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Good morning and welcome, everyone, to the Flood Mitigation Funding and Resources webinar.

Thank you for joining us today.

My name is Lee Huntoon and I'm the Outreach Specialist for the Water Supply and Infrastructure Division of the Water Development Board.

For today's webinar, we will be presenting an overview of the Flood Infrastructure Fund Intended Use Plan and a walk-through of the FIF Abridged Application led by Tom Entsminger, the Manager for Programs is WSI.

Good morning, Tom.

And we will also give you all an introduction to the Flood Information Clearinghouse webpage led by Kathleen Ligon, Special Assistant to the Executive Administrator.

Good morning, Kathleen.

Hi, everyone.

And so moving on, we know everyone is working with potentially temperamental Internet service.

So if you experience any technical issues, please know that this webinar is being recorded and will be made available on our website for viewing as soon as possible.

Tom will be starting his presentation momentarily but first some housekeeping.

The webinar is scheduled to last up to one and a half hours and our plan today is have Tom and Kathleen give their presentation and then we will answer questions submitted from you all by email during the webinar.

Please send those questions to fif@twdb.texas.gov.

Right now I'm going to walk you to the flood infrastructure fund webpage.

On there, you will see access to the flood infrastructure landing page.

If you click on that, here is the fif@twdb.texas email.

We will try to answer all questions that are submitted but if we're unable to answer them today, staff will follow up by email as soon as possible.

And please know this webinar is also for us, too, as an agency and that we do not have all of the answers because we do not have all the questions.

So your emailed questions are very welcomed and will help us evaluate and develop the program further.

Additionally, we are hosting another webinar next Thursday, April 23rd at 2 pm for folks that may not be able to join us today.

We will be covering the same topics we will discuss today.

So if you know of anyone that may benefit from this webinar, please let them know that they can register on our website and here is where you click to register.

We also have on-demand presentations available for reviewing.

Right now we currently have the Flood Infrastructure Fund Intended Use Plan that Tom has previously recorded.

He will basically be giving that same presentation today but then he's also going to do the walkthrough of the abridged application.

We hope to add in more as we go by.

Lastly, before we begin today, I'd like to have you all take a quick one-question poll to give us an idea of the backgrounds of the folks that are with us today, since we have almost 500 people with us.

If you all could go ahead and answer those questions, that would be great.

 I'll give y'all just a few more -- We're still collecting some of the responses.

 It looks like we have a real great mix of people with us today.

 And just please remember to submit your questions to fif, F-I-F, @twdb.texas.gov and we will try to answer those questions if at all possible at the end of the presentation.

So I'm going to go ahead and close the poll.

And you can see our results.

We have a great section of folks with us today and with -- Hi.

This is Kathleen.

If everybody is still there, I'm going to go ahead and just give my presentation orally and y'all can follow along online.

It's pretty simple.

I think everybody's sitting at their computer anyway.

Lee and Tom, is that okay with y'all?

Absolutely, that's fine.

Absolutely.

Great.

Since I cannot share my screen, if everybody could just go to the Texas Water Development Board website.

It's twdb.texas.gov.

I'll give you a minute to get there.

And once you're there, if you click on the flood, just the word "flood" in the very top menu, don't click on anything below it.

Just click on the word "flood" and that will take you to our TWDB flood what we call our landing page.

And this is a page we put up after the last legislative session to give updates on what we're doing.

So it includes not just programs we've already around but an update on the new programs we're putting together.

So it generally includes a pretty timely update on what we're doing with the flood infrastructure fund, how we're implementing the regional and state flood planning process, and then it also gives you contact information, links to the flood infrastructure fund page and where we're attempting to do our webinars today.

And then also it gives you a link to the flood information clearinghouse, which I'll show you in a sec.

But right below it, if you haven't already, you can sign up for emails to get updates.

So generally this page is updated about the same time that we send out our updates.

So if you click on the Flood Information Clearinghouse page, this is a new website that we launched just about a week ago.

We started working on it just right after the legislative session.

It was included as a little tiny piece of Senate Bill Seven which is the same bill that gave us the Flood Infrastructure Fund.

And it didn't include much other than it directed the Water Development Board to develop a clearinghouse of information about state and federal programs that may serve as a source of funding for flood projects.

And so that's what this is.

It's really our first cut at it.

We'd like to do something fancier down the road.

We've been working really closely with the Texas Division of Emergency Management, the TDEM, and also the General Land Office or the GLO and we have some other agencies, too, that are going to participate in this effort.

And so really this is what we can think of as like a storefront.

So anyone can access this site and come here and get information.

There's also this backend group of agencies that are coordinating and we're calling the FLICC and that's modeled after a group called the Texas Water Infrastructure Coordination Committee that's been around a while and it's something that we participated in with a group of other funding agencies, public, private, state, federal.

It looks like maybe I might need to be able to share now.

Let's see.

Yay, I think I can share my screen.

Let's see.

No, that's not it.

There it is.

Okay, hopefully everyone can see my screen now.

I'm going to keep talking like you can.

I'm assuming you're there or you're watching or you're on your own computer looking at it.

So we have this new committee.

It's really work that's already gone on in the past.

We're essentially formalizing it and we're calling it the Flood Information Clearinghouse Committee.

So in addition to the website, we also have a group of agencies that are participating in this backend effort, where we're coordinating funding at more of a program level.

So I'm just going to real quick walk y'all through the page while we try to figure out everything else that's going on.

So if you go to the site and scroll down, one of the things we want to point out to everyone is we're really thinking of this as a work in progress.

Let me go to full screen mode here.

We would like feedback on it.

We know that there's probably some improvements that we can make and so we'd love to hear from you.

And the email address for that is FLICC@twdb.texas.gov.

And so the second phase that we're working on, we're kind of thinking of that as more of an interactive site with a decision tree where you would go to the site and you would be asked questions and you would give information about who you are and what your project is like and then the site would automatically spit out the information.

So it's kind of like a dating site for flood mitigation projects.

It's like our match.com but that's another site down the road.

So this is what we have now.

We want to make it clear that this is really targeted at flood mitigation projects and not really recovery.

Those two things are kind of difficult to tease apart at times but this site in general is focused on flood mitigation or mitigation of future flood events.

And so the things that we have included on here right now if you go to the first button "Am I eligible," this is a really important thing and the reason why this site is an important thing that the legislature thought that we should work on is because there are at least six state agencies that administer federal flood mitigation programs.

So of those six agencies, they're administrating at least three federal agency programs.

So you've got the six state agencies on top of FEMA, the Department of Housing and Urban Development, and USDA funding and sometimes there's other funding that goes through different agencies.

