A cottage floats in New Harbor on Jan. 11, after it separated from its pilings during a storm on Jan. 10. Derek Davis/Staff Photographer, file
A state commission created in the wake of last winter’s severe storms is finalizing its first report on how Maine can prepare for and recover from extreme weather events made more frequent and more intense by climate change.
On Wednesday, the Commission on Infrastructure Rebuilding and Resilience called for improved emergency communications, an online flood risk disclosure, streamlined rebuilding permitting, storm preparedness grants for homeowners and voluntary buyouts for oft-flooded properties.
Last winter, as storm surges overran areas that had never been flooded, municipal officials had no choice but to use social media to contact at-risk residents. Some towns have since created a cellphone notification network, but those have limited use, only reaching those who subscribe.
“Areas that had never seen flooding were flooded within minutes,” Old Orchard Beach Fire Chief John Gilboy, who used a boat and front-loader to rescue stranded residents in January, told the commission. “A frequent response from families during rescue efforts was ‘I should have left.’ ”
The commission wants to give local officials and emergency managers access to the federal Integrated Public Alert and Warning System. Unlike subscription-based systems, the federal system sends wireless emergency alerts to all mobile phones within a designated area, without requiring prior registration.
The commission wants the public to know a lot more about flood risk before the next storm hits.
It wants the state to create an online disaster data service that centralizes existing hazard, risk, and vulnerability information to help the public understand the risk from flooding-related storms and provide guidance on how to mitigate public health risks and property damage.
The commission wants the state to develop an online tool to make it easy for a buyer to find out if their home is at risk of flood – something required under Maine’s new disclosure law – and help homeowners assess their need for flood insurance and home improvements to minimize flood damage.
The commission wants Maine to consider giving grants to Maine residents to strengthen their homes against future weather-related losses, like roof replacements, storm windows or shutters, tree branch removal and building retaining walls to direct water around home foundations.
The program, modeled after the successful “Strengthen Alabama Home” program, might also make participants eligible for a reduction in their homeowner’s insurance. Eligibility for the program would be targeted to insurable, owner-occupied properties that meet national home resiliency standards.
After the emergency itself has passed, people begin the rebuilding process. While Maine already has some expedited permitting procedures in place, the commission urged the state to do more to raise public awareness about the eligibility for those rapid rebuilding options.
It also called on state permitting agencies to increase staffing through temporary contracts to manage the surge of permit applications that occur after any major storm. When a storm hits, state agencies should prioritize their review of disaster-related permit applications, the commission said.
The commission also called for increased cooperation and expedited permit review from its federal partners, especially the Army Corps of Engineers, which issues permits for activities that affect the nation’s waters and wetlands, like dredging or construction projects below the high tide line.
REQUEST TO STREAMLINE PERMITTING
At its meeting Wednesday, Robert Wood, director of the Bureau of Land Resources in the Maine Department of Environmental Protection, said the report should urge federal partners “to consider what they can do for Maine as far as streamlining permitting for resilience and storm recovery.”
Commission members warned that the report needs to plan for relocation and retreat, not just resilience.
“I don’t think we’re going to be able to code or build our way out of the problems in some of these hazardous areas,” said Pete Slovinsky, a marine geologist with the Maine Geological Survey. “We need more information in terms of a recommendation around relocation and or retreat.”
As presented to the commission on Wednesday, the draft report makes reference to moving critical structures from the most vulnerable areas by elevating them or pulling them back from a flood-prone area, like a 100-year floodplain or a Category 1 storm surge zone.
“While wholesale retreat from the coast or river corridor may not be politically or economically viable, the idea of avoiding specific areas that experience chronic inundation from either precipitation or tidal events is gaining acceptance across the country,” the draft report reads.
The report also suggests the state help fund the 25% municipal cost share for FEMA’s Hazard Mitigation Grant Program, which buys properties at risk of repetitive flooding from homeowners who want to sell. The land is turned into wetlands, gardens or wildlife refuges to reduce future flooding.
As of 2019, Maine had 118 FEMA-funded property buyouts, 94 of which were in Canton.
The 24-person commission was created by Gov. Janet Mills in May after storms in December 2023 and January 2024 killed four people and caused $90 million in damage to public infrastructure, with millions more in losses for private homes and businesses.
This first report is due to Mills on Nov. 15. The commission will deliver a final report in May 2025.
The Gulf of Maine has risen about 7.5 inches over the last century, with about half of that happening since the 1990s. The Maine Climate Council projects seas will rise another 1.1 to 3.2 feet by 2050 and 3 to 9.3 feet by 2100, depending on how much we curb global emissions rates.
STORM SURGE NOT ACCOUNTED FOR
And that doesn’t include storm surge, which is what many people who rely on Maine’s 20 miles of working waterfront – out of 3,200 miles of coastline – say caused the most damage during the January storms, wiping out the pilings that underpin so many of the docks, wharves and piers.
How does climate change affect sea levels? In a warming world, glaciers and ice sheets are melting, adding water to the ocean. The ocean also expands in volume as the water warms. Ocean circulation patterns, terrestrial water storage and the gravitational effects of glaciers also play a small role.
Gulf of Maine sea levels are projected to rise faster than the global average because it is susceptible to changes in the Gulf Stream and seasonal wind patterns, according to the Island Institute, a Rockland-based nonprofit that serves Maine’s coastal communities.
Mainers don’t have to imagine what storms like the ones we had last winter will do to Maine’s future coastline. The state has mapped out how much of it will be lost to rising sea levels under different scenarios, in different years, and what future storms could do to that which remains.
A 1-foot increase in sea level by 2050 will lead to a 15-fold increase in the frequency of nuisance flooding, which is daytime or high-tide flooding that happens absent a storm. It would cause a “100-year storm” flood level to have a probability of occurring once every 10 years.
The state has yet to produce maps that show the impact of future storms of various strengths on different parts of the Maine coast, much less the potential damage of wave impact. But the surges like those experienced last winter can add 3 to 4 feet of additional water on top of the rising seas.
