SmarterSafer 2025 Priorities List 

Flood

SmarterSafer supports a proactive, long-term approach to flood risk reduction by promoting mitigation measures, such as resilient infrastructure and updated flood mapping. We advocate for policies that encourage private sector involvement in flood insurance, strengthen building standards, discourage development in high-risk areas, and support accurate risk-based pricing for insurance.

• Promote Mitigation Measures – Mitigation is the best long-term defense against flooding. An NFIP reauthorization package and others should include language that authorizes the necessary funding to improve mitigation measures in areas susceptible to flooding and should place a particular emphasis on green, nature-based, and resilient infrastructure.
• Flood-Prone Communities – Congress should prioritize aiding flood-prone communities by passing legislation that mandates the updating of flood data, allocates grants for infrastructure projects aimed at flood mitigation, and enforces penalties for non-compliance with these measures. These actions would help lessen both the severity and financial impact of floods while facilitating quicker recovery for affected communities.
• Updated Mapping – Any NFIP reauthorization package should include measures that allocate funds to assist with updating floodplain mapping in areas susceptible to flooding. Legislation that accelerates the generation of new and modern maps, including through the use of best-available technology, will help communities better identify and communicate present and future risks. Communities impacted by flooding must be better informed of accurate levels of risk in order to plan for future disasters.
• Encourage Private Sector Involvement – Congress should focus on encouraging private sector involvement in flood insurance and prevention by including measures in any NFIP reauthorization package that promotes private investment. This would allow for greater flexibility in coverage options, such as permitting private flood insurance to meet continuous coverage requirements and help strengthen overall flood resilience.
• Improved Resiliency Measures – Congress should focus on ensuring that federally-funded projects account for future flood risks by incorporating resiliency and mitigation measures in their planning. Any NFIP reauthorization package should include requirements for regularly updated data and mapping to accurately assess flood risks, while also recognizing communities that have made investments in resilient infrastructure and flood mitigation.
• Discourage Future Development in High-Risk Areas – Congress should focus on discouraging future development in high-risk flood areas by ending NFIP subsidies for newly constructed properties in such zones. This would help reduce the financial incentives for building in flood-prone areas while ensuring that any future means-tested assistance programs are available to support families impacted by these changes. Further, Congress should resist any effort to diminish rules and regulations that address this priority.
• Increasing Purchase of Flood Insurance Policies – Many individuals living in flood-prone areas do not purchase NFIP or private sector flood insurance policies. SmarterSafer welcomes legislation that would seek to increase the purchase of flood insurance policies by requiring property owners in flood-prone areas to purchase flood insurance. Congress should consider a number of approaches to address this issue, including but not limited to a study on the expansion of the current mandatory purchase requirement and an expansion of floodplains that more accurately reflect risk borne by communities.
• NFIP Minimum Building Criteria – Congress and the administration should support efforts to require smarter building criteria to reduce flood risk, such as higher elevation standards in the special flood hazard area, incorporating standards to safely site and design critical infrastructure, discourage the development of natural floodplain buffers, and prohibit ongoing fill and build practices.
• Climate Change Impacts – Congress should work to pass legislation that includes future climate change impacts, such as extreme storms and rising sea levels, in flood risk maps. This would enhance their effectiveness in discouraging development in areas currently at risk of flooding, as well as in those vulnerable to future flooding.
• Past Flood Damage Disclosures – Congress should work to pass legislation that requires disclosure of past flood damages and ongoing flood risks to home buyers and renters to ensure that residents can make an informed decision about a prospective home and adequately protect themselves from future flood risks.
• Mitigation Support – Congress should work to pass legislation that expands flood mitigation support and access to buyouts available to NFIP policyholders through the Increased Cost of Compliance (ICC) coverage, especially for properties subject to repeat flooding.
• Federal Flood Risk Management Standard – Congress should maintain FEMA’s Federal Flood Risk Management Standard (FFRMS), established to manage future flood risks and advance resiliency measures across the federal government.