So it is really an extraordinarily complicated universe.

And all of those programs have different requirements, different eligibility, different types of projects, different timelines, and some are tied to disasters and some are not.

So this is our first, if you click on the first box there, "Am I Eligible," this just gives you a general idea of what your entity may be eligible for.

And you can see that at the top like if you're a city or county, you're really eligible for most programs, pretty much all programs.

If you're a private entity, really the opposite is true and you're probably not eligible for much.

And so in general, this site is really targeted at public entities.

Go back.

And then we go to the second box, "Is My Project Eligible," we have a similar chart that we're still working on.

We have other agencies that we need to add.

But you can see kind of the range of projects that certain programs are able to accommodate.

And so the federal programs are pretty broad.

They do have some restrictions like if you've got a dam project, if you're building a new dam, you can see that's one of the first lines at the top.

There really aren't federal programs that will work.

And so state funding is really the best source and there's a little bit of FEMA money for dams but not much.

So this just gives you a general idea.

It's not meant to be exhaustive.

It's two pages long.

So you can kind of see the types of things that -- Yeah, really it's not exhaustive.

I'm sure we'll add to the list at some point.

Go back.

So the "What Funding is Available" box lists out all the programs.

I won't go through all of these but the one at the very top, it's called BRIC, the Building Resilient Infrastructure and Communities Program, that's a brand new program that FEMA is rolling out right now.

I believe they're accepting public comments on it.

And that's something that TDEM is going to be administering and it's going to be replacing their pre-disaster mitigation program, for the most part.

And so this just includes -- I'll just go through these really fast.

I won't read them all out to you but it includes programs at the Water Development Board administers, affirmative ag, GLO, TCQ.

One of the interesting things about TDEM's Hazard Migration Grant Program, it's a FEMA program and even though it's mitigation for future events, it's actually tied to specific disasters.

 And these also include -- We're going to try to keep this as up to date as possible about what the funding cycle looks like and if you land on this site, what's going on right now with funding, when it might be available or if it was just let out or if it's no longer available or may be coming soon.

Back.

Really the most important piece of this site is the request for information form and so I'll click here and show y'all what this looks like.

There's also some frequently asked questions that you can take a look at first.

We tried to design this form so that the agencies that get together to review the information that comes in, we really just get the bare minimum that we need to point an entity towards available programs or funding that's available.

And so we didn't want to ask too many questions.

I think it comes out to about 22, 23 questions and we hope that it doesn't take you long to fill it out.

If it does, please let us know.

But it's really intended to be just a local official that has general knowledge about a flood project.

So the information that you submit does not have to be perfect.

You don't have to even really know the perfect name of the project, how much it's going to cost, you just need to have a general idea of what you want to do.

And so obviously we need to know who you are and how to get ahold of you.

I'll just scroll through this real quick.

It's very important that we know what type of entity you are because, like I said before, programs have different eligibility and we oftentimes can't tell what type of entity you are created from in statute just by your name.

So we need to know that.

Project type is another one, like I said, not every program can fund every project type.

Skip through a little bit.

So number ten, what type of financial assistance is being sought, most of the federal programs, well all of the federal grant programs, excuse me, federal programs are grants but the state programs have a loan component, so that's something that we need to know if you are able to take on a loan.

It's important to know if you already have federal funding for the particular project, if you're looking for a local match.

We need to know where you're located because oftentimes funding is geographically based particularly with a disaster.

Number 14, do you have a FEMA-approved hazard mitigation plan, that's an important question because it's required for FEMA funding.

And then these next several questions, let's see, so the cost, like I said just an approximate cost is fine.

We need just a really brief project description.

We do need to know if you're including a dam because the biggest pot of funding right now that's available the General Land Office, the community development block grants for mitigation, you're not able to enlarge a dam or levee beyond the original structure.

So that's a really important piece of information for us to know.

If you happen to know the cost-benefit ratio, that would be great to include it because that is an important piece in many of the programs but we don't have to have it.

And then finally the last few questions are about NFIP-insured structures and this is just an example of the Flood Mitigation Assistance Program that the Water Development Board administers.

It's specifically targeted at mitigating NFIP-insured structures.

And so that's really the best option for your project, if that's what you're doing.

And additionally, it offers really the best grant opportunities.

So we want to point everyone towards really the best deal that's out there.

And then finally the last question is just making sure that everyone understands that this isn't an application for assistance, it's really just a request for information.

Go back.

And then finally we list events.

Obviously just webinars at this point.

We have a list of other resources here on this website.

I'm sure it'll probably grow over time.

It just lists some things that are out there.

It has a link to the Base Flood Elevation Viewer where you can view flood modeling data, has links to training, link to the State Flood Assessment, community development and revitalization there.

The second line is the General Land Office Program.

Go back.

And speaking of the General Land Office, the really big news that came out and I just want to take y'all here because this is a big deal here but HUD approved the mitigation plan that GLO put out there for the $4.3 billion in disaster fund.

So that's a billion with a B, so that's really the biggest pot of money out there for flood mitigation projects.

And so if you take a look at this, the action plan itself is a couple of hundred pages.

But they do have a pretty nice summary on this site that lays it out.

It's fairly complicated.

It's a federal program, so obviously it's complicated.

But if you take a look at the map, this covers really a lot of Texas.

So it's targeted at Hurricane Harvey, the counties that were declared a disaster from Hurricane Harvey and then also 2015 and 2016 flood events and some of those are up in North Texas and in Central Texas and even some out on the panhandle.

So this funding is 100% grant.

It does have federal strings attached but I would encourage everybody if you are located in one of those counties to take a look.

And one of the things that Tom is going to cover, I think we're going to get him back online in a minute, on our abridged application we actually ask some of the questions that we included on that form, so we want to make sure that we cover all of the questions on the form that I just showed y'all on our abridged application and that way the committee can consider each project.

And so if you submit an abridged application to our program, you may get some feedback from us that says, hey, you know what?

You're located in one of these counties.

You may want to consider looking into this funding.

At the very bottom of page two we just have links to our programs and we're going to try to keep this updated with regular information.

And then this also links back to our flood landing page, where you can check on the status of regional flood planning.

So with that, I think I'm going to turn it back over to Tom, if that's possible.

Let me see.

Yay! Alright.

Well good morning, everyone.

My name is Tom.

And it looks like we had about 40 people join us during the time that we were working with the technical difficulties.

So maybe that's, you know, it could've been worse.

As Lee mentioned at the start, the slides that I'm going to go over they appear in a recorded presentation that's posted on the website.

I'm also going to go into a review of the abridged application and I'm working on a video of that right now.

