TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — In May of 2009, Florida’s northeast coast was drenched by five consecutive days of rain. One of the worst hit areas was Daytona Beach, where more than 20 percent of the streets were underwater and nearly a thousand buildings reporting some kind of flood damage.

One of those structures was the West Wing of the Museum of Arts & Sciences (MOAS), which contained a range of exhibits from prehistoric fossils and historic weapons to Cuban art and African artifacts. Located on a low-lying plot about three feet lower than the rest of the museum campus, the 22,416-square-foot wing gradually filled with three to four inches of flood water.

According to Jenelle Codianne, the museum’s director of marketing and public relations, there was damage to the floors, walls, interior walls, electrical, doors and office furniture. No collections were lost, but several exhibits were damaged including the Center for Florida History, which displayed the museum’s giant ground sloth skeleton. It took several days to disassemble, but the prehistoric skeleton was moved to another wing and avoided water damage. Meanwhile, museum employees were busy moving artworks into other galleries.

As one of Daytona Beach’s leading cultural institutions, it was imperative the wing be rebuilt. But museum authorities were adamant that reconstruction should eliminate the potential for future flooding.

In order to fund the reconstruction, MOAS applied for a Flood Mitigation Assistance (FMA) Grant from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and financial aid from the Volusia County Environmental, Cultural, Historic and Outdoors (ECHO) Program. The FMA program is one of the Hazard Mitigation Assistance (HMA) programs funded by FEMA and managed by the State of Florida.

The FEMA grant provided more than $4 million of the $5.4 million reconstruction price, with an additional $1.3 million coming from local sources including an ECHO grant and the museum’s own funding. The Orlando office of global architects VOA Associates Inc. won the competition to design the new structure, while locally based Hall Construction handled the fabrication.

After demolishing the flood-damaged structure, construction began on its replacement – on the same footprint but slightly larger than the previous building. The new wing was built on a concrete spread foundation with concrete masonry stem walls backfilled with earth and overlaid with a concrete slab. The floors of the new wing were elevated 2.5 feet above the old level and 2.2 feet above Base Flood Elevation – or roughly six inches above the maximum water level of the 2009 flood.

Unveiled in October of 2015, the new West Wing is a state-of-the-art museum space that features five exhibit galleries as well as a planetarium. In addition to being a huge success with the press and public, the resurrected building also passed its first weather test with flying colors.

“Happy to report NO FLOODING!” Stephanie Mason-Teague, the museum’s director of development, declared via email the week after Hurricane Matthew stormed up Florida’s Atlantic coast. The new West Wing held up perfectly to Hurricane Matthew. Water didn’t even get close to the building, let alone enter it. The mitigation measures incorporated at the time of the rebuilding did the job of preventing repetitive flood loss.

“We had a lot of tree debris,” Mason-Teague added, “and were without power, phones, internet.” But that was the extent of the hurricane’s impact. The museum was able to get back online, clean up the tree debris and open its doors to the public again within a week of Matthew striking Daytona Beach.

For more information on Florida’s disaster recovery visit fema.gov/disaster/4280, fema.gov/disaster/4283, twitter.com/femaregion4, facebook.com/FEMA, and fema.gov/blog, floridadisaster.org or #FLRecovers. For imagery, video, graphics and releases, see fema.gov/Hurricane-Matthew.

For more information on FMA/HMA programs, visit Floridadisaster.org or www.fema.gov/hazard-mitigation-assistance.

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Best Practice: Daytona Beach Museum of Arts & Sciences

CHICAGO – The U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) has released $1,677,592 in Flood Mitigation Assistance (FMA) funds to Cook County, Ill., for the acquisition and demolition of eight flood-prone homes.

“The Flood Mitigation Assistance Program enables communities to implement critical flood mitigation measures to reduce or eliminate the risk of loss of life and property,” said Andrew Velasquez III, regional administrator, FEMA Region V. “This project will help to eliminate future structural losses in Cook County by permanently removing these eight buildings from the floodplain and will also greatly reduce the financial impact on individuals and the community.”

“The acquisition of flood-prone properties has been a priority for the state of Illinois for more than two decades,” said James K. Joseph, director of the Illinois Emergency Management Agency. “Removing homes such as these from flood-prone areas not only helps residents avoid the heartache of dealing with future flood losses, it also reduces flood response and recovery costs for the local governments.”

FMA provides grants to state and local governments and tribal organizations to implement long-term flood hazard mitigation measures. Through FMA, FEMA will pay more than 90 percent of the $1,857,014 eligible project cost. The remainder, $179,422, will be provided by Cook County. 

FEMA’s mission is to support our citizens and first responders to ensure that as a nation we work together to build, sustain, and improve our capability to prepare for, protect against, respond to, recover from, and mitigate all hazards.

Follow FEMA online at twitter.com/femaregion5, www.facebook.com/fema, and www.youtube.com/fema.  Also, follow Administrator Craig Fugate’s activities at twitter.com/craigatfema. The social media links provided are for reference only. FEMA does not endorse any non-government websites, companies or applications.

 

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Media Contact: Cassie Ringsdorf, 312-408-4455

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FEMA Awards $1,677,592 Grant to Cook County