Wildfire

In September 2023, the Wildland Fire Mitigation and Management Commission published its final report which outlined a comprehensive, consensus-based set of recommendations to address the nation’s wildfire crisis. SmarterSafer has identified multiple recommendations that the Coalition believes Congress and the upcoming Trump administration should consider in the upcoming 119th Congress and beyond, including:

• Community Wildfire Risk Reduction Program – Congress should establish an interagency coordinating partnership to reduce program friction and create greater alignment and support to proactively address wildfire risk reduction actions and increase ignition resistance of the built environment.
• Update Existing Federal Programs to Include Wildfire – Federal officials should integrate wildfire risk reduction measures and technical assistance into existing programs.
• Improve Hazard Assessments – Those responsible should support data procurement and analytic systems to inform building codes/standards and promote ignition-resistant construction and defensible space. Those responsible should evaluate the need to refine and/or expand state and national wildfire hazard datasets.
• Incentivize Community Preparation Activities – Policymakers should create incentives to encourage state, local, and Tribal governments to improve land use planning while increasing the accessibility of federal grants for wildfire risk reduction efforts. Additionally, they should incentivize innovation in affordable building material design, subdivision design, landscape architecture, and safe, sustainable building practices to create more ignition-resistant structures and communities.
• Hazard Risk Disclosures – Policymakers should require all-hazard risk disclosures for real estate transactions, including both sales of newly constructed homes and existing homes, for all federally backed mortgages, such as those from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
• Co-stewardship and Co-management Agreements – Federal agencies should be ensured the directive and authority to enter into equitable and meaningful co-stewardship and co-management agreements for multi-jurisdictional lands (areas managed across multiple jurisdictions, such as states or districts), and to support Tribal self-governance in order to address wildfire risk reduction, management, and recovery, as well as to enable beneficial fire practices.
• Utility Hardening – Policymakers should establish federal standards for electric utility wildland fire mitigation plans, along with uniform rules and procedures for managing wildfires along federal rights-of-way. Additionally, we recommend including specific language that prioritizes funding to ensure adequate financial support at the federal level.
• Use Outcome-based Performance Metrics – Those responsible should change the system of land management agency performance metrics beyond acres treated to actual risk reduced. [
• Facilitate Prescribed Burning – Federal agencies should be directed to develop a strategic plan for the implementation of prescribed fire at a national scale and clarify the extent to which non-federal partners involved in this plan are covered under the Federal Tort Claims Act when burning on federal lands. Additionally, the EPA, DOI, and USDA should be directed to work together to expeditiously evaluate current federal regulations, such as the exceptional events pathway, regarding the treatment of smoke from wildland fire in air quality management programs, with the goal of ensuring that these programs can accommodate the increased use of beneficial fire.
• Expand Shared Data – Policymakers should support data collaboration to advance modeling and improve codes, standards, and the development of ignition-resistant materials.
• Improve Tools – The upcoming administration should direct relevant agencies to adopt new and existing technologies to improve the mitigation and management of wildfires and to establish more flexible means of working with the private sector.
• Expand Recovery – Policymakers should expand FEMA Public Assistance-eligible activities to cover downstream risks caused by wildfires and review or amend existing programs to remove barriers that prevent the distribution of funds for mitigating the impacts of higher flows resulting from wildfires.
• Supporting Communities Impacted by Wildfires – Congress should focus on facilitating the movement of critical firefighting resources and support FEMA in offering guidance for wildfire-impacted areas. These measures would help improve wildfire response and resilience in vulnerable regions.
• Climate Finance – SmarterSafer encourages entities to invest in solutions that promote climate finance, with a focus on resilience and strengthened standards. SmarterSafer urges initiatives to explore how private capital and third-party investors can play a role in supporting climate resilience efforts, such as forest resiliency bonds.

Severe Storms

SmarterSafer supports measures to improve resilience to tornadoes, including stronger building codes, better access to climate data, and enhanced disaster mitigation funding. The Coalition advocates for stricter building standards in tornado-prone areas, incentives for storm shelters, and streamlined disaster recovery linked to pre-disaster investments.