It should go up very soon.

I'm just running into some technical difficulties.

Those seem to follow me, I guess.

But so those are going to be posted on the website.

Those of you who have not reviewed the documents I refer to are going to be scrambling to take notes and try to understand all this detail.

Just know that the documents themselves are online, the presentations are online or are about to be.

And so this is just sort of fill in the gaps.

It shouldn't be understood to be a replacement of course for the time that you spend actually reviewing the documents themselves.

So the Intended Use Plan of course is our document that gives the detail that doesn't appear in the rule or statute.

And so what I'm going to do is I'm going to work through the sections of the Flood Intended Use Plan or Flood IUP because that really answers what I think would be a lot of your preliminary questions if you haven't already reviewed that document and it'll help you kind of frame your next questions.

So I'm going to talk to you about the big topics like the eligible applicants and activities, the minimum standards, the project categories, and how we're going to approach prioritization.

The main thing, the one point that I would pick from this whole presentation that I really hope you come away with a clearer conception of is going to be the eligible activities or those project categories.

And so I might try to linger on those a little bit.

So of course I don't need to tell y'all, this is the new program that came out as SB seven and Proposition eight.

The Flood IUP, the reason that we use an IUP in this program is that we didn't have this expectation that we'd get everything right the first time or that we'd think of everything the first time before we rolled out the program.

And so we knew that there needed to be a certain degree of detail provided so that folks would know how to apply and things like that but we want to be prepared to continue developing and improving it over time.

So we have this Flood IUP and the idea is that it'll be updated for each funding cycle.

Each update will be accomplished by an opportunity for some public comment.

It allows us the flexibility to adapt and improve over time.

And the two pieces of information that are probably the most important in it are the four categories of eligible activities and the two-stage application process.

When I say "two-stage application process," what I mean is that there are two submittals that we look for from the applicant.

The first is the abridged application and that provides the information we need to prioritize the proposed projects and it also tells us what to expect in terms of the impact to our capacity.

So, you know, some projects will eligible for grants, some eligible for loans, some eligible for a combination thereof.

And so we have at the end of prioritization this ranked list and an understanding of how many of the projects we can afford to fund.

And so we invite those above that fundable line to submit full applications.

The full application is what we use to consider underwriting or financial assistance for the project.

The application review is completed by a team of TWDB staff who then make a recommendation to the Board for consideration of the commitment.

So eligible applicants are going to be different by category and I haven't really gone into the categories, so don't get too distracted but just note that only one category is unique and then the other three categories share eligible applicants.

And so categories two through four is going to cities, counties, any district created under Article three Section 52 or Article 16 Section 59.

If you're a consultant and you work with communities in our already existing programs, then like the SRF or our State Funded Infrastructure programs, you should know that this is not a perfect one-to-one match for the eligibilities on those programs.

There's a lot of significant overlap.

But if you're not sure, it's worth checking out, if you're working with some kind of district or something like that.

But generally, I've seen that the entities that you would expect to be applying for these kinds of projects are generally eligible to be applying for these kinds of projects.

Category one is going to be different in a couple of different ways that I will touch on as we go through the presentation because we already had a program for flood protection planning and it already had existing rules and existing bank account.

And the way we're going to fund that category of projects is we're going to actually transfer funds into that existing account, which makes them subject to a different set of rules.

And so as we work through here, you're going to see a couple of places where it's different.

And as I said, I haven't really gone into detail on the categories yet, so let's not worry too much about what they are but that's why category one is going to be different.

Eligible projects is just as incredibly broad as we can make it.

Basically, we're trying to fund flood projects with this program.

And the language that appears in rule is intended to really just paint a huge broad picture of what we'll consider in terms of flood projects.

This first line here says a drainage, flood mitigation or flood control project, I don't want to read all of this to you but basically every stage of any flood-related project you can think of is probably going to be eligible.

Specifically, you can see we've got drainage, flood mitigation and flood control here, those three have been defined.

And we're using this very open language like on drainage, it says "includes but is not limited to" or, you know, under flood control, "anything that retains, diverts, redirects, impedes, or otherwise modifies the flow of water." Basically, what we're saying here is that we haven't thought of everything.

We don't have a finite list of what's eligible.

We just need to hear from you if you have an idea that you'd like to pitch to us.

However, there is a list of eligible projects in the Flood IUP.

So that's my first point where I'm going to encourage you to take a look at that document itself.

Minimum standards are eligibility criteria that apply generally to all the projects.

They might apply in different ways to different types of projects.

I described them previously as sort of the sign out in front of the rollercoaster that says you must be this tall to ride.

That's kind of what the minimum standards are intended to be.

So let's walk through those.

The first is a benefit-cost ratio for all construction-oriented proposals and so that's your structural improvement, your elevations, and we're also considering buyouts as a construction-oriented proposal.

The information that you'd need to provide is the actual BCR and it's a description of the methodology used.

In the IUP, we actually give links to the FEMA and Corp of Engineers methodologies but we explained that if you'd like to adapt them to your project or your situation, you can do so, we just need to know what's going on, what are the key assumptions and parameters that you used.

And then we might also ask you to show your work and give us that detailed BCR calculation.

So that was for those construction-oriented proposals.

What about all the other stuff that this program can do?

Well, as you can see here, for things like flood early warning systems, low water crossings and some other projects, you can see that the information that we ask for is not necessarily a formal BCR but it's in the same spirit.

We want to know what's the situation before and after the proposed project.

The minimum standard for a BCR does not apply to studies that are aimed at identifying potential projects.

If all you know is you have an issue and you're performing a study to try to identify different ways of solving the issue, that's not going to require a BCR.

So things like identification of flood risk, flood modeling, and inundation mapping, or the preparation of flood response plans.

No BCR required.

The next one is an MOU.

And the idea here is that if you have a flood control project where the project watershed extends into jurisdictions other than the applicant and onto some other eligible political subdivision jurisdiction, they need to a party with the applicant on an MOU that relates to the management of the watershed.

And so this could be one other political subdivision.

It could be a bunch.

It could be none.

It all really just depends on the size of the project watershed.

And so if you have a bunch of political subdivisions that this applies to, you don't have to do individual MOUs.

You can do just one and have them all sign it or if it's easier, you can do the individual ones.

It's up to you.

Important thing to note on this requirement is that it's not due with the abridged app.

We do ask you do affirm that you've described the project to these other political subdivisions, you've given them a copy of a draft MOU.

We ask for a list of what entities those are but we don't want the full signed executed MOU until the full application stage.

Here's also an affidavit with the full application.

Again, it's sort of in the similar spirit to the MOU.

