All Forum Posts by: NA Morris

The terms used when describing floodplain areas have specific meanings. The floodplain consists of the "floodway" and the "flood fringe". The regulatory floodway is calculated by constricting the boundaries of the floodplain resulting in a 1 foot rise to the base flood elevation (BFE). In any jurisdiction (city, county,whoever is in charge), no structures can be put in the regulatory floodway because it will impact (ie raise) the elevation of the floodwaters surrounding the property. Depending on the jurisdiction, some will allow, and some will not allow, development in the flood fringe as long as you can demonstrate that the development does not raise the BFE (no rise) or possibly some other criteria, again jurisdiction specific. If development is allowed in the flood fringe then it has to meet certain criteria like it must be a certain elevation above the BFE, at least 1 foot, maybe more depending on the location, and it must be built with certain materials among other things. You can tell what zone you are in by searching your address here. https://msc.fema.gov/portal/search The City of San Antonio looks like they allow for certain construction in the floodplain as long as it does not raise the water surface more than 6 inches,but the "no rise" applies to the floodway. You can see their rules here.https://library.municode.com/tx/san_antonio/codes/unified_de... So, from what you have said it sounds like your lots are in the floodway based on what the engineer told you. Unless the floodplain study for this area is new this is not something that has just happened recently. Your options are to appeal the appraisal, make it agricultural (community garden or farm crops), raise bees or anythng like that to get the taxes down. As a general development rule, floodplains make good amenity areas so maybe you could sell it to the city or neighboring HOA looking for parking and pickleball courts or similar, or look through the allowed uses in a floodplain per the COSA regulations and see if anything sparks for you. I hope this is helpful. All the best!