/03/04/why-does-guerneville-flood-so-much-and-why-cant-it-be-fixed/
There has been flooding 38 times in 80 years. This works out to five times per decade.
This is a particularly bad year. The last time the flood was this high was 1997. Before that, 1995. Before that, 1986.
I'm not clear on why the author of this piece is surprised that this theater was flooded.
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Move.
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It is beyond sad that so many homes and businesses that have been previously safe from the wrath of Mother Nature are now in her path. Following the Flood of '93 on the Missouri and Mississippi the federal government bought out numerous landowners. Small towns in both Missouri and Illinois up and moved to higher ground.
When disaster insurance is quite logically unaffordable it's time to get out of the immediate disaster zone. A decent government would recognize the science involved in the changing environment and help make moving possible, but it would not be without cost. The cost of doing so benefits everyone. The future looks like it needs new leadership.
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While I'm sorry for your loss, I think it means people need to think more about where they locate buildings. Insurance can't fix climate although it can attach a price to lack of foresight.
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Given the damage it seems the insurance was properly priced.
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@van hoodoynck I think the point of this is that there are so many natural disasters that the insurance prices out having a business when it never used to
Just a thought/idea: Maybe small business owners should investigate investing in water/fire mitigation projects in their area as a collective group. Finding experts to help them plan; getting approval for projects; applying for grants and state aid; and what else? Committing financially to a 5 or 10 year plan to address the issues instead of paying into the insurance industry. You know it's going to happen so fix it. Don't wait, lead the way. It is your community.
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@SCB This particular flood caused $155 million in damages to 2000 homes and businesses, i.e., over $75,000 (on average) to each insured unit. Unless people have been paying into this flood co-op for years, this particular flood would have broken the bank. Families would still have found themselves only partially covered.
This is exactly the same problem Obamacare came up against in trying to get buy-in from healthy individuals. They won't enroll unless a tax penalty coerces them into it.
How will the flood co-op get members in times of drought? It will go bust on the first major flood unless the state financially guarantees the benefits. This just superimposes the risk on citizens far from the danger area. Would you agree to be taxed for their benefit?
Btw, how do those people in California flood zones get mortgages? Don't their banks insist on flood insurance?
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That's the risk that every business and individual takes when they decide insurance is too expensive. Regardless of whether the cause was climate change, other development, or simply bad luck, the sad fact is that these owners chose to forego a financial backstop that many of us pay for.
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@JSL It might be more fair to say that this was a risk more imposed rather taken. We outsiders can't know the situation in any detail, but it seems easy to believe that a small town movie theater would not generate enough revenue to cover the increased flood premium. The choice may have been between closing, selling, and risking. The analogy with health insurance is pretty plausible too.
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@JSL there are some places that insurance companies won’t touch.
Move.
Climate change is affecting all. Many animals are moving further north and to higher elevations. Humans are not immune to the forces of nature.
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