It's basically attesting to two things.

First that the applicant has acted cooperatively with other political subdivisions to address flood control needs in the project area and second, the substantially affected political subdivisions have participated in the process of developing the project.

There is a prohibition against what we call redundant funding and I think based on some of the comments we received to the initial draft IUP there was some confusion about that term.

We don't mean that we're not going to participate in projects that have funding from other sources, we just need to know that all those funding sources have budgets that are detailed enough that they know what they're paying for and we're not paying for the same thing twice.

I kind of tend to slip back into the water supply world but if you're thinking about a pipeline, if Section A to B appeared on your budget for some other funding program, we don't want to see A to B on ours.

We want to pay for B to C or C to D or some other part.

There's a requirement that the project area needs to be served by ordinances or orders at least equivalent to National Flood Insurance Program minimum standards.

Those need to be enforced and there's going to be a little affirmation to that on the abridged application, as we'll see here in a little bit.

And it's applicable if the project is intended to help the applicant fulfill the requirements necessary to participate in the NFIP.

Development of the project needs to have been done using the best and most recent available data.

The word "best," I know, is kind of subjective but if you're studying innovation models or something, you don't want your basis to be somebody's water color landscape from the 1800s or something.

Just know that when we review the documentation, there will be subject matter experts who are going to give it a sniff test and there might be a need for some correspondence afterwards.

But basically, we're looking for the industry standard and the best, most recent available data.

For construction projects, applicants need to be able to document they have done two things.

First, they planned for all the operations and maintenance costs associated with any proposed facilities and that's important because it's not eligible under this program and it's not eligible under many public financing programs.

So you need to make sure the operations and maintenance costs are planned for.

You also need to consider possible flood water capture techniques associated with the project for water supply purposes.

Whenever there's a drought, we hear people say, "Well, why didn't we catch the water from the last flood?" So we're kind of looking for that unicorn project.

Can you get flood water capture for water supply purposes attached to your project?

So those are the minimum standards, that is a section in the Flood IUP.

There is substantially more detail on things like the benefit-cost ratio for example, so you really do need to go to the source documentation for that.

Next step is going to be the project categories.

And I think this is the thing that I mentioned that if you come away with one thing a little bit clearer than it was before we started, I hope that it's this.

So there are four categories that is different from the first draft Flood IUP we released.

I think there may have been five or six.

We're down to four at this point.

Category one is flood protection planning for watersheds.

Category two is planning acquisition, design and construction or rehabilitation.

Category three is matching funds for federal awards.

Category four is measures immediately effective in protecting life and property.

So let's walk through these individually.

Category one, we get a lot of questions about it for reasons that will become clear to you in the next slide or two.

So I want to make sure that we're really clear on what's eligible under this category.

We're looking at study areas that are HUC-10 or larger.

That's a hydrologic unit code, H-U-C, or HUC-10 or larger and it needs to be an activity that fits the definition of flood control planning as it appears in Water Code Section 15.405.

And so I've copied and pasted what that is.

Planning for flood protection, preparing apps for obtaining regulatory approvals, activities associated with administrative or legal proceedings by regulatory agencies, and preparing engineering plans and specifications to provide structural or nonstructural flood mitigation and drainage.

In this category, what we're not talking about is the preparation of flood insurance rate maps or FIRMs.

So the way these categories work is there are across the board opportunities for zero percent interest rate loans.

And then in each category there are different ways to be considered for possible grants up to a certain percent.

And so in order to be considered for that grant, you need to provide some extra information in your abridged application.

You can elect not to provide that information, don't worry about seeking the grant funding, you can get the zero percent interest rate loan.

And then in most of the categories any portion that's not covered by the grant would be covered by the zero percent interest rate loans.

So in this category, you can get your zero percent interest rate loan, or if the study area has an annual median household income less than or equal to half of the statewide annual median household income and has a flood-related federal disaster declaration in the past five years, that is 100% grant.

So what if you don't meet both of those parameters?

There is a sliding scale of grant availability based on the annual median household income.

So the AMHI of 75% or less gets 90% grant.

And at the other end of the scale, AMHIs of over 125% get 50% grant.

And so when we talk about these grants, we're looking for the local share on these components.

The local share doesn't really appear in the other categories.

If you don't meet these parameters or if you don't want to provide the AMHI information for the study area or anything like that, you can still get your zero percent interest rate loan.

So the rest of the categories are going to look a little bit different than this one but they'll be consistent with each other.

So category one is kind of the odd ball in a few different ways and this is just another one.

Category two is planning, acquisition, design, and construction or rehabilitation.

You can also add the word "implementation" to that if it's a nonstructural kind of activity.

This is sort of our catchall category.

Anything that does not clearly fit into the other three categories will end up here.

And these are project phase names that we use in our other programs.

I'm sure they're used elsewhere too, but planning refers to the preliminary studies and feasibility assessments to help you understand where you want to go for the rest of the project.

Acquisition in this case refers to the land acquisition or easements required for the project.

I know that in the flood world, acquisition refers often to your severe repetitive loss, buyouts and things like that.

In this case we're talking about, well to use water supply terminology again, it would be a well site or something like that.

Design is when you are doing your fully-developed project, getting it ready for the permitting and the construction.

Again, in that water supply world, that's the point here you have your plans and specs that are approvable by the TCEQ so that you can actually do your project and serve customers.

Construction again is going to be understood to be incredibly broad.

As I mentioned on a previous slide, buyouts for the purpose of the benefit-cost ratios, they're considered in this category.

Implementation of nonstructural projects is in this category.

Rehabilitation of existing things is in this category.

So really it's sort of the catchall.

So I mentioned the grant availability on this one is a little bit different but you do get that zero percent interest rate loan to cover anything that isn't covered by the grant.

And the way it works is you have these different boxes of opportunities and you're kind of just checking off what applies to you or to your project and you get the sum of all the qualifying percentage from all the boxes that you checked.

So the first one, the project is totally outside of MSA, 10% grant.

That's metropolitan statistical areas.

There's additional grant based on the annual median household income and again it's on a sliding scale similar to that previous one.

We have these four different tiers of grant percentages.

There's a calculation that makes some possible grant available based on the unemployment rate of the area, if it's greater than the state average.

The same is true for population decline.

Rural applicants are eligible to receive 5% grant.

And if at least 30% of the total cost are green or nature based, along with at least one of the these other boxes being checked, that's another 5%.

I have not defined rural yet.

I know you're wondering about that one.

We'll get to that in the prioritization section.

 Category three is that federal award matching funds.

