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jpak

(41,759 posts)
Sun Jul 21, 2019, 04:58 PM Jul 2019

Plan would make coastal mansions eligible for disaster aid

Source: Bangor Daily News

OLD SAYBROOK, Connecticut — On an exclusive Connecticut peninsula, where signs warn outsiders to stay off private roads, eight multimillion-dollar homes with sprawling yards along the Long Island Sound are poised to become eligible for taxpayer-funded disaster aid.

That’s despite the fact that the Fenwick neighborhood of Old Saybrook is in a potentially perilous position, hovering where the Connecticut River meets the sound. A 1938 hurricane washed many Fenwick homes out to sea, including that of Katharine Hepburn’s family.

The eight homes, a short distance from the rebuilt Hepburn house where the actress died in 2003, currently lie in a coastal protection zone that bans homeowners from receiving federal funds to fix storm damage. The goal is to create a disincentive for new development in areas vulnerable to storms. Half the homes were built after the zone was created nearly four decades ago.

But a proposed massive overhaul of the protection system to correct mapping mistakes and other errors would lift the prohibition on aid for the Fenwick homes and more than 900 other structures along the East Coast from New Hampshire to Virginia. That would allow the owners to buy lower-cost flood insurance backed by the federal government and potentially benefit from millions of dollars in other federal aid to fix infrastructure including roads and bridges.

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Read more: https://bangordailynews.com/2019/07/21/news/new-england/plan-would-make-coastal-mansions-eligible-for-disaster-aid/?_ga=2.24077561.252021657.1563742388-1605214994.1563742388

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Maxheader

(4,374 posts)
1. Called the gold coast...
Sun Jul 21, 2019, 05:05 PM
Jul 2019

In california you can drive down hwy 1 and look back up mountain ravines and see rubble foundations where the rich dudes built home and they washed down the hill during mud slides..And if you look further back you can see where the latest mansion sits on the top..just waiting for its turn..Personal insurance to pay for them? Why would an insurance company insure imminent failure? Unless it wasn't an insurance company covering the losses?

dixiegrrrrl

(60,010 posts)
3. Funny no one calls insurance, socialism
Sun Jul 21, 2019, 05:59 PM
Jul 2019



Altho my rates go up in part to pay for the insured damage of the idiots who keep re-building on a damn sand spit in the Gulf.
When Katrina washed away the middle of the spit, and half the homes, the former owners demanded that the state truck in a zillion tons of soil to make the 2 pieces...of SAND...whole again so they could re-build.

That idiocy has been on my last nerve for years.

erronis

(15,331 posts)
6. Because insurance companies are cash cows. A few $$$$ homes won't hurt their bottom lines.
Sun Jul 21, 2019, 06:18 PM
Jul 2019

Health insurance, auto insurance, house insurance, life insurance - whatever.

They are all scams built on the fact that people hate the idea of loss. Even if that fear is unreasonable.

Initech

(100,103 posts)
4. Hey millionaires and billionaires - no free handouts!
Sun Jul 21, 2019, 06:01 PM
Jul 2019

If we can't have them, why should you? It works both ways.

CTyankee

(63,912 posts)
8. Katherine Hepburn had a house in Fenwick. I think she died there. Evidently, she really
Sun Jul 21, 2019, 07:32 PM
Jul 2019

loved it there so I imagine she passed at peace.

cstanleytech

(26,319 posts)
11. Fuck'em!!! If they have the money to have a million dollar or more house then they can pay for their
Sun Jul 21, 2019, 09:06 PM
Jul 2019

own damn insurance and the taxpayer should not be spending one single penny to help them.

Response to jpak (Original post)

NickB79

(19,268 posts)
15. In 50 yr this area will be underwater
Mon Jul 22, 2019, 05:16 AM
Jul 2019

No amount of climate legislation can change the fact that many FEET of sea level rise is already locked in. The last time we were at 400 ppm of CO2, sea levels were 80 feet higher than today.

This is wasted money to rebuild here, or anywhere on the coast for that matter.

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