• Enhancing Tornado Warning Systems – Congress should focus on ensuring that programs like the Tornado Warning Improvement and Extension Program are regularly evaluated and updated to improve preparedness and response. This should be part of broader efforts to enhance disaster resilience and ensure that warning systems remain effective and up to date.
• Tax Incentives for State Mitigation Grants – Congress should focus on providing tax exemptions for state mitigation grants. This would encourage states to invest in disaster mitigation efforts by reducing the financial burden on these critical initiatives, helping to enhance resilience and preparedness in communities across the country.
• Accelerate Disaster Recovery Funding – Across all jurisdictions, the dispensation of disaster recovery funds to communities should be accelerated throughout the recovery process and tie disaster recovery funds to future investments in pre-disaster mitigation and resilient construction.
• Climate-Resilient Housing – Policymakers should prioritize the inclusion of resilience measures in the construction of new federally-supported affordable housing units to ensure long-term affordability and sustainability. As the shortage of affordable housing grows, it is essential that new development incorporates features that promote resilience to natural disasters, which will also support more stable and sustainable insurance markets. Additionally, advocacy efforts should encourage Government-Sponsored Enterprises (GSEs), such as Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, to consider resilience as a key factor when evaluating mortgages for newly constructed properties.
• Strengthening Building Standards in Tornado-Prone Areas – Policymakers should take steps to require homes, buildings, and other structures built in tornado-prone areas to be subject to more stringent building standards and constructed with materials that can better withstand high winds.
• Risk Transfer Programs – Policymakers should consider new risk transfer programs to offset the cost of severe storm and tornado damage borne by taxpayers.
• Climate Data Sharing – Congress and federal agencies should augment scientific climate data sharing between federal, state, and local government agencies and the private sector.
• Support Weather-Related Research on Border Scale – Policymakers should offer increased support for weather-related research that includes Pacific weather and ocean temperature patterns. Understanding these patterns, such as atmospheric rivers, El Niño/La Niña, and their broader impacts, will enhance predictive models for weather events that affect not only the West Coast but also other regions of the country, including the Midwest, which faces threats from tornadoes, hail, and derechos.

Infrastructure

SmarterSafer advocates for protecting and enhancing infrastructure through higher design standards, climate resilience assessments, and financial tools like insurance and catastrophe bonds.

• Enhancing Infrastructure Resilience – Policymakers should protect infrastructure investments with enhanced minimum design and resiliency standards. Additionally, proven financial tools such as insurance and catastrophe bonds should be utilized to safeguard infrastructure against unforeseen disasters.
• Promoting Climate-Resilient Infrastructure – SmarterSafer advocates for the promotion of the development of climate-resilient infrastructure based on vulnerability assessments using high-quality information and data. This includes programs like the Department of Transportation’s PROTECT grants, as well as FEMA’s Building Resilient Infrastructure and Communities (BRIC) Program – a critical source of pre-disaster mitigation funds.
• Improving Infrastructure Resiliency with Forward-Looking Data – Congress should support improving infrastructure resiliency by ensuring that organizations responsible for issuing building codes have access to forward-looking meteorological data, including information on wildfires and other environmental trends. This will allow for the adoption of more effective, future-proof building practices.
• Expanding Climate Resilience Programs – Congress should focus on expanding the federal and state disaster preparedness programs by including the development of community resilient climate infrastructure as a qualified activity under the program(s). This would promote equitable use of pre-disaster mitigation funds and require resiliency goals, including considerations of climate impacts and natural floodplain function benefits, to be included in state hazard mitigation plans, strengthening community preparedness.
• Add Flexibility in FEMA’s No-Rise Policy for Restoration – Congress should pass legislation and develop guidance to add a specific definition for ecosystem restoration to the NFIP as well as provide flexibility in FEMA’s no-rise analysis and map review and revision process for ecosystem restoration projects that pose no adverse impact to people or property.

Safeguarding the Role of Government While Promoting Efficiency

SmarterSafer supports the concept of a more efficient government that is mindful of the disbursement of taxpayer dollars. At the same time, the federal government supports a number of pre-disaster mitigation and resiliency programs that support communities, bolster environmental protection, and offer better stewardship of federal funds. Policymakers should recognize the value of programs that generate critical data and resources, noting that private industries, including insurers, actively leverage these outputs to improve risk modeling, resource allocation, and resilience strategies. Supporting these initiatives fosters greater collaboration between public and private sectors, driving innovation and better-prepared communities.

• Target Areas and Agencies of Concern – SmarterSafer will monitor areas likely targeted by the DOGE in the second Trump administration, with a focus on programs affecting the Coalition, especially NOAA and the NWS.
• Potential Cuts and Privatization – The DOGE may reduce funding for resiliency programs, potentially leading to the privatization of NOAA and NWS services. SmarterSafer will remain attentive to Coalition member concerns.
• Monitor FEMA’s Placement Under DHS – Policymakers should include language that emphasizes the need to monitor and assess the implications of FEMA’s placement under the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Analysis of any implications to alter FEMA’s structure will ensure the agency maintains its effectiveness and focus on disaster response and recovery.
• Promote Education on the Value of Governmental Agencies – SmarterSafer should prioritize efforts to educate decisionmakers on the long-term value of certain governmental agencies and programs in preventing loss of life and property. This includes highlighting the cost benefits of such programs, particularly those that may be considered for elimination or reduction by the DOGE to ensure sustained support for disaster resilience and mitigation initiatives.