And so what we had in mind here was those FEMA grants that come out and there's always some degree of local match required and some communities, depending on the makeup of the community or the size of the project, or both, are going to struggle to come up with that local match.

So again, we have the zero percent interest rate loan available to help with that or we have grants.

And the structure here on the available grants is going to be very similar to the previous category.

But you'll notice it's already different.

This box in the upper left-hand corner says 90% max and that's new.

That didn't happen in category two.

So that's one of our key differences here.

Otherwise, the actual categories are the same except here on AMHI, each of these tiers has gone up, I think, 30% higher than it was in the previous category.

So those are our two changes: 90% max and a more generous AMHI grant availability.

The other ones are just exactly the same.

Category four is the one I probably struggle the most to explain.

They're measures immediately effective in protecting life and property.

And the idea here was that we pictured a bunch of different ways that this could possibly go and one way that it could go is that we would make huge investments in huge structural projects that would take a while to construct but that would awesome once they were finished.

But what if in the interim while that kind of thing is under construction, what if we are hit by a major storm, if we put things out that could be implemented more quickly while the bigger things are being worked on, it becomes a potential kind of PR benefit for us.

If a storm happens and maybe not a benefit but just an avoided black eye and when you have a program like this, we're hoping we'll keep on going.

We want to avoid black eyes and we want to make sure that we're saving lives and property immediately.

So what we did was we created this category and it's sort of hazy.

We're not really sure exactly what things fit in here but we've come up with a few examples like warning systems, crossing barriers, public education, and outreach, reverse 911 systems, dam emergency action plans.

These are all things that are characterized by quick implementation and immediate effectiveness where you could, if a storm happened tomorrow, you could point to it and say, "Oh, wow.

Look how great that worked." So as you'll see on the abridged application, there's a part where we ask you, what category are you applying for, and it's not really an opportunity for you to dictate to us what category it's going to be.

It's sort of an opportunity for you to say, "Hey, are we on the same page?" Are we understanding the categories and understanding your project directly?

If you have something you want to pitch for category four, just check the category four box and the worst we could do is say no, it fits in category two or something else instead.

So as with the other categories, we've got the zero percent interest rate loans.

The structure of the available grants is exactly the same as the previous one, category three.

And you'll remember that what was different about category three from the category before that was that 90% max and the higher AMHI grant percentages.

So they stayed the same for categories three and four.

Okay, let's go through the prioritization criteria that we'll be actually using to rank the projects.

There are some overarching priorities that the Board has expressed and so they want to give some points just to categorically to category one and four projects.

And so for category one, the points will depend on the AMHI.

Like in category four, you just get those straight points.

So this is where we define rural.

If all entities in the project area are outside MSAs and have populations of less than 10,000, or if the applicant is a district or a municipality with a service area of 10,000 or less in population, or if it's a county in which no urban area exceeds 50,000 in population.

That's 12 points here in the prioritization.

And as you'll recall, it was 5% grant in categories two through four.

Emergency need awards points based on recent or imminent failure of existing flooded infrastructure or a flood related disaster declaration in the past 36 months that would be significantly mitigated by the project.

And when we say "failure" here, what we mean is an inability to perform as designed.

And so you'll be asked to provide some documentation if you're requesting consideration for these points.

Distributed benefits is meant to sort of promote regionalization.

If the project will directly benefit or includes the active participation of another political subdivision, 10 points.

There are points available based on the estimated completion date and this is sort of similar to those measures immediately effective.

Maybe this is more for those medium-sized projects.

We'll ask you for the estimated completion date in the abridged application but we'll also kind of take a look at it.

When all project phases are anticipated to be done, if it's within 18 months, that's 10 points; within 36 months, that's worth five points.

So there are a couple of scoring factors just for construction projects.

The first is if the project is actually going to result in an integral, reliable, and quantifiable water supply benefit to a specific water user group with an identified need, in other words if you did that consideration that we require in the minimum standards and you were successful and you've got that unicorn project, 10 points.

Another one just for construction projects has to do with those flood control projects that have substantial impacts on the flooding characteristics in the project area.

So we're talking about projects that have an impact on the shape, the geography of flooding in the project area.

We're not talking about structures in this one that are actually demolished or removed from a flood plain.

We're just talking about the change in risk that they're exposed to as a result of the flood control project that's being proposed.

I know that that has been confusing wording in some of the documents we put out.

So that's something that I picked up on I think in the comments and that we'll probably clarify for the next round.

So what we do is we ask for how many structures fall into this category, how many are no longer at the risk they were before or would be if you implemented the proposed project.

And from all the projects that are giving us a number, we compare them and so it depends on what percentile you're in compared to the other proposed projects that have that kind of impact.

If you're in the top 25%, 12 points, all the way down to if you're in the bottom 25% of all those respondents, you get three points.

And so those last two were for construction projects only.

This is sort of to balance the weight a little bit.

If no construction is requested but you're just looking for planning, acquisition and design under category two, that's 12 points.

Nonstructural flood mitigation of any kind, if it constitutes at least 20% of the total cost, that's five points.

And for the tiebreaker, we're using what's called the social vulnerability index or SVI, which is a metric that the Centers for Disease Control came up with to help identify areas that might need some extra consideration and support when it comes to things like planning for or mitigating against or recovering from disasters.

It works really nicely as a tiebreaker because it's a decimal point and all the previous things had been just round numbers.

In the Flood IUP we provide a link to the latest interactive map for SVI information.

And depending on your zoom level, you can find it at either the census tract or the county level.

So the next steps after prioritization will amend the IUP to include the prioritizes list kind of like we do in our SRF programs, if you're familiar with those.

We'll present the results to the Board and we'll ask for their consideration and their approval to send invitations to those who ranked within the available funding capacity to submit those full applications.

And so the difference between those two is that the abridged app is just we will use it to make baseline eligibility determination.

We'll make sure we understand what category it belongs in to and we will prioritize it.

The full application is totally different.

It's meant to give us the details that we need to consider underwriting the financial assistance for the project.

So the abridged app is maybe a dozen pages or something like that.

You'll have a few attachments.

So it'll add up a little bit but the full application is substantially more detailed and it's a much bigger document.

I won't really go too far into this because Kathleen already talked about but on the abridged application, we've included some FLICC information to assess eligibility for some of the other agencies' programs.

And of course when you submit your abridged applications or if you have questions about the program, fif@twdb.texas.gov is the email box that we set up.

I want to thank the folks who actually sent emails to that account to let us know the solution to our technical issue this morning.

So I know that you're using it.

Thank you.

Continue to do so and that's also where you're going to submit your documents.

