The Galveston County Daily News

GALVESTON — City officials have released the map showing which properties have been cleared for repairs and which are still waiting for detailed damage inspections.

Property owners whose structures are colored green on the map can begin the rebuilding process as soon as they get permits from the city’s planning department.

Properties colored yellow or red cannot be repaired until inspectors working for the Federal Emergency Management Agency have inspected them.

In some areas, a glitch in the mapping software left properties without any color coding, but all properties have been placed in one of the three categories. City officials are working to correct the software problem in future versions of the map.

Federal inspectors are assessing about 200 properties every day. The maps will change as the inspectors complete their work and submit information to the city’s planning department.

Only properties with repair costs that total less than 50 percent of their value can be repaired without complying with current codes.

Floodplain management rules require substantially repaired properties to be raised above base flood elevation, which is at least 11 feet in most areas. But base flood elevation is only a few feet above ground level in some areas.

The city will use the value set by the Galveston Central Appraisal District plus 5 percent as the baseline for establishing whether a structure is substantially damaged.

Property owners who disagree with the city’s assessment can submit a private appraisal to show their home is worth more than the appraisal district’s value. They can also submit quotes from a contractor showing that the repair work will not be as expensive as city staffers might think.

Notification Letters

City officials will send notification letters to all property owners whose houses are substantially damaged, with repair costs of more than 50 percent of their value.

Despite persistent rumors about properties and entire areas that have been condemned, the city has not made any decisions about which properties will have to be demolished.

It may be possible to repair even properties colored red on the map, depending on their value and location on the floodplain map.

Waiting For Assessments

Although inspectors began work last week, it might take federal contractors several weeks to enter the information in a database and release the information to the city, Wendy O’Donohoe, city planning director, said.

Several assessments are already finished, but the city has not received any information, O’Donohoe said. City officials expect to be able to start sending out the first batch of letters within the next 10 days, she said.

City officials do not plan to send letters to property owners whose houses have been cleared for repair work, she said. Property owners should continue to monitor the news and the city’s Web site (www.cityof galveston.org) to find out whether their property has been cleared for repair, she said.

The FEMA assessments could take as long as four weeks to complete, based on the number of properties that must be inspected.