More than six months after Hurricane Harvey flooding ravaged the city of Houston and surrounding Harris County, a new website has been launched that could help prospective homebuyers avoid a similar catastrophe in the future.
Created by a professor at Texas A&M, Buyers Be-Where purports to show the flood history of every home in Harris and Galveston County.
The site uses Google Maps to break down the residential risk for each home, calculating flood zones, past flooding and even hazardous waste.
“That may be a game changer,” Realtor Bobby De La Rosa recently told KHOU11. “If a buyer can find out exactly what they’re buying above and beyond whatever they’re looking at, it will definitely help a buyer make an informed decision.”
Hurricane Harvey Flooding Forces Controlled Releases at Addicks & Barker Reservoirs
Hurricane Harvey hit Texas on August 25, 2017, pummeling Houston with torrential rains for five days and bringing catastrophic flooding to many sections of the city.
The situation became even more dire as the Addicks and Barker Reservoirs quickly filled to capacity, extending their flood pools to thousands of upstream homes and businesses built behind their dams. By August 28th, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers had begun a series of controlled releases at both reservoirs in order to prevent dam failure and spare upstream properties from further flooding.
Within 48 hours, the rate of release was increased from 718,000 gallons of water per minute to over 6 million gallons per minute. The Corps made this decision even though it was aware that the increased rate of release would cause flooding to thousands of additional properties located downstream along Buffalo Bayou, including many that had remained dry during the storm.
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Harris County Failed to Mitigate Known Flood Risks at Addicks & Barker Reservoirs
In the months since the disaster, it’s become increasingly clear that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the Harris County Flood Control District had been aware of the flood risks posed by the Addicks and Barker Reservoirs since at least the 1990s.
Yet little was done to correct or mitigate the dams’ deficiencies in the decades before Harvey made landfall.
Unfortunately, many of the homeowners hit hardest by Hurricane Harvey flooding lacked flood insurance because they had no idea that their property would be inundated in a major storm.
Some were the victims of inaccurate and outdated flood maps that wrongly placed their property outside the 100-year flood plain. Others were never told that their homes had been built in the Addicks and Barker flood pools, as Texas law does not require that buyers be notified when a property is located within a flood pool.
In other states, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has acquired easements near dams and levees to compensate owners when floodwaters must be diverted to or stored on private property. But no such action has ever been taken in relation to the Addicks and Barker Reservoirs.
Was Your Home or Business Flooded During Hurricane Harvey Because of the Addicks & Barker Reservoirs? Our Hurricane and Flood Damage Lawyers Can Help. Call 1-888-603-3636 or Click Here.
Our Addicks and Barker Flood Damage Lawyers continue to investigate claims in connection with Hurricane Harvey.
Having won more than $1 billion for our clients, including hundreds of property owners who sustained wind and flood damage due to hurricanes and other major storm events, our attorneys will devote all of the resources and time necessary to help you and your family recover from this catastrophic hurricane.
If your property was flooded during Hurricane Harvey because of the Addicks and Barker Reservoirs, and you would like to learn more about your legal rights and options, call 1-888-603-3636 or Click Here to send us a confidential email via our “Contact Us” form.
All questions and consultations are free. And because we exclusively represent clients on a contingency-fee basis, you’ll owe nothing unless we win your case.