If you haven't done so already, I suspect that many of you already get our email updates because that's one of the major ways that we announce these webinars, but if you don't already get the email updates, you can click on the envelope on the upper right-hand corner of our website and you can actually choose which topic you'd like to get emails about.

So you don't have to get everything if you're not interested in everything.

But flood is certainly one of them.

So I'd recommend that.

And that's it for my Flood IUP walkthrough.

The next thing I'm going to do is show you the abridged application.

So bear with me one moment while I open that up.

Okay, so this is the actual abridged application and we'll just take a few minutes to kind of walk through the major sections here.

We got general information with the name and type of the entity.

By type, we mean are you a city, a county, a river authority.

We just want to make sure you're an eligible political subdivision because again, this isn't a perfect match for our other programs and we're kind of learning this too.

Contact information should ideally be somebody who can answer questions about the information that was provided on the abridged app.

It doesn't need to be that executive level official.

They might really just want to put their name on it and that's fine but it should ideally be the kind of person who's going to be answering the questions that we have about the answers that you give.

Project information, we got the name of the project, that's up to you.

The amount requested from us, the amount requested here is obviously going to reflect your best understanding at the time that you fill out this document but it's important to keep in mind that the invitations are based on comparison between the amount shown in these abridged applications and the available program capacity.

So as we get through that review and invitation process and the full applications, your opportunities to increase beyond what you're putting here on the abridged app are probably going to be pretty limited.

So you want to make sure that it's -- You might just want to put some thought into this estimate here and know that you might be constrained in your ability to raise it.

Financing from other sources is depicted in the next line followed by a line to show what those sources are.

Financing from all other sources on the line after that and then the total project cost on the bottom line here, the project cost.

So if you are not seeking consideration for the loan funds, you just want the zero interest rate loans and you don't want to attach all that AMHI stuff, you could just click here and we'll know not to look for the extra stuff.

As I mentioned, we asked for you to indicate which category you're applying under.

And again, this is just to make sure we're on the same page.

If we see a discrepancy, we'll reach out right away and make sure that we read your description correctly.

Minimum standards, I won't belabor these.

I just went over them but I know the language here seems to indicate that we're just going to trash the abridged application if all these boxes aren't checked and that's really not the case.

It's for your benefit just to make sure that you know what you need to satisfy and what you need to provide.

The next thing is the description of the project.

We give just one blank page for this.

Really we just need to come away with an idea of what you're proposing.

We want to be able to understand what category it should fit in to, what are the major elements or components of it, what is the issue you're trying to resolve, what should the outcome be.

The full application is going to ask for all the engineering detail and things like that.

You'll have the opportunity to explain your project in much, much more detail if you proceed with the process.

I really think that most, if not all, of the projects that we see through this program should be able to be described in plenty of detail on this one page.

But if you feel constrained, just attach more.

It's no problem.

So here's the information for the grant funding.

And so this is the stuff that you wouldn't need to provide if you had clicked that box and just said, hey, I just want the zero percent interest rate loans.

And so for example, category one, the grant percentages were based on the AMHI of the study area.

So we ask for that.

And it's similar in categories in two through four, the unemployment rate, population decline, AMHI.

I'm going to show you in a moment here how to do this weighted average based on population, by the way.

So stay tuned for that.

In fact, why don't we do that now?

You'll see in the Flood IUP that on page 16 we actually specify the vintage and the source on some of this census information.

If you're not experienced with census information, it can really be a headache.

You can type in annual median household income and think that you got the right answer but because it came from the wrong table or the wrong set of estimates or something like that, it turns out to be wrong and you're thinking, "What did I do?

What should I do differently?" I think that you should get your data from this spreadsheet that we provided a link to on page 16 because it provides everything except for your MSAs and you're MSAs are up here.

So between these two spreadsheets, you should be able to answer everything.

And so I downloaded a copy of the spreadsheet onto my desktop.

And you'll see here the columns.

We have the AMHI, total population, current and prior, so we can determine population declines.

We have the unemployment rate.

So the rows, we have United States as a whole.

We have Texas as a whole.

So you can compare to the statewide metrics.

And then we have every county in Texas.

We have every city or census-designated place, every census tract and every block group.

So you would just basically take the rows that apply to your project and, as I've indicated here in the demo tab, I'm doing an imaginary project here in Travis County and I selected a few census tracts at random and I'm pretending that my project is not serving all of census tract 24.21.

It's just serving two of the three block groups in it, just for the sake of demonstration.

And as you can see here, the formula that I used to obtain my weighted average AMHI based on population was to take the sum of the product of each AMHI and population, take the sum all the way down there and then divide it by the total population.

So that's just the sum of column B.

I think the AMHI and I think the unemployment rate are the only places where we ask for those weighted averages based on population but that's how you would do that.

If you're sitting there looking at the tables on the census website, I know that that just sounds crazy.

It's like, "How would I do this?" But it was kind of written with this spreadsheet in mind.

So if you're working off the spreadsheet, you're going to find it much easier, I think.

I am not a math person, so if I can do this, I guarantee you can do it but if you have any questions, I'm more than happy to help.

Alright, so back to the abridged app.

This page again is where you would use that spreadsheet to answer questions that will help us to determine what grant percentages your project is eligible to receive.

And then the next section is prioritization criteria.

So if you weren't seeking the grant funding and you didn't answer this page, you're not done yet.

You just skip this one page.

You still need to fill in the prioritization criteria.

The first one is rural applicants.

That's the same metric that we've covered before.

So just yes or no.

And again, it's going to appear on the previous page to be considered for 5% grant.

Down here, it's for the 12 points in the prioritization criteria.

This one relates to the emergency need criteria.

So you indicate the status here whether there's a recent or imminent failure or a recent flood related disaster declaration or none of the above.

Distributed benefits, again that's the one that's pointing at regionalization.

So that's just an easy yes or no.

There's the question about the estimated completion date.

Here are two factors just for construction projects.

And again on this one, I'm not really wild about the word "removed" here.

I think we might edit that going forward because that gives the impression that you're moving structures as opposed to moving the geography of flooding in the area, which is what we're really looking at.

And here's that extra factor for the nonstructural flood mitigation elements since those previous two refer to construction only.

And then there's our tiebreaker.

And again, there's a link to the interactive SVI map in the Flood IUP.

 So I mentioned that the minimum standard regarding MOUs kicks in fully at the full application stage where you have to provide that executed MOU.

At this stage, we're just asking you to affirm that there's eligible political subdivisions that will be required to be parties to the MOU have a copy of the proposed MOU and have gotten adequately detailed description of what you're proposing.

This also might not be applicable.

So your project watershed might not fall into others or it might not be a flood control project or something like that, so you would click here.

