The National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) requires participating communities to regulate development, which includes improvements or damage to existing structures--called substantial improvement and substantial damage, in mapped special flood hazard areas. Damaging events can quickly overwhelm your floodplain, building code, permitting, and other staff. Bring order to the chaos with a Substantial Damage Response Plan (SDRP).

Download and tailor this model plan to meet your community's needs. See below for supporting fact sheets.

Having a predetermined process to follow when a disaster occurs is mission critical to your community's NFIP floodplain management program.

Additionally, communities that participate in or want to join the Community Rating System (CRS) can also get credit for Activity 510, a Substantial Damage Management Plan.  

Before developing an SDRP, communities need to understand their capabilities. By completing a thorough community assessment, the SDRP can be drafted to complement local plans and regulations and make the best use of the strengths of the floodplain management team, while addressing any gaps that exist. 

A structure inventory database (SID) is a powerful tool communities can develop to increase the efficiency of substantial damage response and track substantial damage and improvements.

Exercises can be carried out as stand-alone activities to train new staff or to remind existing staff and partners of their responsibilities during a damaging event. The exercise also can be included as a component of an exercise of the community’s broader emergency operations plans.

Substantial damage assessments may be completed for a range of disasters, from a small-scale event such as a house fire up to a large event such as a regional flood. The severity of the event will determine the scale of response necessary.