Homes in flood plain get OK
City Council says developer meets rigid standards
City Council approved a developer’s plan to build hundreds of homes in a west Houston flood plain Wednesday, as Mayor Sylvester Turner stressed the proposed development had met all city rules and exceeded the more stringent flood plain development standards the council passed earlier this month.
The vote, which was unanimous and occurred without discussion, will let the developers create a municipal utility district to issue bonds to pay for roads, water, sewer and drainage infrastructure on the former Pine Crest Golf Course, where homebuilder Meritage Homes and land developer MetroNational plan to build some 900 homes. Prices of the new homes are expected to range from the high $200,000s to the mid-$500,000s.
Rejecting the utility district would not necessarily have prevented the site from being developed, but would have denied the developers their preferred method of financing the subdivision.
That would have been a worthy goal, said Jim Blackburn, environmental lawyer and founder of the Bayou City Initiative, a collection of civic groups focused on flooding and drainage issues. The council should have re-
jected the proposal because it would convey that Houston will not readily accommodate building in flood plains, Blackburn said.
“This is land that, frankly, shouldn’t be developed,” he said. “It’s private property, they can develop it if they want to — but we shouldn’t be helping them develop it. It’s not about whether they meet requirements. It’s about whether they ought to get some special arrangement that would help them develop this flood-prone area.”
Turner cast the decision as a vindication of sorts. When he pushed for those tighter flood plain development standards after Hurricane Harvey, opponents had said the stricter rules would drive builders out of the city.
“This is an example that, yes, people will build in the city of Houston with the more stringent requirements we put in place,” Turner said. “We want you to develop in the city of Houston, but we have to do it in a more resilient manner.”
Meritage officials say the drainage system they are planning to build at the Spring Brook Village development will remove the 150-acre former golf course at Clay and Gessner from the 100year flood plain, and will reduce stormwater runoff compared to what the site produces today.
Some nearby residents have expressed concerns that the development will put homeowners downstream along flood-prone Brickhouse Gully at even greater risk during storms.
City estimates show Harvey damaged more than 2,300 homes and apartments in the Brickhouse watershed, and the city and county have bought out dozens of repeatedly flooded homes there.
Meritage Homes is regrading the site, digging three detention ponds and a new channel to guide water through the site and into Brickhouse Gully. The excavated dirt will be piled elsewhere on the site and the new homes will sit on top of that soil, Meritage has said. The lowest structure will sit 2.78 feet above the projected water level in a 500year flood, they said.
That would exceed the new elevation standard — two feet above the 500-year flood level — that council adopted for development in city flood plains earlier this month.
A conditional letter from the Federal Emergency Management Agency states that the changes will greatly narrow the floodway on the site and remove the tract from the 100-year flood plain, placing it instead in the less risky 500-year flood plain.
The Memorial Day 2015, Tax Day 2016 and Harvey floods all reached or exceeded the 500-year standard, which refers to a storm that has a 0.2 percent chance of happening in any given year. A 100-year storm has a 1 percent chance.
Kyle Davison, Meritage’s Houston division president, applauded the council vote.
“This will allow us to provide future residents with additional amenities to make Spring Brook Village an even more desirable community,” he said.
Chad Berginnis, executive director of the Association of State Floodplain Managers, said Houston should be commended for setting stronger building standards in flood plains.
However, Berginnis, who previously served as a local flood plain administrator, said many communities couple such restrictions with flood-conscious subdivision requirements and zoning standards. For instance, he said, a golf course in a flood plain would be zoned for open space, or development rules could prevent new subdivided lots from being created in flood plains.
“Perhaps the best use of this from the perspective of better flood risk management,” he said, “is using this as a lesson learned as to, ‘What are the additional things we as a community need to do to ensure we’re comprehensively managing flood risk?’”
Even if a community rejects zoning — as Houston voters have three times — a well-funded parks or open space plan could preclude 900 homes from being built on a flood-prone golf course, Berginnis said, because officials could set aside funds to purchase the course at its fair market value.
“It just becomes a point of political will to implement and fund those kind of activities,” he said.
Matt Zeve, director of operations for the Harris County Flood Control District, took no issue with Berginnis’ view.
“If I had known that this piece of land was on the open market, I definitely would have at least tried to make an offer to acquire it for detention,” Zeve said. “The best way to prevent flooding is to have some government agency own the most flood-prone land so that a developer doesn’t get a chance to buy it.”
Flood Control District employees do examine the monthly tax auction listings looking for floodprone parcels, and the district sets aside dollars each year to buy flood plain acreage along Cypress and Spring creeks.
If the money was there, Zeve said it would make sense to expand that effort to all 22 watersheds in Harris County.