Next page.

This is where we have our additional information for FLICC.

Again, it's not related to our prioritization or our eligibility of determination for our programs but there is other funding out there including a lot of grants.

And so if you put the information here, we can at least kind of just put it through the paces and see what might be available for your project.

And Kathleen kind of went over the questions that appear, so I won't belabor that point.

There's a certification on enforcing flood plain management standards.

This relates to the minimum standard that the area needs to be enforced by orders or ordinances at least equivalent to NFIP minimum standards.

And then there's a checklist, which again this is just a tool for your benefit.

So you can see there are attachments related to a lot of things we've talked about.

Your list of MOU entities, your BCR information, your census data, your documentation of emergency standards and things like that.

So going through the list item by item is going to be important to help you make sure that you're submitting a full abridged application.

Typically when we receive a submittal, if it's not absolutely perfect, we don't just toss it in the trash and you never hear back from us.

There's almost no mistake that you can make this irremediable unless you're flat out ineligible or the project you're proposing is ineligible.

If you're submitting a slightly incomplete abridged application, we'll just get back with you and let you know, in other words.

It's not just a one chance of getting this thing in.

But using this checklist will help you make sure it's complete.

I don't think that's going to be a problem.

The last item here is an actual template of the MOU.

You don't have to use ours but we're just providing one for you.

You can expand it to include as many entities as you need to.

And again, if you have like a half a dozen entities that you're going to have to do this with, you can do half a dozen MOUs or you can do one MOU with a half a dozen signatures.

So that's up to you.

Okay, so that's my abridged application review.

I'm going to pitch it back to -- Actually, I'm going to take a look and see if we have any questions at the moment while my co-presenters hop back on.

I don't see any questions yet in fif@twdb mailbox.

Let's check the chat here on the webinar.

I don't see any yet or in the question section.

Here's a question.

Let me read through it real quick.

Bear with me.

 Okay.

We received the following question through the email box.

It says, "Can TxDOT participate with a local municipality for a mitigation project?

I'm sure that in many areas around the state, TxDOT's road is effectively a dam and creates flood issues upstream.

If they cannot participate, can you set up a specific category to put these issues in so that TxDOT would need to address those issues once funding becomes available to rework existing roadways and bridges?" The entities that are collaborated with in the development of the project, we don't have a limitation on that.

In terms of the entities that can receive a financing or the financial assistance, that part is limited and that's the part where you want to make sure that you're an entity organized under the proper part of the constitution.

I actually am not sure about state agencies for the purpose of this program.

But there's nothing preventing an applicant from reaching out to TxDOT and coordinating with them in the development or the implementation of their project.

A dedicated category is a neat idea, generally I don't see a prohibition against new categories or refinement of categories in the future.

I think it'll be kind of a handy tool for us to sort of develop the program going forwards.

A category developed just to force the hand of another state agency to do a specific action might be something that we'd hear about.

So I don't know and we'll continue to chew on that one.

The idea of new categories in general I think is a good one or a refinement in categories but I don't know about that specific type of project getting its own category.

I'm going to read another couple here.

Bear with me.

Okay, I have another one here.

The introduction of minimum watershed size of HUC-10 for category one means that only large studies are eligible.

Many smaller communities would be interested in category one but they cannot achieve the HUC-10 size.

This could be because neighboring municipalities are not interested, maybe they've already completed their own flood study, for example, or they're just not interested.

Is there any consideration of relaxing the HUC-10 part of the requirement so that smaller communities can participate?

That's a good question.

I'll admit right off the bat that I'm not an expert on flooding or study geography or the HUC scale but it's not something that appeared in the first draft of the Flood IUP, as many of you know.

And there was a wave of questions because it was clear early on that that category or that type of project was going to be eligible for a pretty generous grant percentage and we had a lot of questions about whether localized studies were going to clear.

And in conversations at the staff level and with the Board and with the development of the Flood IUP, we just landed on the notion that we needed to sort of draw a minimum scale for this.

So to really kind of capture the scale of watershed planning that we really want to be accomplished with the generosity of that grant money.

So the HUC-10 it's in it right now.

I haven't heard any consideration of relaxing or getting rid of that part of the requirement, partially because if you have anything that you're considering that's smaller than a HUC-10 geography, it's still going to be eligible as planning under category two.

So you are not out of luck for this program and you're not out of luck for grants.

So I think -- And again, I think the categories are likely to mature as the program matures.

I just don't think that that part of that category is going to change this year but I've been wrong before.

Let's take a look at another question here.

Oh, this is a very good question.

Okay.

This one says, "I just wanted to double check the AMHI data.

In the presentation, the demo tab consisted of census tract data.

Since this tract data would need to be found by an agency or whoever's writing the grant correct, there is not a direct link or a breakdown of census tract or block group within the spreadsheet." I almost included a walkthrough of how you could go to that census website and use their map to find out which census tracts apply to your project but I didn't because I find the website pretty unpleasant, to be honest with you, and I haven't gotten it to work for me consistently.

But for the person who asked this question, I'm going to follow up with more specific instructions.

I assume that many of you are working with consultants who have some mapping capabilities that might make that kind of thing easy but I know that some of you don't and so you don't have to use census tracts.

You can use cities or counties.

It just needs to be appropriate to the project watershed.

And if you have trouble figuring out which census tracts or block groups apply to your project, drop us an email and I will get back to you.

I'll write up some more specific procedures that you can follow and it should help.

No more currently in the email box.

Let's take a look here on the actual software.

Okay, yeah, we do have a few.

Alright.

So can we apply for just the grant share and not the loan covering the non-grant share ourselves as local discretionary funding?

Yes, you can.

Short answer.

So you can apply for the grant.

And if the grant doesn't cover all of your project, you can get the rest of it in zero percent interest rate loan or you can just self-fund the remainder.

Next question.

Do you plan on collecting this information on where projects are funded and displaying on a GIS viewer on the clearinghouse website?

We have a lot of pretty cool ideas for the clearinghouse website and you're thinking a lot like the way we are, I think.

Stay tuned because including in the GIS world, we're working on some pretty cool stuff with our partner agencies.

Oh, this next one is great.

Thank you very much for this.

I noticed at the top of the form that the abridged application due date was changed to June.

Yes, I should've said that right out from the start.

The original due day was May 14th.

It has been extended to June 15th.

That happened last week and it's a great reason to sign up for our email updates because that was one of the first places that we sent that.

Thank you for asking about that.

I really should've pointed that out.

Next.

Are there any requirements for project start date?

None specifically that I know of.

Not to my knowledge.

Next question.

Will preliminary engineering for a flood mitigation be considered as a category one project or a category two project?

Off the top of my head it sounds like a category two but maybe with some more information we could give you a more definite answer on that.

It sounds like category two to me.

Next question.

Do dam emergency action plan updates qualify for category four or only new EAPs?

Great question.

Really great question.

I think my hunch is that yes, it would qualify for category four even if it's an update.

Next.

What is the timeframe for the TWDB to select from the abridged applications to invite participants to further apply for funds?

Well I had already an answer for that before the deadline changed.

We had the timeline set so that we could get some commitments going and get communities with some funding on the books going into the next legislative session.

And the delay is going to mess that up but I don't know if we're just sort of taking the rest of our steps and just bumping them a month to compensate for the adjustment in the abridged application period or if maybe we'll push certain things over to the spring.

If everything does stay the same, if all the steps say the same length as they were initially, then we're probably looking at the September time period for what you're asking about, those full applications.

Again, it remains to be seen.

I think there will need to be further announcements about what the rest of the timeframe is going to look like now that we've changed the abridged application due date.

Next question.

If you started the purchasing of a property for a specific project, will the grant reimburse the cost already started?

Reimbursements, we have the ability to consider them on a case-by-case basis but it's always tricky.

The work that's being reimbursed needs to have been done as if there was the public funding money involved in the first place and very few people conduct their projects that way, satisfying all the environmental requirements and stuff like that.

Particularly in a new program, I'm not sure.

It's something that the Board could consider.

You can propose it but I would not call it a slam dunk kind of proposal.

Particularly that's for something, if it's financed with existing debt.

If it's just work that you've already done and you want it reimbursed after the fact, that's typically possible.

You just need to make sure that you follow the right requirements.

Next.

Can you elaborate more on the types of nature based mitigation infrastructure, especially green infrastructure that turns flooding liabilities into groundwater supply assets?

I don't have any off the top of my head but we would love to see some creative proposals.

This is part of the reason why our language regarding things like eligible projects is just so incredibly broad.

It's an invitation for creativity and for folks to do something a little bit different.

Our next question.

Are conservation easements eligible activities under category two?

Yes, they are.

If so, if a local government applies for FIF financing to purchase a conservation easement, what duties, rights, and responsibilities can be shared with conservation groups?

We're actually in the middle of discussions about that kind of thing.

We don't have a ready answer for it yet but we got some really good input in the public comment sections in comments that we did or that we received, rather.

And so I don't know for certain yet but we'll have an answer on that shortly.

Next.

Is right of way acquisitions strictly as flood plain preservation eligible, meaning no current plans for a structural project on the acquired property presumably under category two?

Yes, yes.

That piggybacks on that previous question.

Yes, it is eligible.

Next.

What category would the woodlands township and not a city fit in to?

That's a good question.

That is something where you might want to get with an attorney and look at the constitution and see if you're under one of those specified articles.

If it's a census-designated place, that makes it easier to get your census information.

Otherwise, you're kind of looking at census tracts and block groups.

When we're talking about suburbs, there's such a huge variety of different kinds.

It's hard to really tell you for sure.

I'm not familiar enough with the woodlands to give you a certain answer on that.

But if you want to submit that via the email, we can give it to our legal staff and maybe have them take a look.

Next.

What factors define whether a project is in a rural versus nonrural location?

This was those three factors having to do with location outside of MSAs or service area of 10,000 or less or being a county, an application from a county that has no urban area exceeding 50,000.

And that's specified in the Flood IUP, if you look under the prioritization section, under the rural applicant criteria.

Next.

The IUP doesn't reference which year of SVI data should be used.

Do we assume that we should use the latest data?

Yes, please.

As we come to a better understanding of SVI data, we'll refine our guidance on that.

Next question.

With the distribution of FEMA grant funding, we learned after the fact that the money was distributed geographically based on various parameters.

Will this also be applied for this grant application?

No.

There are no geographic limitations.

Kathleen showed you the map with the different shaded counties and things like that and GLO is working from different lists of allocations for certain geographic areas or certain events and things like that.

We don't have that kind of thing in this program.

The entire state is, every county is just as eligible as any other.

Next question.

What constitutes planning for an entire HUC-10?

That is a large area and we need clarity on what minimum standards are and what kinds of project TWDB is looking for under that category.

I think that's something where I can give you a better answer by putting you in touch with our subject matter experts on staff.

So I will be happy to do so.

Next one.

Was eligibility for public relations campaigns eliminated?

No.

Public education and outreach and things like that are going to be eligible possibly under category four or if we can't make a case for category four, it could implementation under category two.

Public relations versus outreach versus education, these are all kind of hazy terms but we've been talking about it in terms of public education or public outreach.

Those are still eligible.

I think the actual number of the category that they're in might've changed from the draft that you had seen previously and so that might be a point of confusion too.

Hey, Tom, can you hear me?

Yes.

We have approximately three minutes left.

So if you can't get through the remaining questions, we will encourage people to send the questions to the FIF email.

Yeah, I'm about halfway through the questions.

And I appreciate you asking so many good ones but I don't think we're going to have time to get through all of them.

And this is one reason why it's still good to send those questions to fif@twdb.texas.gov.

These are really genuinely good questions and I appreciate them.

And we'll spend time today or whenever you do submit them through the email, we'll spend some time getting answers for you.

Tom, do you want to try to read a couple more?

Sure.

We'll see how many we can fit in here.

If for example a project is 100 acres in Galveston County and a nonprofit has enough money to purchase 92 acres for a nonstructural flood mitigation project, can a local government apply for FIF financing to purchase 100% of the remaining acres say if Galveston County is only to be eligible an 8% grant under category two or would the grants only be available for 8% based on the financing eligibility of the remaining acres?

I picked the wrong question to try to answer quickly.

I'm going to come back to that one.

Will permeable pavement be allowed as an independent project or only as part of a larger project?

It would be allowable on its own.

Is there any time that the VCA can be waived?

Yes, if you're doing a study to determine what your project alternative is going to be.

If we only apply for planning acquisition or design, will we be given preference next year for construction?

Not under the current scoring factors.

That is something that I would not rule out for future years as we have more projects that have been through the first phases in this program but it's not currently one of our scoring factors this year.

Tom, I think we're going to have to stop there.

We're out of time.

So thank you, everybody, for your participation in our webinar today and thank you, Tom and Kathleen, and we appreciate everyone's patience today with our technical difficulties.

Again, if you didn't hear your question being answered, please email us at the fif@twdb.texas.gov and we will try to get those questions answered as soon as possible.

This webinar is now completed.

Everybody, have a great day.

Thank you.